Dinesh Kamath's Editorial 'Modernize MCI' that was published in Newsband

Modernize MCI

India is a democratic country with over 1.2 billion people, but the systems of health-care delivery and medical education are poorly regulated, expensive, opaque and considerably corrupt. Hence there is a need to modernise the Medical Council of India (MCI).

A body like the MCI, which sets ethical norms for medical professionals, should be headed by someone who is absolutely non-corrupt. But it was accused of failing to stop the sale of medical seats in private colleges for capitation fees going up to Rs.50 lakh. Hence inducting non-medical professionals of integrity and community health experts to regulatory bodies would help advance public interest. The larger goal of a revamp should be to produce medical professionals, especially postgraduates, in such numbers that would improve the doctor to population ratio and ensure their availability across the country.

The Central Government should stop the sale of medical seats in private colleges by abolishing capitation fees. It is a disgrace that such a system was even permitted in the process of producing well trained and competent medical professionals. When so much of money is involved, it is neither shocking nor unexpected that Medical Council of India (MCI) got corrupted as all other agencies in India. It is time to give a decent burial to this highly commercialized medical education. It must be done forthright with an ordinance of the Central Government, if needed.

MCI should be restructured on the lines of election commission, independent, empowered, autonomous and free from interference from government machinery. In medical colleges, how can you expect a person who is paying a hefty amount like 50-60 lakhs to perform his equivalent to GOD job efficiently. He/she is most likely to indulge in corruption. Another thing is out of about 6 lakh students appearing for getting into a coveted institution, only about 45000 are fortunate enough to secure a seat. So before reforming the MCI we need to reform the process that doctors-to-be are going to follow.

Medical profession is holistic and corruption in such sector at the apex level brings a stigma to that noble profession. Political involvement in admissions for higher medical courses leads to the poor outcome of medical graduates. After commercialising the medical education by opening it to private sectors the standard is deteriorated to the core.

People regard Doctors as equal to GOD in India, but few avaricious doctors become so commercial in their practice that they play with people’s life and situations. Ethical committee of MCI must be strengthened and must take speedy actions against those unethical doctors who jeopardize the interest of medical fraternity. MCI must punish them severely and set examples for the betterment of society.

The MCI is under the grip of vested interests mostly the Seniors in the Profession and also Corporate Hospitals having made it commercial. The Capitation fees for MBBS/MD and PG admission courses is on par with Real Estate industry and to top it MCI does not bother to test the Professional skills of the Doctors unlike their Western counterparts. The brilliant young intelligent meritorious Doctors vanish to countries like US/Canada/UK/AU for better opportunities as salary offered in India for young brilliant is worse than that given to a BPO or a Computer workers. The Corporate Hospitals and Medical colleges are managed funded by Politicians, Industrialists and also a few incompetent people in the profession. It is high time for the Health ministry to take suggestions from the expert committee pertaining to Health Care.