The coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic has quickly spread to various countries. As on May 8th, 2020, in India 56342 positive cases of corona had been reported. India with a population of more than 1·35 billion had difficulty in controlling the transmission of coronavirus among its population. Multiple strategies became necessary to handle this outbreak. The Ministry of Health and Family Welfare of India raised awareness about this outbreak and to take all necessary actions to control the spread of COVID-19. Indian Government implemented a 55-day lockdown throughout the country to reduce the transmission of the virus. Schools and colleges had shifted to alternative mode of teaching-learning-evaluation and certification. Online mode became popular during these days.
India was not prepared for a sudden onslaught of such a crisis due to limited infrastructure in terms of human resource, money and other facilities needed for taking care of this situation. This disease did not spare anybody irrespective of caste, creed, religion on the one hand and ‘have and have not’ on the other. Deficiencies in hospital beds, oxygen cylinders, ambulances, hospital staff and crematorium were the most crucial aspects.
You are a hospital administrator in a public hospital at the time when coronavirus had attacked large number of people and patients were pouring into hospital day in and day out.
(a) What are your criteria and justification for putting your clinical and non-clinical staff to attend to the patients knowing fully well that it is highly infectious disease and resources and infrastructure are limited? (b) If yours is a private hospital, whether your justification and decision would remain same as that of a public hospital?
Approach · directive: “what criteria / whether”
What it asks · (a) State the criteria and justification for deploying clinical and non-clinical staff in an infectious, resource-short setting; (b) say whether they would differ in a private hospital.
It asks 2 things — answer each
- (a) State the criteria and justification for deploying clinical and non-clinical staff to attend to patients of a highly infectious disease with limited resources and infrastructure
- (b) State whether the justification and decision would remain the same in a private hospital
Open with · Duty to patients versus duty to the staff who treat them, under acute scarcity: send people into danger only on terms that are fair, safe and transparent.
Cover
- Opening: duty to patients versus duty to the staff who treat them, under scarcity; deploy people into danger only on fair, safe terms.
- (a) Criteria: need and competence, vulnerability, consent and rotation, equal protection for non-clinical staff; a flowchart from triage to daily review.
- (a) Justification: WHO's 2016 outbreak-ethics guidance (the duty to assume risk is not unlimited; society owes reciprocal support); utility and justice in triage.
- Reciprocity in 2020: Rs 50 lakh insurance per health worker (PM Garib Kalyan) and the ordinance making violence against health workers cognizable and non-bailable.
- (b) Private hospital: Parmanand Katara (1989) binds every doctor; means differ, not duty; never refuse an emergency for want of a deposit.
- Long-term: a trained reserve of staff, PPE and oxygen stockpiles, and surge-bed drills.
Close with · Public or private, protect those who protect patients and allocate scarce care by need; what changes is who pays, never whether protection is owed.
Add value (verified)
- The Pradhan Mantri Garib Kalyan package announced on 26 March 2020 provided an insurance cover of Rs 50 lakh per health worker fighting COVID-19.Finance Minister announces Rs 1.70 Lakh Crore relief package under Pradhan Mantri Garib Kalyan Yojana, PIB, 26 March 2020 ↗“Insurance cover of Rs 50 Lakh per health worker fighting COVID-19 to be provided under Insurance Scheme”
- The Epidemic Diseases (Amendment) Ordinance, 2020 made violence against healthcare personnel during an epidemic a cognizable, non-bailable offence, punishable with three months to five years' imprisonment.Promulgation of an Ordinance to amend the Epidemic Diseases Act, 1897 in the light of the pandemic situation of COVID-19, PIB, 22 April 2020 ↗“The amendment makes acts of violence cognizable and non-bailable offences. Commission or abetment of such acts of violence shall be punished with imprisonment for a term of three months to five years”
- Parmanand Katara v. Union of India (28 August 1989): under Article 21 the State must preserve life, and every doctor has a professional obligation to extend services to protect life.Pt. Parmanand Katara v. Union of India & Ors., Supreme Court of India, judgment of 28 August 1989 (Indian Kanoon) ↗“DATE OF JUDGMENT28/08/1989 BENCH: MISRA RANGNATH BENCH: MISRA RANGNATH OZA, G.L. (J) CITATION: 1989 AIR 2039 1989 SCR (3) 997 1989 SCC (4) 286 JT 1989 (3) 496 1989 SCALE (2)380 ACT: Constitution of India, 1950: Article 21-- Obligation on the State to preserve life--Every doctor has professional obligation to extend services to protect life”
- Parmanand Katara: every doctor, at a government hospital or otherwise, has the professional obligation to extend services to protect life, and no law or State action can delay that paramount obligation.Pt. Parmanand Katara v. Union of India & Ors., Supreme Court of India, judgment of 28 August 1989 (Indian Kanoon) ↗“(4) Every doctor whether at a Government hospital or otherwise has the professional obligation to extend his services with due expertise for protecting life. [1006A] (5) No law or State action can intervene to avoid/delay the discharge of the paramount obligation cast upon members of the medical profession.”
