Community health centres lack 80% of health specialists needed: RBI data

Social sector expenditure by states increased sharply during two years worst hit by the coronavirus

Health specialists such as surgeons, obstetrician and gynaecologists, and physicians are awfully short of requirement of state community health centres (CHC), showed data from the Reserve Bank of India recently.

As many as 79.90 per cent of the requirements were unfulfilled at these centres in 2021 compared to 76.09 per cent in 2020. The two years were hit by Covid-19 waves.

Against a requirement of 20,732 health specialists, only 4,957 were in position at these centres in 2020. That means only 24 per cent of the requirement was met that year, showed data in 'RBI Handbook of Statistics on Indian