- At the outset, let’s make it amply clear that the elected representatives chosen by us, the people, are meant to serve us and not act as if they have been given a carte blanche to indulge in showing off power in an ostentatious manner. No harm in reiterating yet again that the democratic form of governance in India is nothing but by the people, for the people, and of the people. As the name suggests, political leaders are people’s elected representatives who are oath-bound to uphold the Indian Constitution and serve the people to the best of their abilities. However, the false pretensions, officiousness, arrogance, high-handedness, and gross sense of entitlement exhibited by the political class, irrespective of party affiliations, are reaching a nadir by the day.
PC: Times Now
- The less said, the better about the ministers who tend to behave as if they own their respective ministries and the officials working under them by blatantly indulging in high-handedness sprinkled with an authoritarian streak in berating for supposed laxity. The latest episode involving Goa’s health minister publicly humiliating a medico has caught the attention of the whole country. Mind you, medics cannot be bullied by ministers. Simple. Nonetheless, how medics deal with patients is also a vital part of healthcare. The Goa incident started with a refusal, correct decision, by the books, at Goa Medical College’s emergency department to administer a routine B12 injection to a 77-year-old. She got the jab in the orthopaedic ward.
PC: Hindustan Times
- It hasn’t ended with an apology to the GMC casualty’s chief from Goa’s health minister, who had suspended the doctor in a brazen public show of arrogance on camera. The video of the public humiliation correctly triggered outrage. The minister was not just badly behaved; he displayed an attribute shared by many politicians: pulling rank at the drop of a hat. Recollect how in April, a UP minister on-camera wanted a Sonbhadra hospital’s CMO sent to the jungle because he was not available to welcome the minister on arrival. He, too, like his Goa counterpart, believed their high-handedness was speaking for patients. Far from it. They spoke from a point of privilege and ego alone. Invariably, these incidents lead us to a proverbial inadequate healthcare infrastructure.
PC: Goa News Hub
- Agreed, some doctors are often less than civil with patients in public hospitals. Dismissive behaviour with patients and nurses is not infrequent but barely recorded in any survey. Neither is its impact on care outcomes studied, starting with patients not daring to clear doubts for fear of a dressing-down. Noticeably, some doctors routinely get away with markedly impolite behaviour, especially with poor patients. Indeed, the doctor-patient ratio in public hospitals shows how burdened doctors are. But it’s good to ask whether that’s the complete explanation. Whatever the case may be, there’s no way people in power should indulge in uncouth behaviour, denigrating individuals openly with unbridled arrogance. That’s poor optics for a democratic country.
