Effects of the Quality of Power Supply on Diabetic Retinopathy Screenings: An Experience From India

The United Nations and most governments around the world committed to sustainable development goals in 2015. The 17 sustainable development goals and 169 targets aspire to bring far-reaching global changes in the field of economics, health, education, inequality, social, and environmental issues. The sustainable development goals are integrated, which means that an action in one area will bring the change in another. The third sustainable development goal (good health and well-being) aims to achieve universal health coverage through its interlinking with other goals (United Nations, 2015). Improving access to affordable and clean energy, the seventh sustainable development goal is fundamentally tied to the third. Owing to its potential to affect health services, the World Health Organization (WHO) emphasized that electricity or power is an enabling factor for universal health care access (World Health Organization, 2014). It is important to link access to energy or power to health outcomes. The availability of electricity and its interaction with the health care system is an important determinant in providing and receiving health care information and services (Devasenapathy et al., 2016). The availability of electricity that provides continuous hours of supply and stable voltage has a direct impact on health outcomes (World Health Organization, 2014). The Indian state of Punjab has been reeling under acute electricity shortage due to limited electricity generation and distribution caused by depleting coal supplies (Kannappan, 2021; Vasdev, 2021). A high number of power shortages have been reported in the state in 2021 and 2022, leaving Punjab in an acute electricity crisis (Kannappan, 2021; Vasdev, 2021). While the health sector is no exception in being affected by power outages, these have significant consequences in the accessibility of health care and affect the delivery of continuous services. Meanwhile, traditional power sources mitigate the power demands in resource-poor settings to ensure continuity of services (Klinger, Landeg, & Murray, 2014). The Indian Public Health Standard (IPHS) lists out the essential medical equipment that is necessary to deliver quality healthcare in a public health setting. Most of the essential medical equipment is dependent on electricity. The lack of availability of and nonfunctional equipment could subsequently hamper delivery of health services, in settings that have limited resources (Mani, Patnaik, & Dholakia, 2019). Diabetic retinopathy is a complication of diabetes that can cause vision loss and visual