Progress of Rural Health Care System in India

Abstract

This study attempts to examine the progress of rural health care in India during the period between 2004-05 and 2011-12 in terms of increase in the total number of health centre functioning, number of health centre functioning at government buildings and number of availability of manpower at health centre. At the national level there is an increase of 2340 SCs, 813 PHCs and 1487 CHCs in 2011-12 as compared to those existing in 2004-05. This implies an increase of about 44.4% in the number of CHCs, about 3.5% in the number of PHCs and about 1.6% in the number of SCs in 2012 as compared to 2005. The study shows that 64% of total sub-centre, 83% of PHCs and 97% of CHCs are functioning at government buildings as on March 2012. The rest are located either in rented buildings or rent free Panchayat/ voluntary society buildings. The availability of manpower is one of the important prerequisite for the efficient functioning of rural health services. When we compare the manpower position of major categories in 2012 with that in 2005, it is observed that there are significant improvements in terms of the number in all the categories.