JOIN US Shivajinagar MLA Roshan Baig alleged on Thursday that super speciality corporate hospitals, along with pharmaceutical companies in the city, were running a mafia by not allowing other systems of medicines such as Ayurveda and Homoeopathy to flourish.
He was speaking at a ceremony organised by the Ayush department, where 28 renowned Ayush doctors were felicitated.
“The mafia is lobbying to suppress the Ayush forms of treatment,” Baig said. Ayush is the acronym for Ayurveda, Yoga/Naturopathy, Unani, Sidda and Homoeopathy systems of medicine.
“Corporate hospitals in the city put dead bodies on the ventilator and ask the families of the patients to pray for their recovery. These hospitals construct their buildings on government land and swindle hefty amounts from the poor, even for simple treatments,” he said.
Baig said there are many fake medicines, especially those brought from Rajasthan, sold in chemist shops in the city. The government should think of setting up a regulatory body to monitor such activities by private hospitals and pharma companies, he said.
Replying to Baig’s plea, Health and Family Welfare Minister Aravind Limbavali said the Karnataka Private Medical Establishments’ Act would monitor the activities of private hospitals and practitioners.
“The Act also has a provision to fix the rates for medicines and medical procedures in the hospitals, where they will have to display the rates for the public,” he said.
Limbavali said there were treatments for dengue and chikungunya in Ayush forms of medicines and the government was bound to promote indigenous forms of medicines in the State.
He said all government hospitals, including those at the taluk level, would have Ayush centres.
M Madan Gopal, Principal Secretary, Health and Family Welfare, said since Ayush forms of medicines did not have standard operating procedures and had loose ends in the treatment protocol, they were being misused.
“The grants given by the government to conduct research and development in Ayush forms of medicines is very less, since it is not promoted like allopathy,” he said.
Although there are medical solutions to infections like dengue in Ayurveda, there is no scientific evidence to prove that these medicines actually cure the disease, Gopal said.
Awardees
Ayurveda – Dhanvantri gold medals presented to Ananthachar, S M Angadi, T L Devaraj, B G Gopinath, J V Apte, Eshwar Reddy and late R R Bhat.
Unani - Avicenna gold medals presented to Mukthar Hussain Kote, Azizunnisa, late Amanullah Sharieff, Salauddin, late Mohammed Umar Farooq, Shameer Hussain and S M Alia.
Homoeopathy - Hahnemann gold medals presented to Subrahmanyanavar, Sharada Venkatasubbaiah, S S Shetty, B S Manjunath, Chandrashekhar M P, Ramdas A Acharya and P M Hulikanthimatta.
Naturopathy and Yoga - Patanjali gold medals presented to Hemalatha Murthy, P Kamala, Govardhan, Srinivas Reddy, Biradar, M A Ramamurthy and B C Bhagya.