Providing health infrastructure in the 150 odd Maoist-hit districts across the country can play a key role in the economic development of those areas, eminent cardiologist Devi Prasad Shetty on Saturday said.
“If government creates health infrastructure like medical colleges in these areas, we can see similar benefits what we had experienced in south India,” Dr Shetty said in Kolkata on the sidelines of celebration of Udayer Pathey, 2011 .
It would have twin benefit - bring in peace in these regions and help in creating more doctors at a time when the country was facing a shortage of 7 lakh to 10 lakh medicos.
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The medical colleges should be run by the government as otherwise the fees would be too high for the common people.
Referring to West Bengal, he said 20 medical colleges could be set up in a short span at an investment of just Rs 70 crore.
“You already have district medical hospitals and these only require to setup education wings,” Dr Shetty said.
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Rabindranath Tagore International Institute of Cardiac Sciences promoted by Dr Shetty is setting up a district health centre with critical care departments for heart and kidney at Bolpur.
“We want to demonstrate the model to the government and later we will replicate it in other districts. We had asked for support to allow us to setup these centres within the existing district hospial,” RTIICS vice-chairman and group CEO Dr A Raghuvanshi said.
On the single medical entrance test, Dr Shetty said it would help in maintaining quality of students without curbing State’s control on seats.