Yahoo – AFP, February
1, 2018
India has an estimated 840,000 medical doctors -- one for every 1,674 people -- far fewer than the one per 1,000 people recommended by the World Health Organization (AFP Photo/PRAKASH SINGH) |
India on
Thursday announced a national healthcare scheme for half a billion of its
poorest citizens in a major giveaway to voters in the final budget before a
general election.
Finance
Minister Arun Jaitley said India's most vulnerable families would be able to
access up to 500,000 rupees ($7,855) a year for hospital cover through the
initiative.
India
spends a little over one percent of its GDP on public healthcare -- one of the
lowest proportions in the world -- a sum the government is aiming to increase
to 2.5 percent by 2025.
The
government currently provides 30,000 rupees towards healthcare for poor
families, but that sum is insufficient to cover most medical procedures.
The
programme would take public healthcare in the world's largest democracy
"to a new aspiration level", said Jaitley.
"This
will be the world's largest government-funded healthcare programme," he
told parliament in his budget speech.
"The
government is steadily but surely progressing towards a goal of universal
health coverage."
He said
"adequate funds" would be provided to roll out the insurance program
to 500 million of India's poorest nationwide.
Nearly $190
million was earmarked to improve smaller local health centres accessed by many
of the most vulnerable, he added.
India is
home to 1.25 billion people but lacks sufficient doctors, and state-run
hospitals are stretched to breaking point.
Patients
face long delays for even minor treatment, and a consultation with a private GP
can cost 1,000 rupees ($15) -- a huge sum for millions living on less than $2 a
day.
Jaitley
said the government was "seriously concerned" that millions of
Indians had to borrow or sell assets to receive adequate treatment in hospital.
India only
has an estimated 840,000 medical doctors -- one for every 1,674 people -- far
fewer than the one per 1,000 people recommended by the World Health
Organization.
Prime
Minister Narendra Modi won a thumping mandate in 2014 promising, among other
things, a universal healthcare plan to protect India's poorest.
The budget
is his government's last before Indians go back to the polls for a general
election, which must be called by May next year.
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