Health cover: Too little, too scarce

The latest National Sample Survey (NSS) shows that over 80% of India’s population is not covered under any health insurance scheme. The data reveals that despite seven years of the Centre-run Rashtriya Swasthya Bima Yojana (RSBY), only 12% of the urban and 13% of the rural population had access to insurance cover.

What else the survey notes?

§  Around 86% of the rural population and 82% of the urban population are not covered under any scheme of health expenditure support.

§  Coverage is correlated with living standards, as in urban areas, over 90% of the poorest residents are not covered, while the figure is 66% for the richest residents.

§  The poorer households appear unaware or are beyond the reach of such coverage, both in rural and urban areas.

Share of Private doctors:

Private doctors are the single-most significant source of treatment in both rural and urban areas. 72% of the treatment provided in rural areas and 79% in urban areas was availed in the private sector. The corresponding figures in the previous survey were 78% in rural areas and 81% in urban areas, which shows that the overall share of public sector saw a slight increase.

§  The rural population spent, on an average, Rs.5,636 for hospitalised treatment in a public sector hospital and Rs.21,726 at a private sector hospital.

Challenges:

§  The biggest hurdle in seeking medical treatment was financial constraint, reported by over 55% and 60% people in rural and urban areas, respectively.

In rural areas, the next most important reason was no medical facility available in neighbourhood, accounting for 15% cases, while this figure was just 1.3% for urban areas.