Commercialization of Health Care: Good or Bad?

Hello friends.

In my opinion, commercialization of health care is not good.

That's true that the commercialization improves the techniques and treatment, also provides good facilities to the patients, but that also true that it increases the prices of the treatment and medicines. And it becomes unaffordable to the middle class or poor people to get the treatment from such hospitals. And because of the private hospitals or clinics, the condition of government hospitals is getting bad.

Most of the time, there is no doctor because they are in their private clinics, or if they are there, then they don't give much time to the patient and want them to come to their clinic. It is ok for the rich people, but a middle class family cannot afford this and therefore they have to compromise with their health.

But since, it is more profitable to the doctors, therefore, the doctors prefer to give the time to their private clinics that leads to the decrement in the government hospitals.

So, my suggestion is this that the government should take care of the government hospitals with better facilities and good medical treatment instead of increasing the private sectors so that both the rich as wall as the poor people could get the better medical care.

First of all I would like to say thanks to all my friends.

It is good to appreciate the topic which we get as a discussion.

As per my opinion we could say how to effect due to commercialization.

1. It runs only for earning profit by providing better facilities which is not needed. Patient is not like your lifetime customer. We should treat him like a human being. We should cure his / her disease. We should think like socialism - commercialisation - profit but we should not think like profit - commercialism.

2. As a healthcare we could say who is the customer ? In this case we came to know that when MEDICAL REPRESENTATIVE made direct contact with doctor not the real patient. In this case as a honest and genuine doctor, he should prescribe the medicine which is very economical in price and curable like genetic medicine etc.

In my opinion, commercialization of healthcare is good but at the same time it causes a lot of problems in our country in which people can't afford the expensive medicinal facilities.

Commercialization results in price rise of medicines, increase cost of diagnosis, out of afford of poor peoples. But at the same time it increases the quality of treatment, provide hygiene conditions. So commercialization should be stressed in the urban areas where the people have money.

But in my opinion it should we have lack of systemization of the existing facilities rather than the lack of effort in medicinal investment. There are policies which is present but is not implemented in reality, like in government hospitals free medicines have to be distributed, but it is sold by the chemist there or are not in stock, so people have to buy it from outside, some hygienic condition as well as a supervisory body to inspect or regulate the system should be adopted in the government Hospitals.

In my view Commercialization in health care has brought up lots of benefits like increasing facilities, private hospitals are fulfilling the requirements of extra hospitals in the our country which government is not able to open new one, etc. But its should be up to some extent only, and government should take a strong decision regarding to this issue so that poor people can get some advantage from this and misuses can be minimized.

Commercialization is way to increase the profit of the one, so on applying the commercialization on the health makes bed effect just because by applying the commercialization the doctor always thinks about their profit that makes the poor guys in trouble those are unable to pay money for their cure many times the poor guys are scarifies with their health just because of the high rate for the treatment this came due to doctor invest their money in commercialization for increasing the profit and they recollect their money by the people that could make the commercialization bad but it would be good when it will use in research process for finding the different way for the disease.

I have share my point of view pertaining to above topic.

Since every coin has two faces likewise commercialization of health care has good as well as bad aspects.

Good aspects, people who are in good position want them to be treated in good private hospitals as they expect good facilities and proper care and the faculties in private hospitals are very attentive and the treatment they provide will be best of the technology.

Bad aspects, people who are below poverty line can not afford such high amount to get treatment for them government has to take care by providing good facilities with affordable price.

Following the large scale macroeconomic reforms introduced in many countries since the 1990s, there has been a shift in the provisions of public goods, including health and education. Certain Asian and Latin American countries have opened up the medical care market for privatization and introduced the concept of user fees in public health services. The concept of segmented medical care was given in the World Development Report itself- offering private, market-oriented better quality care for the rich. By comparison, the public health facilities look woefully inadequate. They were widely criticized, and the government expenditure on health declined sharply.

This change in the healthcare sector where private players have started treating it as a flourishing business is premised on the view that the public sector is unable to act as a sole provider of those services within the backdrop of shortage of resources. Even when there is no recession, the capital need to be deployed in several other sectors mainly industry, agriculture and infrastructure so that health care falls short of funds. It is now being realised that greater competition is the only option for better quality services and improvement in the overall efficiency of these services.

The advocates of reform hold that the state should undertake only minimal interventions in the economy, and for health service it should provide only the essential service. This view totally overlooks the issue of incompatibility between public welfare and private provision. More importantly, this approach does not address the problems of poverty, inequality among social classes, religious groups and gender aspects. The poor and socially backward classes depend on public provision of health care almost entirely.

The system of health care as it is present in most of the developing countries is that while the poor would go for the public care for essential clinical services, the rich would prefer high-tech private medical care. Consequently, consumer choices of health services remain restricted to only those who can afford to pay for services in highly expensive private hospitals and clinics. The 'willingness to pay' is often equated with 'ability to pay'. But some studies have shown that in some family's highly expensive treatment of serious diseases like heart ailments, cancer, nervous system disorders have lead to erosion of family assets, high indebtedness. Some families have known to resort to inadequate diet, drop out of school children, especially girls.

This is known as medical poverty trap. This takes place so often and in every region of our country that we have no reason to accept that the government should provide only the essential clinical services. They need medical care against diseases like respiratory infections, renal problems, intestinal disorders, vitamin deficiencies, arsenic poisoning, fatal accidents, mental disorders, etc. Under gross economic equalities, the application of market system and sticking to the segmentation of health services will pass on the benefit only to the rich.

