MillenniumPost
Bengal

West Bengal increases health budget from Rs 682Cr to Rs 9552.70Cr

Kolkata: The budget allocation in the health sector in Bengal has gone up from Rs 682 crore in 2011 to Rs 9,552.70 crore in the current fiscal clearly indicating the emphasis and impetus given by the Mamata Banerjee government to this sector.

"The Health department has witnessed a sea change in all parameters under Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee who holds the charge of the Health ministry. We have given equal priority to health services as well as in medical education in the past eight

years," Minister of State for Health Chandrima Bhattacharya said at the state Assembly on Friday while delivering the budget speech on allocation in the state Health department.

According to Bhattacharya, the number of doctors in state hospitals have more than doubled in comparison to 2011.

The number of doctors in state hospitals was 4,500 in 2011 which has gone up to 10,900. The number of nurses has also witnessed a sharp jump from 37,366 to 52,820 in 2019.

" You should admit that during your 34 years rule in the state there has been no recruitment of doctors and nurses, but there has been a lot of retirements," Bhattacharjya said reacting to criticism of the sector from CPI(M) MLA Tanmoy Bhattacharya.

According to Bhattacharya, the

government has come up with 42 super-speciality hospitals across the state and during the process has carried out a survey of the places to have an idea of its location.

"We have identified areas on the basis of proneness in respect of accidents, eye diseases etc and have accordingly put up special facilities in these hospitals," she said.

The present number of beds in super speciality hospitals are 13,600 among which 13,000 beds are operational which accounts for 91 per cent of bed occupancy.

"There was not a single critical care unit (CCU) in the state in 2011 and now we have 44. If we combine High Dependency Units (HDU) with the CCU, the figure stands at 69," Bhattacharya said.

The district hospitals across the state has also seen a major facelift with infrastructure for digital X rays, CT scan, dialysis, MRI facilities being introduced in a number of hospitals. "The number of referral cases from district hospitals to the city hospitals have also gone down," she added.

Next Story
Share it