The acute power crisis that has gripped Delhi state has had its toll over the hundreds of small and medium scale hospitals and nursing homes of the region. The erratic and inadequate power supply coupled with the unannounced power cuts that goes for hours together is creating havoc with the day to day functioning of the small scale hospital sector.

According to Dr Anil Bansal, president elect, Delhi Medical Association (DMA), the situation has deteriorated over the last two months with power cuts going on even for eight hours at a stretch thereby affecting the normal functioning of the hospitals. "Operation theatres are the worst affected. Even generators cannot provide more than fours of uninterrupted power supply. And round the clock power is essential for all critical care units and hospitals having operation theatres" he said.

Dr Bansal said that most of DMA members had complained about the high cost involved in having generators for the routine functioning of the hospitals and nursing homes. The small nursing homes cannot afford to have generators of their own as it would cost them too much. The number of patients coming to such nursing homes has also reduced due to their inability to offer proper care due to no fault of theirs. It is known that the power situation has visibly affected all hospitals other than the corporate sector.

Though DMA had made representations to the government to avoid hospitals from such power cuts and also entitle them for subsidized power, there has been no positive response yet. Dr Bansal said that the government is not doing anything worth enough to help the nursing homes bring down their expenses. "However the government keeps on asking us to provide low cost treatment," he said.

Dr Bansal also pointed out that as generators cause a lot of pollution, they couldn't be installed in the hospitals. There are about 12000 registered doctors who are listed in the data bank of the Delhi Medical Council (DMC). The number of registered nursing homes comes to about 500.

The state authorities had recently appealed to the people to be patient with regard to the hardships faced due to the power crisis. The authorities have informed the patients the acute power crisis was a temporary phenomenon and would come to an end soon.