'Govt docs increasingly corrupt'

“This has happened despite the salaries of doctors rising nearly three times since 2008”, he said. Speaking at the inauguration of a programme to operate on 200 poor and handicapped children for free organised by Sparsh Hospital he said: “Health schemes initiated by the State are only for people  who either have the money or are politically connected.”

Hegde referred to the case of a doctor from the Karnataka  Institute of Medical Sciences, Hubli, where a doctor was caught red-handed taking a bribe from a patient. “Eventually I had to recommend the child to a private hospital, where he was treated free. These days a lot of doctors are serving society without drawing any emoluments from the government”, he said. He said healthcare is not available to a large section of the population even today.

“Without timely intervention, these children will continue to remain handicapped”, he said.
A team of doctors from Sparsh Hospital, Bangalore and the United Kingdom have come together to perform the operations free. In the next two weeks, the team, led by Dr Sharan Patil from Sparsh Hospital and Dr James Fernandes from UK, will be operating on the children. The children will be treated for challenging musculoskeletal
abnormalities such as club foot, cerebral palsy, spine deformities like scoliosis, congenital pseudoarthrosis, dislocation of hips and complex hand deformities.

Dr Patil said the criteria for selection of the children was that they belonged economically weaker section. “We excluded those who could not be operated, those with simple problems, and also those who could afford treatment”, he said.