Punjab Health Sector Assessment : A Policy Note
Punjab made little progress on key health indicators during the 1990s the state was not able to significantly reduce infant and under-five mortality rates. In 1998-99 institutional births accounted for only 37 percent of the total, while 37.4 perce...
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| Format: | Policy Note |
| Language: | English en_US |
| Published: |
Washington, DC
2021
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| Online Access: | http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/424081468042841828/Punjab-Health-sector-assessment http://hdl.handle.net/10986/36775 |
| Summary: | Punjab made little progress on key
health indicators during the 1990s the state was not able to
significantly reduce infant and under-five mortality rates.
In 1998-99 institutional births accounted for only 37
percent of the total, while 37.4 percent of all deliveries
were not attended by any health personnel, and 25 percent of
children were malnourished. Finally, the tragedy of female
feticide and infanticide continue to haunt the state, which
has by far the lowest sex ratio in the country and there are
strong indications that the situation is deteriorating
rapidly. In terms of health system performance, Punjab
compares well with the Indian average, but lags behind other
states at comparable levels of socio-economic development.
Key indicators point to a mixed picture with high
contraceptive prevalence at 67 percent but a very low
proportion of institutional deliveries, which at 38 percent
is less than half that of Tamil Nadu or Kerala. Punjab shows
the same acute inequalities as the rest of the country, in
terms of distribution of service utilization by
socio-economic groups. The health sector largely fails to
reach the poor, mostly concentrated among rural populations
and schedule castes. In conclusion, while coverage may still
be an issue particularly in the peripheral rural areas, all
the evidence shows that the key issue to address in Punjab
is poor quality of services. In the public sector, the
deterioration of services is extremely severe, particularly
in primary care. |
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