Caste-washing the healthcare system will do little to address its discriminatory practices

Abstract

Bullying, discrimination and harassment within the healthcare system in India is well known and urgent measures have to be put in place to address them. However locating caste­based harassment as general bullying would be a disservice to the thousands of young people from vulnerable communities who often face extreme harassment within the system. Naming this as caste based harassment would be the first step to addressing it. There is an urgent need for reservation policies to be strengthened to allow representation of vulnerable communities at all levels of healthcare planning, implementation and evaluation.