City doctors condemn medical commission Bill

Tribune News Service

Ludhiana, December 21

The Alliance of Doctors for Ethical Healthcare (ADEH) condemned the “approval” to the National Medical Commission Bill (NMC) by the Cabinet, saying this remedy in the form of a technocratic, bureaucratic NMC was no solution to the ailment of the outdated, degenerate Medical Council of India.

Members of the ADEH demanded that there should be a debate on the NMC Bill and that it should not be pushed through in the winter session of the Parliament.

A member of the core committee of the ADEH, Dr Arun Mitra said this Bill as approved by the Cabinet was not available in the public domain and was reported that only a few modifications were made in the draft NMC Bill.

“This Bill embodies a technocratic and bureaucratic approach which will not solve problems like corruption in sanctioning of medical colleges; exorbitantly costly and yet sub-standard medical education; lack of continuing medical education; absence of standardisation; and sky rocketing medical bills.”

In a release issued yesterday, ADEH core committee members said: “All members of the NMC would be government appointees, whether by nomination or as ex-officio. The NMC violates the basic requirement of modern governance structure that a regulatory body must be multi-stakeholder, transparent, and accountable. In the existing MCI, the government-appointed members are more than the members elected by doctors. Yet corruption and other problems kept on escalating. Making all members as government appointees is certainly not the way to eliminate corruption. Representatives of doctors and citizens must have a rightful place in the NMC.”

“Appointing eminent experts to the NMC will not also solve the problem of corruption as the primary problem is lack of accountable, transparent structures and processes. Similarly the primary cause of substandard medical education is in many private colleges; admission-based primarily on ability to pay exorbitant fees and not on merit; secondly students in such colleges hardly get to see any patients since ‘free’ hospitals supposed to be attached to these colleges are more of a virtual reality. Instead of reversing this downhill course, this Bill provides for capping of medical college fees only up to 40 per cent of the seats,” said Dr Arun Gadre, a member.

“Going by the Niti Aayog’s note circulated earlier about the NMC, in the name of establishing world-class medical institutions in India, the NMC will allow profit organisations to open medical colleges,” he added.

“This will worsen the existing situation for ordinary Indians. Provisions such as medical colleges rating to depend on the performance of students in their examinations are typically techno-bureaucratic approach to complex problems,” he said.