Unhealthy practice

For a patient who is to soon go under the knife, to hand over a red envelope (read as bribe) or not to the doctor is a perplexing question.

Many hand over the money fearing the doctors will slacken in their efforts at the operating table.

Over the weekend, the Ministry of Health and several other central government departments held a meeting to ban such unethical behavior. Doctors who routinely receive generous kickbacks from sales representatives of pharmaceutical companies too would soon be feeling the heat, it was decided.