THE Times of India on February 1, 2026 carried a report datelined Chandigarh drawing attention to the plight of a labourer from Faridabad who was forced to carry his deceased wife’s body home on a vegetable cart because the family had exhausted its funds on medical treatment and could not afford a private ambulance. Another story in the same newspaper three days later reported that in Noida, a family claimed they were denied a shroud and assistance for their deceased 24-year-old unless they paid an extra Rs 3,000 at a post-mortem centre. A few days earlier, the BLK Max Hospital in Delhi allegedly refused to release a dead patient’s body until an additional ₹1 lakh was paid, even though earlier payments had been made. These are just three amongst the scores of disturbing stories that are reported in media on a regular basis. If this be the situation in the National Capital Region one would dread to imagine the plight of ordinary people in most other parts of the country.

These unfortunate incidents show how large sections of the population stand deprived and distressed owing to weakening of public health infrastructure and growing dependence on private providers consequent to decades of neoliberal reforms and declining public investment in health. With government spending on public health accounting for a mere 1.5 per cent of GDP, millions have been forced to rely on out-of-pocket expenditure. This is pushing over 55 million people into poverty every year. Combined with this is the promotion of unscientific practices and remedies peddled as traditional medicine.

It is against this backdrop that a meeting of Party activists and professionals working in the health sector was held on January 31 and February 1, 2026. Convened at New Delhi’s Harkishan Singh Surjeet Bhawan, the meeting expressed grave concern over the rapid corporatisation and communalisation of healthcare in the country and sounded a warning that public health is being steadily transformed into a profit-driven commodity. It called for the recognition of health as a fundamental right, increasing public health expenditure to at least five per cent of the GDP by the Union government, among other things.

NEED FOR SHARPER INTERVENTION

The Party directly and through organisations associated with it or in which its members are working has been intervening in the health sector in many states through various initiatives. They have been mainly in campaigns and movements focused on health policy issues; public health education and awareness initiatives; service-oriented health programmes and activities; and work within health related professional organisations.

The need to significantly scale up these interventions in this critical area becomes more urgent in the background of the attempts being made by various communal outfits peddling obscurantist practices trying to expand their reach and influence. Reviewing of past and current interventions, sharing of experiences and increasing the work of the Party and the mass organisations in which its members are working formed part of the agenda.

A Note outlining the perspective of our work in this sector placed at the meeting, which drew from the over four decades of work in this area, was categorical in its assessment that neoliberal policies pursued under the present government have weakened the principles of universality, equity and accessibility in healthcare, while accelerating the consolidation of corporate hospital chains, insurance-driven models and private equity investments in the health sector. Healthcare, the note pointed out, is increasingly treated as a market opportunity rather than a social responsibility of the state.

PRIVATE SECTOR STRANGLEHOLD

It also highlighted that nearly 80 per cent of healthcare services are now delivered by the private sector, which owns over 60 per cent of hospitals and hospital beds. Over the last decade, private healthcare has expanded at an annual rate exceeding 25 per cent, reinforcing a two-tier system in which advanced care is available to the affluent, while the majority faces deprivation, inadequate and unaffordable services.

The meeting also expressed serious concern over the weakening of public-sector pharmaceutical units, rising medicine prices, and the limited scope of drug price controls. With nearly 70 per cent of household health spending going towards medicines, speakers warned that access to life-saving drugs is increasingly compromised, particularly for the poor, elderly and those with chronic illness.

The meeting also flagged the growing influence of financial markets and foreign private equity in healthcare, with 100 per cent foreign direct investment permitted under the automatic route. This financialisation is eroding medical ethics, placing healthcare workers under pressure to meet revenue targets, and reducing patients to sources of profit.

Another key concern was the attack on federalism and increasing centralisation. The note sharply criticised the increasing control of the Union government over health financing and programme design, arguing that centrally imposed schemes such as Ayushman Bharat undermine state autonomy and fail to account for diverse local health needs. This, it says, undermines the efforts of states like Kerala and Tamil Nadu where sustained public investment has yielded better health outcomes.

Deep inequalities in health indicators were underlined, with stark differences across regions, castes and social groups. Maternal and infant mortality rates remain unacceptably high in several states, while shortages of health facilities and personnel persist nationwide. It emphasized that people from the vulnerable groups—including women, the disabled, Dalits, Adivasis, migrant workers, transgender persons—face systemic exclusion and discrimination in access to care.

Participants also raised alarm over the promotion of pseudo-scientific practices and unverified remedies, which they said challenge scientific temper and public health. The role of the RSS and affiliated organisations in shaping health narratives through superstition and majoritarian ideology was sharply criticised, along with the dilution of regulatory safeguards such as the Magical Remedies Act.

Climate change, emerging diseases, mental health neglect, substance abuse, and the misuse of health data were identified as growing challenges requiring urgent public intervention. The meeting stressed that health outcomes are inseparable from broader social determinants such as nutrition, employment, housing, sanitation, environment and freedom from discrimination. Various intersections – of gender, sexual orientation, disability, caste and community etc. were also highlighted.

CALL FOR POLICY SHIFT

With exceptions, all the 70 participants coming from diverse backgrounds, mass and class organisations, those engaged in delivery of various health services, health activists etc. contributed to the discussion. They were doctors – physicians, surgeons, specialists - medical representatives, representatives from health and science forums, in-charges of hospitals and clinics run or controlled by the Party, representatives of organisations of students, women, disabled, workers, agricultural workers, etc. Amongst other things, they also narrated the experience they gained in running health camps, generic medicine shops, clinics, hospitals, palliative care units, providing assistance during health emergencies etc.

Calling for a decisive shift in policy, the meeting demanded recognition of healthcare as a fundamental right and public expenditure of at least five per cent of GDP. Strengthening publicly funded and publicly run health systems, revitalising public-sector drug production, regulating private hospitals, and ending disguised privatisation through public–private partnerships, ensuring affordable medicines, strengthening food security and nutrition were among the key demands. Opposition to pseudo-science and unscientific health narratives and remedies and defence of federalism in health services were among the 14 main demands contained in the charter adopted at the meeting.

Presided over by Polit Bureau Member Sridip Bhattacharya, General Secretary M.A. Baby delivered the inaugural address. The discussions were mainly summed up by PB Member B.V. Raghavulu. Members of the Central Secretariat K Hemalata, Muralidharan and Vikram Singh, besides veteran of the people’s science movement, D Raghunandan also spoke.

The meeting concluded with a call to intensify political mobilisation around health, deepen work among health professionals and sectoral organisations, expand mass awareness campaigns, build broad alliances, and strengthen grassroots resistance to privatisation. It also stressed the need to consolidate and expand service-oriented initiatives where they already exist, while consciously linking such efforts to larger struggles for a democratic, secular and people-centred public health system.