Medical practice in India is diseased.

The Maharashtra State  Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission has held one Dr Vasant Kumar Jog guilty of quackery for administrating anesthesia to a woman undergoing a Caesarian section operation 10 years ago. The patient died of complications related to anesthesia. TOI, 30 April. Dr Jog is apparently a physician by trade and does not have a degree in anesthesia and hence is not qualified to practice this branch of medicine. The court found both him and the gynecologist guilty of negligence and awarded Rs 660,000 as compensation to the family. And rightly so. Every doctor has a sacred trust of duty towards his or her patient and should never endanger anyone's life for greed of money. The court relied on an expert committee which defined a quack as a " person who does not have knowledge of a particular system of medicine but practices in that system, and is a mere pretender of a medical knowledge or skill - in effect, a charlatan ". Very correct so far. Sadly, as in everything in India, the law is selective and and based on wilful ignorance. The great majority of doctors in India are quacks. That is because there is no law as to who can call himself a doctor. Thus millions of people with dodgy degrees in Ayurveda, Homeopathy, Physiotherapy or Unani are practicing merrily as doctors. Our judges and freeloading journalists get very excited when someone dies of complications related to surgery but do not realise that quacks are killing thousands of people everyday because they do not have the knowledge to diagnose medical conditions and prescribe wrong drugs. Since there is no restriction on chemists to check the degrees of the prescriber before dispensing medicines millions of patients are taking wrong or unnecessary medicines, all of which may have powerful side effects. One of the commonest crimes is to prescribe powerful antibiotics for ordinary common colds or flu which has given rise to bacteria which are resistant to nearly all available antibiotics. The New Delhi Metallo-beta-lactamase 1 is one such example. Tuberculosis has evolved from being multi- drug resistance to extreme drug resistance because quacks do not know that dosages have to change according to the body weight of the patient and prescribe fixed dose combinations which are appropriate for patients weighing less than 50 kilos. In August, 2011 Prof DK Gupta, Vice Chancellor of Chhatrapati Shahuji Maharaj University in Lucknow wrote to the Medical Council of India asking that about 50 students who had repeatedly failed their exams be awarded a degree. These students had gained admission through reservation because they belonged to SC or ST category and could not manage to attain 50% marks required for passing. Since more than 50% of seats are reserved only very few doctors are really capable. No wonder politicians rush abroad if sick.