Healthcare in rural areas
Photo:A. M. Ahad / Driknews
While a country like China devised practical ways to deliver healthcare to rural populations by deploying its band of 'barefoot doctors' from the 1960s in a transitional phase, and then went on to expand full-fledged medical education facilities, chronic shortage of doctors in rural Bangladesh almost four decades after Independence remains a worry. To introduce an undergraduate study of a shorter duration to produce doctors for rural areas is not desirable. It will compromise the quality of education and training. Is there anything rural or urban about human anatomy and diseases? The government should instead concentrate on improving the infrastructure in primary health care institutions, and curb rampant absenteeism which is the major flaw in the health care delivery system in rural areas. Bangladesh is a rapidly progressing country and its doctors and engineers are respected across the world. Introducing a three-and-a-half year course to churn out alternative cadres of doctors at this juncture would not be a retrograde move. It is not as if rural folk do not need specialised care. Specialty hospitals need to be built in rural areas also. The government can think of having a separate quota for rural doctors, who can be absorbed after completing housemanship to work in rural hospitals only. Only those who agree should be allowed to apply under this quota.
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