Covid-19
is one of the most powerful and serious global emergencies faced by the world
in recent times. Covid-19 is the name given to the emergence and spread
of coronavirus by WHO. Originating in Wuhan, China, this virus has spread to
more than 60 countries of the world with major outbreaks in countries like
Iran, South Korea, Italy, and Japan. Even India is not left untouched by this
pandemic with its first case of Covid-19 detected in Kerala on 30 January.
Though the Indian government is committed to taking every possible measure to prevent the explosive outbreak of the disease in India, 294 confirmed cases of
COVID-19 and 5 deaths due to it have been registered. This sudden national
emergency will take its toll both from the economic and social fronts of the
country.
Let us discuss the impact of COVID-19 on various
aspects of the healthcare industry.
Hospitals in India
One
of the greatest challenges all government hospitals are facing at the
moment is overcrowding. It will be interesting to note that 85% is marked to
be a safe occupancy rate in any hospital. The hospital is expected to keep a certain
percentage of its in-surge capacity to be vacant to meet sudden
challenges such as war, pandemic, or a natural calamity.
It is
quite unfortunate that in India hospitals usually have a hundred percent
occupancy and this sudden outbreak of Covid-19 has led to a situation of
over-crowding. Now the hospitals in India have to bear the brunt of this
additional pressure as they are expected to work efficiently at the occupancy
rate of 120% or even more. All this is leading to serious consequences like
patients and ambulance backlogs, delaying or cancellation of surgeries, early
discharge of non-essential patients, shifting of patients to other hospitals,
etc. Both government and hospital management are taking measures for emergency
infrastructure building to increase the capacity of the hospitals. The government has also initiated tie-ups with private healthcare institutions to
share the burden and fight a united war against the national emergency.
Testing
labs in India
Another aspect of the healthcare industry working
tirelessly to fight COVID-19 is labs. India has NIV and 52 other labs
registered under ICMR. All these labs are well-equipped to test the presence of
coronavirus in the given sample. It will be interesting to note that each lab
in the country can efficiently test up to 25000 test samples. The government is
constantly working to add new labs to the list to prevent delays in
testing the samples.
Pharmaceutical industry in India
Despite
all the proactive measures by the government, the situation is not very promising
in the pharmaceutical industry. India imports 85% of active pharmaceutical
ingredients (API) from China. This over-dependence on API in China has led to
conditions like disruption of the supply of raw materials and price volatility in
the country. Though some big pharmaceutical companies have decided to airlift API
from China, all thanks to limited land and water movement, still it is
difficult to meet the sudden increase in demand in the nation of 1.3 billion
people.
Low capacity utilization of approximately 30 to 40%
is another major problem faced by the Indian pharmaceutical industry.
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