India fact of the day

by on April 17, 2008 at 7:40 am in Music | Permalink

Ratio of the estimated number of fake doctors practicing in Delhi, India, to the number of real ones: 1:1

That is from Harper’s Index, May 2008.

9 comments

sa April 17, 2008 at 7:58 am

since half of medical
spending is useless
(HT: hanson)this sounds
about right.

Speedmaster April 17, 2008 at 8:32 am

But more importantly, how many don’t have health ‘insurance?’ ;-)

Floccina April 17, 2008 at 9:16 am

How about the folks who sell herbal cures, organic vegetables and supplements for health proposes in the USA? Ginkgo biloba or saw palmetto anyone? Who does more harm real doctors or fakes?

Westner April 17, 2008 at 9:49 am

I wonder how many of your “facts of the day” are real facts?

Gil April 17, 2008 at 10:48 am

“Be careful with that Adlai, Leela, he’s a doctor, they’re very poor.”

“Actually most doctors are rich.”

“WHAT!? WHEN DID THIS HAPPEN!? YOU’RE JOKING RIGHT?! THAT’S NOT FUNNY!?!?“

Finja April 17, 2008 at 1:43 pm

is there a reason that I don’t get why this is posted under “Music”?

bryan April 17, 2008 at 3:56 pm

I just read a book called Charlatan by Pope Brock that details the health care industry in American during the 1920s and 30s. Sounds about the same.

I also read somewhere that Calcutta’s the most over-populated city in the world, and that it scores terribly on a number of measures (pollution, etc.). But the article compared it to New York City 100 years ago and New York was worse!

I wonder how much else we’d find that’s similar in these ways.

edwardseco April 18, 2008 at 2:41 am

Seems about right. My sister in law says this is quite common in the slums and noted that a hospital was set up by a midwife who calls herself a doctor. A related problem is unscrupulous doctors in the countryside that treat symptoms rather than cure diseases so as not to cut the income stream. It has little to do with mysticism! Ethnocentric judgements aside economists would readily spot the reason for this problem. Information costs are very high relative to incomes. Never did much research in the slums of India but can say that the Indian farmer is one of the best microeconomists in the world. The survival of their families as well as themselves depends on it..

rishi April 18, 2008 at 1:22 pm

There are a lot of homeopathic and aurvedic doctors around who are not complete doctors. They still prescribe allopathic medicines and would account for a lot of the fake doctors.

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