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New Delhi: Two out of five Indians who received treatment for Covid-19 in a hospital during the second wave had to pay bribes, a new survey by community forum LocalCircles has found.
The survey, released on the occasion of International Anti-Corruption Day on Thursday, also revealed that 82 per cent of bribe givers said they had to do so to get hospitalization or beds or ventilators or medicines.
The survey received over 16,000 responses from citizens spread across 317 districts in India. Sixty-eight percent of the respondents were men, while 32 percent were women. Of the total participants, 42 percent were from Tier 1 towns, 32 percent from Tier 2 towns and 26 percent from Tier 3 and 4 towns and rural locations.
When asked “if you or a family member paid a bribe at a hospital during the second wave of the COVID-19 pandemic, what was it for?”, 61 percent of the 8,970 responses citizens said they “didn’t pay” Did “bribe for treatment related to COVID in a hospital”.
39% had to pay bribe for the treatment of Kovid in the hospital
However, the study noted that 39 per cent of the respondents who received Covid-related treatment at the hospital admitted to paying a bribe. Of them, 32 per cent paid it to “get admission/bed/ventilator/medicines for himself or someone”, 4 per cent to “get information about something or visit someone in the ICU room” Paid the bribe, and 3 cents paid it for “reducing the bill value or processing insurance in a timely manner”.
Further examining the “subset” who paid bribes to hospital for treatment during the second wave, the survey found that 82 percent paid it to get admission or beds or ventilators or medicines, 9 percent paid for the bill amount. While another 9 percent did so to obtain information or visit someone in the ICU.
The study also showed that of the 7,249 respondents who paid bribes for hospital treatment at the time, 27 percent said they paid hospital administration staff, with another 27 percent saying they paid other hospital workers . , and 28 per cent said they paid it to the ward boy. Nine percent said they paid it to a “facilitator,” such as a local politician or politician, government employee, middleman, while another 9 percent said they paid it to a “pharmacy or chemist.”
The forum also mentioned in the survey earlier findings On black-marketing during the second COVID-19 wave, which found that RT-PCR tests were overcharged by 13% of citizens, while more than 19% of those who bought COVID-related drugs such as Tocilizumab, Remdesivir, Fabiflu, etc. fee was charged. more than MRP
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