India at 75 looking at 100: Equitable access should be the goal

Source: The post is based on the article “India at 75 looking at 100: Equitable access should be the goal” published in the Indian Express on 24^th August 2022.

Syllabus: GS-2, Issues Relating to Development and Management of Social Sector/Services relating to Health, Education, Human Resources.

News: At present, India is celebrating the 75^th Year of Independence. Therefore, there are various voices for aspirations for India at 100 Years.

Why should India focus on investing in education and health in the next 25 years?

First, although India has a good quality of education and healthcare system, equity has no place in such outliers.

Second, Education and health are fundamental to every society. For example, Indian education produces global CEOs and Indian private healthcare systems have been providing services to medical tourists from many parts of the world.

Third, schooling plays a foundational role in not just societal development, but equity, gender parity, and a host of other consequential shifts.

Fourth, India has islands of excellence in primary care and outstanding clinical services but doesn’t always provide sustained care as they are unaffordable to most of the section of Indian people.

How can India ensure high-quality education and healthcare at 100 years?

(1) To help children achieve their full cognitive potential, foundational education must begin at an early stage at home, and then in schools, before we get to institutions of higher learning. Parents must focus on the verbal engagement and sensorimotor stimulation of the children. Further, there must be trained, competent and engaged teachers in schools.

(2) In families, socioeconomic status determines the amount and quality of the interaction between children and parents in their early life. Therefore, there should be functional schools to mitigate such deprived environments. Here, the functionality of schools comes from the quality and commitment of teachers.

(3) The schools and teachers should act as agents of change and help in the realization of the transformational power of education. However, this is difficult to achieve if the schools are working based on a one-size-fits-all approach of a standardized curriculum and limited assessment of knowledge and competencies.

(4) In addition to improving the schooling system, India must strengthen vocational training centers like Industrial Training Institutes, and simultaneously, reduce the number of degrees that do not serve as a gateway to professional development or knowledge acquisition in the education system.

(5) India needs to create and maintain opportunities at all levels of our educational system in order to ensure equity. To do so, India must ensure that finances are not a barrier to education for anyone.

Healthcare

(1) Education of women can play a major role in the reduction of fertility, safer births and better health of children, and increased social status.

(2) Healthcare must move beyond maternal and child health packages and programs to treat diseases. There should be a focus on enabling people to increase control over, and improve their health, preventing life-threatening diseases, and improving palliative care for patients of such diseases.

(3) Treating a bulk of illnesses does not require hospitals. It requires placing healthcare providers close to patients by creating proper and functional physical and digital infrastructure. In this regard, India should focus on making primary healthcare truly functional, to prevent illness and high out-of-pocket expenses on health.

(4) The right people with the right resources should be placed at the right places to create the right and rapid referral pathways so that delays in care do not result in unnecessary burdens on individuals and their families.

(5) The regulatory governance systems for the private sector must be improved to ensure that no part of the country is a health “desert”.