In India the post-reform era shows a gross neglect of the health scenario. Investment in health sector yields only long-term gains which seem to be at odds with short term political gains which our politicians always tend to seek. Under the Structural Adjustment Programme funded by IMF-World Bank, the government's share in total health has not shown a commensurate rise with the increase in population. Due to poor access and quality of service, the rate of utilization of public facilities has in fact shown a decline over the years as per report of the National Sample Survey Organisation. It has also been observed that whatever public facilities are available they are utilized more by the rich sections.

The share of richest 20 per cent for inpatient bed days is about 6 times more than that of the poor. In monetary terms, less than 10.2 per cent of total government investment on health service goes to the poor and to 31 per cent to the richest by comparison. It is clear that the poor spend disproportionately higher per cent of their incomes on health service.

More than 30 per cent of their income goes for treatment for minor ailments, infections and communicable diseases. The neglect of preventive health care in public health policy is the chief cause of this situation. Out of the total government expenditure, only 13 per cent is spent on primary care, 25 per cent on public health research and a hopping 60 per cent for the secondary and tertiary health care. Due to this, 55 per cent of rural primary care is sought from the private practitioners, of whom many are unregistered and another about 24 per cent from private clinics or nursing home. In this backdrop, the issues of traditional medical systems and their usage appears to be of great importance in India.

Another unexpected trend needs to be mentioned. Although market-based reforms in health care are advocated in almost all the developing countries, the state continues to play a major role in the delivery of health care services in developed countries, especially in America, West Europe and Australia. However, the degree of commercialization of health care services as measured by the spending of the private individuals varies from country to country.

The results of commercialization of healthcare, considered generally, and not with specific reference to India have not been very encouraging. The observations made in this regard show that countries with better health outcomes, have significantly lower commercialization in health care services; better care at birth is associated with more of GDP spent by the government on health, but not with more private health spending to GDP; higher commercialization at primary health care is associated with greater exclusion of children from treatment when indisposed.

It is quite evident that the introduction of private competition and user charges in public health discriminates against the sick and the poor. The condition of health care system in all big and small cities in India shows that the poor have no or little access to health care facilities. The public hospitals are all full of patients; beds are not available wherever we go. The medicines are always short in government hospitals. The situation in remote areas of the country and most of the villages leaves much to be desired. On the other hand, the rich have access to the health care everywhere. In cities, private clinics, hospitals and diagnostic centres are in every part. They welcome patients who can afford expensive treatment.

Commercialisation of education is certainly against the policies of social equalities which India aims to bring. It has also led to many undesirable practices. Private clinics often subject the patients to conduct many tests which are not necessary. They admit patients who do not require admission. This is done to earn more money. Operations are performed at times when they are not required or are bad for the patient's health. However, some hospitals and clinics keep a strict code of conduct and do not adopt such unscrupulous practices. Their high charges are justified because of high cost of inputs.

The fact cannot be denied that the commercialization of health care has supplemented the public facilities in this regard. It has rather helped the government to maintain a high level of health care in the country. In all major and small cities and towns, private health centres are open day and night and are ready for any emergency. They are saving the lives of thousands every day. The private hospitals and clinics have provided employment to lakhs of doctors, nurses and other staff across the country. The government is earning huge revenue in the form of taxes.

These clinics, diagnostic and treatment centres have also created a huge demand for health care products, instruments and medicines. This industry has flourished to become the fourth largest health care industry in the world. The economy owes a lot to this commercialization. Today, India has a strong and sophisticated tertiary health sector where people from outside the country come for medical tourism. Given this situation, India can take advantage of its indigenous medical system to ensure cheap, accessible and capable medical care for her population, particularly the poor. India has many systems like Ayurveda, Unami, Siddha, etc. Which it has developed since the ages. These systems need to be expanded and exploited for improvement of general health of the people.

Commercialisation of health care has become an obvious trend today. The direct outcome of it has naturally been the increasing cost of healthcare incurred by people. Like any other matter this too has both merits and demerits.

The merits of this trend are,

1) Many choices have been available to the people now-a-days as regards check-ups by specialist healthcare providers, admission to and/or other facilities provided by hospitals, types of diagnostic tests to be carried out, methods of treatment, ranges of medicines and so on;.

2) Research and development of medical science has been tremendously booted up;.

3) Necessary investments required to achieve the aforesaid ends have been realised;.

4) Talents are being attracted to the various fields and sub-fields of the medical science;.

5) It has widely expanded the drug and healthcare industries ;.

6) It has thus contributed to the employment and economic growth in commendable manner.

However, the benefits of commercialisation of health care do coexist with many undesirable effects that are not at all beneficial to the public. They can be described as under,

1) Escalating costs of healthcare have rendered it too dear for the poor and the disadvantaged sections of the society;.

2) Continuous trend in this direction will cause healthcare to go beyond the reach of the common people;.

3) Too much greed for profit would create many a nefarious activities in the system so that the high morals of this field will get contaminated;.

4) Commercialisation will lead to patentification inventions of drugs and other medical facilities rendering it too costly and inimical to public interest;.

5) Health is a significant factor in private as well as public domains of life and is very crucial in formation of human and social capital of a country for its progress and prosperity, so unbridled commercialisation must be kept under control;.

6) Commercialisation does not necessarily ensure quality controls in healthcare, examples abound in this respect. So care must be taken to curb any such tendency.

Its good to do commercialization of health as for a developing country like India its good to get advance medical facilities and at the end of the day private hospitals are also spending lot of money to bring these advanced facilities in India.

However, on the other hand government should help the people below poverty line who cannot afford these expensive medical facilities.

Hi we are talking about the commercialisation of health sector. I don't think so that commercialization is a good option in health as well as in education because if we commercialise these two big sectors n we know that india's 35 to 38 percent population is below poverty line and afford high fee for hospital is very difficult. These two big sectors should be in the hands of government which can be more benefited for people of our nation.