NEW DELHI, Nov 12: Neglect of healthcare will have a negative impact on India’s economy combined with rising population, Vice President Hamid Ansari today warned.
With more than 1,300 persons succumbing to cancer every day, it has become one of the major causes of deaths in our country. The distressing aspect is that these cancers could be prevented, screened for and/or detected early and treated at an early stage to significantly reduce the death rate, he added.
He was addressing on the occasion of 20th Anniversary Celebrations of CanSupport, an NGO providing palliative care for cancer patients here. The Vice President said that despite improvements in the access to health care, inequalities related to socio-economic status, geography, and gender continued to remain, and were being compounded by high out-of-pocket expenditures, with more than three-quarters of the increasing financial burden of health care being met by households.
”The total allocation on health remains inadequate and much below the amount required to address the yawning gaps,” he added.
The Vice President said lack of sufficient public allocations has resulted in huge demand-supply gaps in cancer detection, treatment and care requirements.
”Responding to palliative care needs of cancer patients requires not only the medical and nursing needs of the person affected but also the patient’s emotional and spiritual distress and support for the caregivers.
Provision of palliative care services therefore assumes an important dimension of overall cancer care in our country and CanSupport has been a trailblazer in this field,” he added. (UNI)
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