Monthly Archives: November 2020

Incomprehensible digital world

Information technology wizards often coin new words and their jargon is confusing. Much of these await handling in a statesman-like manner

We are living in the age of digitisation and now the pandemic has made it much more universal and in a much lesser span of time than would have been otherwise possible. The multiplication of online platforms and transactions of almost every variety has almost divided the world community into categories, depending upon their facility with this process and medium. The “traditional” mom-and-pop set-ups, dealing with maintenance and services, have been speedily eliminated in favour of the do-it-yourself (DIY) culture and by online instructional videos. There would be nothing to grudge that if two things were ensured. First, the basic infrastructure for online communication as and when needed. Second, credible skills at the responding digital end to diagnose the problem and articulate it in comprehensible terms. Both of these clearly need far more attention than currently seems to be the case. This is not to find fault but to emphasise an essential pre-condition for digital maintenance services. The proposition of both infrastructure and skill take time to reach a level of maturity, making them amenable for use. If it is […]

By |2023-10-22T14:03:55+00:00November 23rd, 2020|Columns, Economics & Development|Comments Off on Incomprehensible digital world

Towards more robust healthcare

The curriculum of medical education seems to focus essentially on the institution of hospitals. The results are there for all to see

The public healthcare system in India is one of those topics on which most people have an opinion. It is often expressed with much energy and claimed insight. There are some favourite viewpoints. Almost all of them talk of primary, secondary and tertiary healthcare. Usually, a discourse on these aspects is accompanied by half a tear on the state of affairs in the country. The truth is that notwithstanding the enthusiasm for allopathic healthcare, this country’s primary healthcare system is nourished and sustained by Indian systems of medicine. They are easily available, the diagnosis is simple and in a large number of cases the results are satisfactory. Traditional medicine systems do not burden the common man with endless medical tests like allopathy does, which in turn are often accompanied by protestations about the possible unreliability of the results. This is not only because of the nature of the tests but also due to the flaws in the process of testing. Often, the search for reliability means repeat tests. Interestingly, the pathology labs, as a source of livelihood, have very […]

By |2023-10-22T14:03:42+00:00November 9th, 2020|Columns, Healthcare & Covid|Comments Off on Towards more robust healthcare
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