Should Hospitals Profit From Patients?

Is it a crime for hospitals to make profits during the pandemic? Can they serve for free? Sadhguru delves into these questions during an interaction with Economic Times Leadership Council members.
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Transcript

Now once you built a hospital as a business,

Now suddenly you want it to be a service center.

How do they do it?

At least give them an assurance,

Salaries and consumables,

Government will pay for it and run it free,

All hospitals,

Three to six months,

No profit.

Then it's important we think through the whole problem,

Not ad hoc saying this and that.

It's called healthcare industry and care should be the operative word.

But you know,

It seems that even in this crisis,

It's being.

.

.

It's largely driven by sort of opportunistic profits rather than,

You know,

Providing the care.

Do you see this changing in the next few decades where it moves from,

You know,

Wealth creation goals to wellness creation goals?

See,

We must understand this that once we take a fundamental wrong step,

After that,

We can only take more wrong steps because once we take a wrong direction.

When I say wrong direction,

Let me take you back culturally in this country.

In this country or in this culture,

We always believed there are three things which should never be commercialized – health,

Education and spiritual process.

These three things should never be commercialized.

So if they should not be commercialized,

What happened in the past was,

The kings who were there always made sure there is enough for the doctors,

For the teachers,

And for the spiritual transmission.

There was always enough substance,

Depending upon the wealth of the nation.

Accordingly,

Certain largess were always given to them,

So that they don't have to fend for themselves.

They don't have to think about where is my bread,

How do I earn,

What do I do?

So that was taken care of.

Well,

Those times are over,

You cannot talk about that anymore because we have moved into a market economy.

Market economy means everybody has to do something to feed themselves and the people around them and whatever.

So to what extent are you going to do is a question.

So coming to that question,

Now we have taken to western form of medicine,

Which is phenomenally capital,

You know,

Essential business.

You want to set up a hospital,

MRI machine means we import it from somebody,

Some other country.

This machine,

That machine,

From what I know,

Because I've visited some of the machine manufacturing,

You know,

Medical equipment manufacturing companies in United States,

Everything is priced five-hundred percent more than the cost.

That's how it is priced.

Because there everything is insurance.

I must tell you this example,

Some.

.

.

An American citizen came here to our yoga center.

He was a ex-B-52 bomber pilot and he was in his late sixties.

And when he was here,

He had a heart attack and we took him to the local hospital and an open heart surgery was needed.

Then we got the surgery done because it was emergency,

We got it done.

Then he wanted to call his insurance.

When he called the insurance,

He said,

You know,

That this cost him about two lakhs or something at that time.

So two lakhs was approximately,

And those days about four thousand dollars.

Today it's much less,

But around four thousand dollars.

He said,

This is the bill and I want to know the procedure because I've paid in India and how to manage this.

So those guys said,

That's okay,

You can get the surgery done there,

No problem.

Okay,

That is for the diagnosis,

But how much is the surgery?

He said,

No,

No,

No,

This is for surgery.

They wouldn't believe,

Because this would cost twenty-five thousand to fifty thousand dollars in United States.

But here it costs four thousand dollars.

Have we made use of that?

No.

Anyway,

We went into a medicine,

Medicine.

Did we really make use of that?

We could have made India the hospital for the world,

Then we would have had really top class arrangement,

So that our citizens also could enjoy that.

We've not done that.

We've done it in a small way because there are too many impediments for even healthcare industry to grow seamlessly,

Too many.

But having said that,

Now between profit and profiteering is what you're talking,

Am I right?

Between profit and profiteering.

See,

We need to understand this.

Now once you built a hospital as a business,

We must understand essentially,

You legally it's a business.

Now suddenly you want it to be a service center.

How do they do it?

Right now this is happening,

I'm telling you our own.

.

.

Our own plight right now.

We have schools in rural India,

Where schools are run with all,

You know,

Scholarship for almost eighty percent of the students are under scholarship,

Where people have been contributing from all over the world.

But now there are no contributions in.

.

.

Because of this virus thing,

There are hardly any contributions.

But now the government passes a law,

You cannot reduce the salary for teachers,

You must pay the salary.

No school,

No fee,

No contribution,

But you must pay full salary.

How do you pay?

So private schools are arm twisting the parents,

Either you pay us this much donation,

Otherwise we will chuck your child out of the school.

What else will they do?

For somebody else this may look like profiteering,

But how else do they manage,

I'm asking.

Right now hospitals,

They've invested hundreds of crores of rupees into Building One-One Hospital because everybody wants every equipment,

Even the atmosphere in the hospital,

Just the way it is in America.

They want that kind of thing.

So they've invested heavily.

If you look at the hospital building,

I'm talking about the good hospitals in the country,

If you enter there,

Is that the way ordinary government buildings are in the.

.

.

In this country.

Much higher scale,

Isn't it?

So it costs money.

Many hospital receptions are like five-star receptions.

So it costs money when you build that kind of business.

And now suddenly you talk about service free of cost,

When it is loaded with patients,

You're not going to work.

When we build a business,

You should not have given the entity of business if you wanted them to serve.

So the idea was government hospitals will serve,

Private hospitals will serve those who have the money to do it.

But nobody foresaw the pandemic.

Now you want them to serve,

At least give them an assurance.

All your salaries will take care of,

Just serve free for three months,

No profit,

No loss.

Salaries and consumables,

Government will pay for it and run it free,

All hospitals,

Three to six months,

No profit,

Not a single rupee of profit,

But you will not go into losses.

You must take care of something,

Otherwise how do they run the hospital?

So some hospital may be a old hospital,

They might have made enough money.

