Oxfam calls for new regulations to reduce unnecessary hysterectomies in private hospitals

The charity Oxfam has called for immediate action to stop doctors conducting unnecessary hysterectomies in Indian private healthcare facilities. The private sector provides 80% of outpatient care and 40% of inpatient care in India, it said.1 However, evidence from recent scientific studies and surveys indicated that gynaecologists in private hospitals and clinics have been recommending and performing hysterectomies on women when the operations were not clinically indicated. Araddhya Mehtta, global health spokesperson for Oxfam, said, “The trend is seen all over India but is particularly disturbing in Rajasthan, Bihar, and Chhattisgarh, where doctors simply abuse their power of being a doctor. When women come with abdomen pain, doctors prescribe hysterectomy to women from poor economic backgrounds, telling them that it might be a cancer or a hole or a stone in …