Health Of The Nation

As of 2019, the population of India was approximately 1.37 billion, bringing it closer to the most populous nation, China which had a population of 1.43 billion ( ourworldindata.org ). By 2027, India is expected to overtake China to become the most populous country on this planet with an estimated population of 1.47 billion. While China’s population is expected to start declining later this decade, it is estimated that the population of India will continue to grow and reach a peak of 1.7 billion in the late 2050s before starting to decline. Between now and 2060, India is expected to add over 400 million people. Looking at the staggering population numbers, every now and then there are discussions papers, demand from political parties among other to introduce measures to curb the population growth. There are good arguments both in favour and against policy decisions like One Child Policy. Basis the recently released report by the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare (MoHFW) — Health ...

On 26th November, Dr Harsh Vardhan, Union Minister for Health and Family Welfare (MoHFW) tweeted that he held a meeting with the officials of the National Health Authority (NHA), the implementing body of Ayushman Bharat or Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojana (PMJAY) to review the progress of the scheme. PMJAY provides free health insurance coverage to over 50 crores or bottom 40 per cent of the country's population. The scheme guarantees health services for approximately 1300 medical conditions with the financial support of up to INR 5,00,000/- per family per year. In his tweet, the minister also highlighted that, since its launch in September 2018, the scheme has provided over 1.4 crore cashless treatments worth INR 17,500/- crore to the poorest citizens. A visit to the official website of PMJAY ( https://pmjay.gov.in ) on 3rd December shows that till date, total admissions under the scheme have been 1,43,66,465. It also shows that claims raised were INR7,564 crore (almost INR10,00...

Ayushman Bharat, the flagship scheme of the government of India completes two years since its launch on this day in 2018. The scheme aimed at meeting the objectives of universal health coverage (UHC) in India is designed based on the recommendations of the National Health Policy 2017. The scheme, which aims for a comprehensive health care delivery has two major components; Health and Wellness Centres (HWCs) and Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojana (PM-JAY). While HWCs aim to cater to a severe shortage of primary care centres, the PM-JAY assures a health coverage of up to rupees five lakhs to the bottom 40 per cent of country's population (approximately 10.74 crore households or little over 50 crore people). PMJAY is the largest health assurance scheme globally. It provides a cashless cover for treatment of approximately 1300 predetermined health conditions to the eligible population. Prior to the launch of PMJAY, the health assurance schemes were rather small as each state aimed to pro...

The Constitution of India states that it is the “ duty of the State to raise the level of nutrition and standard of living and to improve public health ” (Government of India, 1950) . However, for the past decade, the public health expenditure in India continues to hover around one per cent of the gross domestic product (GDP) (MoHFW, 2019) . According to the World Bank, India is a Lower Middle-Income country, but its spending on healthcare is even less than the countries in the Lower Income Group. Since government financing is a function of the taxes that it raises, countries with a higher tax to GDP ratio tends to have better-financed healthcare systems. Low and middle-income countries with not so robust tax to GDP ratio finds it difficult to meet the demand for financing the healthcare of its citizens completely. With a tax to GDP ratio falling to a decade low of 9.88 per cent in FY20 (Seth, 2020) , naturally, public financing in India is insufficient to meet the healthcare require...