MARGAO
On the occasion of Universal Health Coverage (UHC) Day celebrated annually on December 12, on the theme “Heath: It's on the Government”, Madganvcho Awaaz has appealed to Health Minister Vishwajit Rane to fulfil his own promise of giving Tertiary hospital status to South Goa District Hospital & make it fully functional.
Reminding the Health Minister Vishwajit Rane of the Memorandum submitted by Citizens of Margao on August 27 and subsequent visit of Health Minister to Hospicio Hospital on September 27, youth leader Prabhav Naik has urged the Health Minister to walk the talk by making the South Goa District Hospital fully functional.
“World Health Organisation has said that Universal Health Coverage (UHC) Day 2024 focuses on the role of financial protection in accelerating progress towards UHC. Financial protection ensures that people don’t fall into poverty because of having to pay out-of-pocket for health costs. Over the last 20 years, financial protection has progressively deteriorated, with two billion people experiencing financial hardship and 1.3 billion people pushed into poverty due to health spending, said Prabhav.
He added: “This means that mothers may miss out on the life-saving intervention they need for themselves or their children, people are not diagnosed and treated for noncommunicable diseases (NCDs) on time, with delays in early treatment leading to severe, untreatable or life-threatening illnesses. This are the observations of WHO”.
Saying that Universal Health Coverage will remain elusive until governments adequately invest in protecting people, particularly the most vulnerable among us from impoverishing health spending, Prabhav has urged Health Minister Vishwajit Rane to act on the call given by World Health Organisation for urgent action to put financial protection measures in place to provide affordable healthcare to people.