- Kant's Humanity Formula: never treat humanity, in oneself or in others, as a means only but always as an end in itself.Kant's Moral Philosophy — Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy ↗“6. The Humanity Formula Most philosophers who find Kant’s views attractive find them so because of the Humanity Formulation of the CI. This formulation states that we should never act in such a way that we treat humanity, whether in ourselves or in others, as a means only but always as an end in itself.”
- WHO, Guidance for managing ethical issues in infectious disease outbreaks (2016), section 13 on frontline workers: once a worker takes on heightened risk, society has a reciprocal obligation to provide necessary support.WHO, Guidance for managing ethical issues in infectious disease outbreaks (2016), section 13, Frontline response workers' rights and obligations (WHO document; copy hosted by AIDS Data Hub, as WHO's IRIS refuses scripted fetches) ↗“Regardless of whether a particular individual has a pre-existing duty to assume heightened risks during an infectious disease outbreak, once a worker has taken on these risks, society has a reciprocal obligation to provide necessary support.”
- WHO (2016), section 13: even workers who have a duty to work during an outbreak have a duty to assume risk that is not unlimited.WHO, Guidance for managing ethical issues in infectious disease outbreaks (2016), section 13, Frontline response workers' rights and obligations (WHO document; copy hosted by AIDS Data Hub, as WHO's IRIS refuses scripted fetches) ↗“some workers may have a duty to work during an infectious disease outbreak. However, even for these individuals, the duty to assume risk is not unlimited.”
Question: UPSC's CS (Main) 2021, GS Paper IV — paper ↗. Approach: Minimalist IAS, checked 1 Oct 2026 (how we verify) — UPSC publishes no model answers. ·
Model answer· 370words · Minimalist IAS
Duty to patients versus duty to the staff who treat them, under acute scarcity: as administrator I must send people into danger only on terms that are fair, safe and transparent.
Stakeholders
- Patients; clinical and non-clinical staff and their families; the hospital and government; the public.
(a) Criteria for deploying clinical and non-clinical staff
- Need and competence: trained ICU, anaesthesia and infection-control staff in high-risk wards; others in graded roles after rapid training.
- Vulnerability: keep pregnant, older and comorbid staff off direct COVID duty; use them for telemedicine, records and triage desks.
- Consent and rotation: volunteers first, then a transparent roster with short rotations, rest, testing and quarantine.
- Equal protection: sanitation workers, ward attendants and ambulance drivers are as exposed as doctors; PPE and support follow exposure, not designation.
- Triage patients by need
- Match staff by skill
- Protect: PPE, tests, insurance
- Rotate and rest
- Review daily
(a) Justification
- Duty with limits: WHO's 2016 outbreak-ethics guidance holds that even for those bound to serve, "the duty to assume risk is not unlimited"; I must make the risk reasonable.
- Reciprocity: once workers take on risk, "society has a reciprocal obligation to provide necessary support": Rs 50 lakh insurance per health worker under the PM Garib Kalyan package (2020), and a 2020 ordinance making violence against them cognizable and non-bailable.
- Utility and justice: one infected ICU team closes many beds, so protecting skilled staff saves most lives; published criteria keep it fair.
(b) Would a private hospital decide differently?
- Ethical core unchanged: in Parmanand Katara (1989) the Supreme Court held that "every doctor whether at a Government hospital or otherwise" must extend services to protect life.
- Means differ, not duty: without treasury support, seek reimbursement for reserved beds and use insurance; be candid about capacity, and never turn away an emergency for want of a deposit.
- Greater duty to staff: contractual private staff often have weaker security, so the duty to protect them is greater.
Long-term preparedness
- A trained reserve of staff, stockpiles of PPE and oxygen, and surge-bed drills, so that the next outbreak finds fairness already planned.
Public or private, protect those who protect patients and allocate scarce care by need; what changes is who pays, never whether protection is owed.
Prepared by Minimalist IAS to the answer standard of Shivam Singh (mentor, 7 years) · facts checked against official sources (how we verify) · updated 1 Oct 2026. UPSC publishes no model answers: compare your structure and coverage with this, then write your own.
