Plan to raise retirement age of doctors in MP

Bhopal, Sep 23 (UNI) The Madhya Pradesh government is considering to raise the retirement age of medical specialists and to provide special allowance to doctors posted in interior areas, Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan said today.

''The government is keen to provide basic facilities to doctors posted in rural areas. If needed, it will be considered to provide them special allowance,'' Mr Chouhan said here while inaugurating a national seminar on ''Tuberculosis and Lung Diseases''.

Referring to the shortage of experts in different branches and lack of healthcare facilities in rural areas, he said the government would consider raising the retirement age of specialists so that the state could get more benefit of their experience.

Mr Chouhan said the government had given emphasis on running full-fledged district hospitals at all district towns, community health centres in blocks and posting of doctors in interior areas.

Setting up of a medical college at Sagar would help expansion of healthcare facilities in the Bundelkhand region, he added.

Lamenting that tuberculosis could not be wiped out so far, the Chief Minister said 10,000 DOT centres were functioning at present in the state. Efforts were on provide MRI, CT scan and other facilities in all medical colleges.

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