I believe it to be most hilarious that I unwittingly participated in this completely pointless mass practice of making resolutions, believing that the world is some wish-granting factory or even that my will would have the tenacity to reach anywhere near my goals. How daft indeed!
I still make resolutions and try to stay committed to them. Because, at the end of the day, resolutions are the closest semblance of hope, more so when you are surrounded daily by the sick and the dying. The resolution gives hope a meaning and hence an idea worth flirting with.
I am hoping that 2019 brings along a sense of assurance to those wretched of the land who toil each day to earn their meal and yet have to compromise on the essentials of life. I hope that the state looks more seriously into the problems of its people and provides feasible solutions and that peace and justice are doable for my country.
I look forward to a general leap in medicine in 2019. No, I can't say that I look forward to [a new] treatment of cancer or a vaccine for malaria, but I wish that the evolution of medicine should be more people-centric. Technology will keep on surging ahead but what use will that technology be if people remain untouched. I wish that we discover a drone that can deliver the advancements of medicine to the poor.
Peoples' health, like peace and justice, is an intangible preposition that reveals a lot about a nation. I wish that the attainment of health becomes a collective responsibility, not a means of collective amnesia, for the people and the government of our country in the coming year. I wish that the equality to health care be under a common blue sky of opportunities. I wish that issues of health care become the means of losing elections in India and not methods of false promises so that the political will in providing health care in India is not mere tokenism but a matter of peoples' right.
Khan is professor, department of orthopaedics, All India Institute of Medical Sciences, New Delhi.
ARTICLES BY INDIA-BASED DOCTORS: AS TOLD TO MINI P. THOMAS