More than two weeks after Punjab Health Systems Corporation (PHSC) requested all government-run healthcare amenities to deposit the person prices collected by them within the state treasury, hospitals and well being centres throughout Punjab are discovering it tough to run day-to-day operations.

The authorities order asking hospitals and well being centres to deposit 50 per cent of the person prices for December,2022 and 100 per cent of those prices with impact from January, has evoked criticism from the hospital administrations, which have been left cash-starved.

On Wednesday, Punjab Civil Medical Services Association (PCMSA) stated the choice to divest healthcare amenities will adversely have an effect on them.

Dr Akhil Sarin, state president of Punjab Civil Medical Services Association (PCMSA), Punjab, stated, “We fear that the acute funds crunch that the public hospitals may now face due to the centralization of finances, the already existing services being provided at these centres may well be jeopardized.”

Dr Gagandeep Singh, chief advisor of PCMSA, Punjab, stated, “The authorities have not given any clear instructions. How will the officials pay their contractual staff? The outsourced staff in district hospitals is paid through user charges. The user charges should stay at the local level with SMOs. It should have been a planned decision. The hospitals’ staff is interested in user charges because it is supposed to be used on the hospital and on needy patients. It will prove to be a demotivating factor for the staff.” He added, “Now we will not have the money to buy lab reagents until some mechanism is formulated. It will affect all health services.”

Ajoy Sharma, secretary well being and household welfare, stated, “The government will provide it (user charge deposited by hospitals) through budget. The budgetary provision will be according to the user charge deposited by hospitals. In the initial phase, there can be teething problems to understand it. It will get resolved.”

Dr Ranjit Singh, the director, division of well being and household welfare, stated, “The government is working on preparing the guidelines.” He added, “After the user charges were spent under guidelines by the SMOs, it was never counted in the expenditure by the government. It then becomes important to deposit it in the treasury.”

Dr Suman Bali, director of PHSC, stated, “We have already put up a file to the authorities about the requirement of user charges. The decision will be conveyed to the hospitals.”

Govt mopped ₹ 9-cr after order issued

The information shared by PHSC states that after the orders over ₹ 9 crore have been deposited within the treasury. It is the 50 per cent of the steadiness for the month of December 2022. According to the knowledge procured from the workplace of the medical superintendent of Mata Kaushalya Hospital in Patiala, “Nearly ₹ 18 lakhs (50 per cent) has been deposited in the treasury from the balance amount for December, 2022.” Moreover, the official doc additionally states that the whole person prices for the month of December 2022 from 9 neighborhood well being centres and three sub-divisional hospitals was over ₹ 96 lakhs. As per the instructions, the 50 per cent quantity, round ₹ 47 lakhs have been deposited within the treasury.