More girls study medicine, but your doctor may still be a man

The first Indian woman physician, Anandibai Joshi, graduated in 1886. About 125 years later, Indian women began to outnumber men in admissions to medical colleges. The trend continues to grow stronger by the year: over the past five years, India has produced over 4,500 more female doctors than male ones.

In India, women constituted 51% of the students joining medical colleges, cornering 23,522 seats in 2014-15 compared to 22,934 men. This increase is in keeping with the global trend. In fact, in the neighbourhood, Pakistan and Bangladesh have much higher proportions of women in medical colleges, 70% and 60% respectively.

However, there is a serious shortage of female doctors in India. According to a paper titled ‘Human Resources for Health in India’, published in 2011 in the medical journal ‘Lancet’, only 17% of all allopathic doctors and 6% of those in rural areas are women. This is less than one female allopathic doctor per 10,000 population in rural areas (0.5), whereas the ratio is 6.5 in urban areas. The number of female doctors per 10,000 population ranges from 7.5 in Chandigarh to 0.26 in Bihar.