‘Awareness is low on healthcare cost among public’

Hospitals lament lack of incentives, relief from State governments

There is lack of awareness among people on healthcare costs and this is one sector where the professionals, including the doctors and nurses, do not have an option to work from home and they risk their lives, Prashanth Rajagopalan, Director, MGM Healthcare, said. “Doctors and the nurses have a 12-hour duty and they need to be paid special incentives for the extra working hours. The human resource and overhead costs have doubled for the hospitals, which are being passed on to the patients,” he said. He was responding to a question by S. Prakash, Convenor, FICCI Tamil Nadu Insurance Panel at the round table discussion on “Addressing pain points in healthcare faced by the public during the pandemic” organised online by FICCI Tamil Nadu State Council.