Page 54 - OKHCoffieeTableBook_Neat

Dr. Aravind Srinivasan, divided his speech into two lifestyles. India is currently in this phase. The lower
parts. In the first part he reflected on the current the GDP, the lower is the expenditure in health
health care scenario in India and in the second sector.
he shared the learning acquired in the last four Expanding on Aravind hospital’s experience in
decades in the eye hospital.
elimination of needless blindness, he said each
Urbanization, rapid economic transformation, individual can make a difference and touch millions
changes in family structures and social revolution of lives. There are 12 million blind people in India.
are taking place in contemporary India. People are India has a higher preponderance of blindness. It
living longer. All these changes have happened is proved that Indians get blindness a little earlier.
because of tremendous strides in the health care The good news is 80% of the blindness is treatable
sector in India, although access to health care through cataract surgeries and by wearing a pair
in some areas still remains unsatisfactory. The of spectacles. 35 million cataract surgeries are
biggest challenge is that the transformation has done in a year in the world whereas 6.5 million
not touched everyone in society. One in five is still is done in India and 1.2 lakh done in Odisha per
living in poverty. China has performed better than year. It is not lack of health care facilities that
us in lifting people out of poverty.

As the economy of a country improves, the society
moves from communicable disease prevalence
to non communicable disease prevalence. Non
communicable diseases are cardio vascular
diseases, diabetes, cancer, chronic respiratory
diseases and injury. People live longer. As a
result, ageing is a major challenge as each aged
person needs to be taken care of. Illness leads to
poverty instead of vice versa as medical costs rise
significantly. Increases are observed in sedentary