Health Policy and Planning Case study 2022

Health Policy and Planning
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Executive summary
In the recent decade India has become the 2nd largest populated country and the largest
democracy in the world facing changes in socio-economic mix and demographics and with a 7%
economic growth rate India is experiencing significant needs and requirements in the healthcare
sector. Compare to other developing countries India’s health policy is the poorest and needs
legislative and judicial government actions to resolve its action. India is facing an acute shortage
of health services in the rural areas and the government of India should implement national level,
state level and district level policies to improve the medical facilities. Changes in demographics,
corruption, poor governance, shortage of human resource and acute shortage of funds are major
challenges being faced by the Indian health sector. Proper measures should be taken by the
government in collaboration with healthcare institutions to address these challenges to provide
better healthcare to the Indian Population.
Introduction
Health policy is a process of actions, decisions and plans that are undertaken to accomplish
public health goals in a particular nation, region or society. World Health Organization said that
by implementing a perfect health policy will lead the civilization to a better future. The
government should enact a strong health policy for increasing the lifestyle and health of the
population. To implement an efficient health policy the government needs proper planning and
the success of the health policy depends on the effectiveness of the planning. This study will
explain different health policies of India, it different challenges and recommendations needed to
improve the Indian health sector.
Health Policy Challenges
India becoming the 2nd largest populated country in the last decade, there has been changes in
socio-economic mix, economy and demography which lead to changes in healthcare
requirements. Recently the Indian healthcare sector has observed massive growth in recent times
up to 16.5 percent from 2008 to 2016 (Naudé, Szirmai & Haraguchi, 2016).
Demographics
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India is facing a burden of non-communicable disease also called as ‘lifestyle’ disease which has
increased in recent years. India’s increasing working-age and middle-class population have to
lead an increase in lifestyle diseases such as diabetes, blood pressure and cardiac alignments.
There has been an increase in death rated due to lifestyle diseases from 42% in 2001-2002 to
50% in 2015. These types of diseases have a direct socio-economic impact on the population of
India (Hirota et al., 2017).
Public Vs Private sector
The Indian health care system has observed a weak contribution to the public and private sectors.
According to NSSO, a survey is conducted on a small sample population and it is observed that
in June 2014, 243 people out of 1000 have received medical care from the public sectors and 756
people out of 1000 have received treatment from the private sector. In total healthcare
expenditure India, accounted for 20% to the public sector and 80% to the private sector. Being a
large democracy and an emerging superpower India spends only 1.4% of GDP in the healthcare
sector, which is the lowest compared to BRICS nations. This has become a serious burden for the
poor and middle class to afford the medical expenditure. It is surveyed that 20% of India’s poor
class population 2.6 times most likely to forgo healthcare than the upper-class people (Savitha,
Kumar & Kiran, 2016).
Health Infrastructure
Infrastructure for health is another burden on India’s population. Being a populated country India
lacks in vital resource shortage and shortage of manpower. The is an acute shortage of beds in
hospitals with a ration of 0.5 beds per 1000 people and lacks behind compared to China with 2.3,
Brazil with 2.6 and the US with 3.2. India’s ratio is much lower compared to WHO approved
standards. Providing healthcare is quite expensive and a burden to the government.
Human Capital Crunch
The healthcare sector is made up of highly skilled and efficient doctors, nurses, pharmacists and
medical support staff. The ratio of doctors available to Indians is very low at 0.7 doctors per
1000 people compared to China’s 1.9 doctors per 1000 people. Doctors in India have a tendency
to shift in the urban areas and as a result, most of the rural population is facing a shortage of
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doctors. India has a shortage of 81% of specialist doctors in rural areas. India is facing a shortage
of more than 3500 doctors in its primary health care centers in rural areas.
Health Insurances
India has a poor healthcare insurance model and it lacks in covering three-quarters of the Indian
population and only 24% of the Indian population have private or government health insurance.
The contribution of government in providing health insurance is roughly 32% which is very low
compared to the UK’s 83.5%. The commercial health insurance in India only covers the hospital
treatment and prescription medicines are not covered by this insurance model.
Healthcare Policies in India
Indian Government has taken several measures to solve the challenges faced by the health care
system.
National Health Policy 2017
The union government has taken up a Five-year plan and launched the National Health Policy in
2017. The purpose of this policy is to ensure and provide better healthcare to the Indian
population. With this policy, the government tried to scale up the Indian healthcare industry and
provide it a progressive growth. Some of the objectives of this healthcare policy are-
 By 2025 the life expectancy at birth of the Indian population must increase 67.5 to 70.
 By 2019 infant mortality rate should be decreased to 28.
 By 2025 increasing the usage of the public health sector by 50%.
 Increasing family planning above 90% by 2025.
 With Swachh Bharat Mission government tried to provide access to safe water and
sanitation to every household by 2019.
 To increase the expenditure in health sectors in ratio to GDP from 1.15% to 2.5% by
2025 (Willis & Bishop, 2017).
 Will establish primary and secondary healthcare centers in rural areas and to maintain a
database of information on the health sector by 2020.
Pradhan Mantri Jeevan Jyoti Bima Yojana 2015
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