Some maybe just,

You know,

They've taken investment from somewhere and built this hospital.

Now if you go into this pandemic stuff and serve them free,

They will go under.

When they go under,

Will somebody pull them up?

No,

It will go bankrupt.

So we need to understand once we say an educational institution or a hospital or whatever else is a business entity,

Then it is based on profit.

You cannot run it any other way.

So what is profit,

What is profiteering?

It depends from which side of the window you're looking at it,

All right?

Somebody thinks this is most essential for them to survive.

Somebody else thinks they can survive on nothing on thin air.

It doesn't work like that.

I'm saying right now,

In cities where you're reaching such a place where there are no hospital beds,

And people are going from pillar to post and dying unnecessarily,

The government,

At least if not for all the hospitals,

Wherever you're saying,

Hundred percent of your beds we are taking,

There you must say,

We will pay the salaries for these three months or four months or whatever.

We will take care of all the consumable expenses for you.

No money,

Free,

You serve.

I'm sure they will do it.

But if you just don't give any assurance and you say you serve,

You serve,

Because whenever there's political pressure,

You say something,

That's not going to work,

Because it's a business,

They have to run it.

So I'm saying if we want to move into the space where in the committee of nations,

We are at least reasonably there,

Then it's important we think through the whole problem,

Not ad hoc saying this and that,

You know,

Not labeling people,

Not labeling.

.

.

See right now,

You're running a law firm.

This COVID time,

If I come with a case,

Well,

I'll have to pay,

Maybe I can beg you,

Please give me a discount.

That's all I can do.

I cannot say I won't pay,

Because you have to run your institution.

So in every profession,

This problem is there.

So when such a problem is there,

More holistic looking is needed.

But the simple solution for all this is,

In India,

We have health solutions of our own.

For various chronic ailments,

We have to bring this.

We are going in the American system of healthcare.

We need to understand,

American system of healthcare is worth three point.

.

.

Whatever,

Three point two trillion dollars per year,

All right?

For quarter the population that we are,

For three-hundred-and-fifty million people,

They spend three point two trillion dollars.

I think it's the most horrible thing to do,

Because in an affluent country where you have variety of nourishment choices,

Variety of lifestyle choices,

Why are so many people sick,

I don't understand.

Three point two trillion is larger than India's economy.

An economy which serves one point three or one point four billion people,

That much and much more you are spending on three-hundred-and-fifty million people.

I think it's a crime against humanity,

If you ask me.

It is a crime against humanity,

That for every small thing you're spending money like this,

When so many people are barely nourished.

Nearly thirty percent of India's population is malnourished,

When this is the condition.

So the important thing is,

We need to invest in villages.

We have traditional systems of medicine.

Every day you don't have to run to doctor for small things.

When something big,

A surgery or something is needed,

You go to the allopathic doctor.

Otherwise daily thing we can take care of within our own systems,

With.

.

.

We must make yogic practices compulsory.

If yoga,

If you don't like yoga,

You must run,

Run somewhere.

If you.

.

.

You must swim,

You must run,

You must do something.

You don't do anything,

You sit like a potato and you want the healthcare system to take care of you.

This is not going to happen.

Health is individual business.

Even illness comes,

We'll go to doctor.

But health is our business.

First thing is make the population.

.

.

Understand this from a young age,

You being healthy is your business,

It's not your doctor's business or government's business.

Health is your business.

This itself has not sunk into people's minds.

We need to sink this in.

If we don't do this,

Don't think we'll have a healthy nation.

As I'm giving you the example of America,

With a choice of nourishment and choice of lifestyle,

Why are so many people sick?

When you have such choice of nourishment and lifestyle,

It should be very easy to be healthy,

Isn't it?

But no,

You choose all the wrong things and you expect the government or the insurance or the company to take care of you and that's going to cost.

Can you afford,

If you go by American standards,

Do you really believe,

Does anybody in this country believe,

Because we are building infrastructure like this,

Do you believe someday for this 1.

3 billion people,

You will give healthcare like United States?

That means you need $12 trillion just for healthcare.

Our aim right now is to reach just $5 trillion economy,

All right?

$12 trillion healthcare,

When will you reach?

You won't do it in two centuries,

I'm saying.

It's most unrealistic and that's not the way to approach this nation's health.

We need to bring this.

Well,

There are efforts to bring yoga into everybody's life,

That also everybody makes a controversy.

If you say yoga,

You will say,

My religion doesn't accept.

If you say this,

Some.

.

.

Okay,

If your religion doesn't accept yoga,

Run and climb a mountain,

Huh?

Do some damn thing with your body to stay healthy.

But you don't do anything and then you expect these kind of things.

Now,

Private hospitals which you've invested heavily,

You want them to serve free.

No,

This is something right now,

Whichever hospital government wants to take over hundred percent of the beds,

You can say twenty-five percent,

Please serve free.

Hundred percent if you want to take care,

Please take care of the salaries and the consumables,

Let them go without profit for three to six months,

It's okay and give them relief from whatever loans they have.

Interest free,

You keep the loan for six months.

It is a fair way to handle things,

Otherwise it's not going to happen.

Now they're arm twisting patients,

They're not releasing dead bodies,

All kinds of ugly things happening,

All right?

All kinds of ugly things happening,

Simply because we don't think of a problem and a solution through and through,

Ad hoc,

Jumping here and there.

I'm sorry,

I'm sorry if I'm sounding very harsh,

But the situation is appalling,

You know.

Reviews

Very good ...Taking Persanal Responsibility is so important.

Thanks for your perspective, this was great to listen to!