The state unit of the Indian Medical Association (IMA) has come out against the Kerala Clinical Establishments (Registration and Regulation) Bill, the draft of which had been published, stating that it suited more to the health conditions of backward states and would only do harm to the state’s health sector.
IMA State Secretary Dr Jayakrishnan A V and president Dr A V Babu said that there was a need to redraft the Bill to suit the needs of the state’s health sector.
Stating that 70 per cent of the people in the state visited small and medium range private hospitals, they said that the draft was prepared in such a way that it would only help the multinational corporates in the health sector.
In Kerala, the people are now getting high-quality healthcare at low cost, they said and added that the Bill would only have a negative impact on the state. They said that medium and small hospitals in the state were already facing the heat with the coming of the corporates. Moreover, district and state-level committees that deal with registration have more government representatives, which would eventually lead to ‘licence raj’, they said.