The Odisha government, which had been so far claiming ‘everything excellent’ in the state health sector has been exposed by the Niti Aayog’s ‘Healthy States, Progressive India’ report published on Monday As per the report, the state finished at the bottom 6th, two ranks lower 2019-20.
Odisha has been placed at the 14th position in the Niti Aayog State Health Index -2019-20 as against 12th in 2018-19.
The ruling BJD which has been claiming to have developed a robust healthcare system across the state now must be realizing the gap between its boastfulness and reality on the ground. Let’s look at our neighbor Chhattisgarh. The small state continues to sit tight in the list of 'Achievers.” On the other hand, Odisha continues to languish in the 'Aspirant' group.
When Odisha scored 44.31 in the Niti Aayog State Health Index -2019-20, Chhattisgarh secured 50.70 out of 100.
Chhattisgarh has been ranked 10th vis-a-vis 14th by Odisha.
Jharkhand, our neighbor in the north-west, has made significant progress. It notched up smart gains in 2019-20 as it scores 47.55 as against 44.17 in 2018-19. This small state has managed to hold on to its rank of 13 in 2019-20.
Odisha looks dwarf when compared with Kerala which has scored 8.20, Telangana (69.96), Maharashtra (69.14), Himachal Pradesh (63.17) and Karnataka (57.93).
A rise in position speaks about your diligence and performance. A fall in the rank surely exposes all your lapses, lack of perseverance and determination. This is what has been found in the report with regard to Odisha.
Nearly 900 crore was spent during the two spells of Covid-19 and more money is going to be spent as the Omicron cases spread their tentacles in the state. The Omicron variant has already posed a real danger for the state as four persons with this variant have already been detected.
The Niti Aayog report has also red flagged a dip in the immunisation coverage among children and the total case notification rate of TB in the state. The report highlights how the state has posted the worst deterioration in reporting disease outbreaks - weekly reports on the number of samples tested for a particular disease and the number of positives detected for the particular disease.
In fact, the report hints at the prevalence of poor disease reporting systems in the state.
The report says that the state with health expenditure amounting to only 4.95 percent of the total expenditure has been ranked in the ‘Aspirant’ category in overall indicator performance.
It’s time to act and deliver …not to make boastful claims.
