Palliative Care in India — Why is there an ignorance around the topic?

According to the WHO, around the world, about 40 million people are in dire need of assistance with their health like palliative care needs.

I recently worked on developing some content for a website called “callthepall”. A company that works on providing Palliative Care services in India. That’s when I realized the nescience about it in the general public.

A large sector of the Indian population is unaware of the existence of specialized post-treatment care like Palliative Care. And because of this oblivion around the matter, a lot of people, eligible for such care services do not avail them, hence risking a further health decline. The main facet of Palliative Care is to prevent such issues. About 5.4 million people in India are in need of such specialized care, and only about 1% have access to it.

A very important concept in Palliative Care is the composition of the care team. It is best administered by a versatile team comprising of doctors, nurses, specialists, social workers, and even volunteers. This means, that a whole team, should set aside their differences, cooperate, and act in the best interest of the patient.

According to the National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI), Palliative Care has been present in India for about 30…