14 Dec NATIONAL HEALTH ACCOUNTS ON HEALTH EXPENDITURE (GS -2 DEVELOPMENT & MANAGEMENT RELATED TO HEALTH)
NATIONAL HEALTH ACCOUNTS ON HEALTH EXPENDITURE- Today Current Affairs
National health accounts has reported that there is decline of out of pocket expenditure from 64.2% in 2013-14 to 48.8% in 2017-18,owing to the increased government expenditure on health.The NHA estimates are based on internationally accepted system of health account 2011, provided by the World health organisation this report will be helpful to assist in policy formulation and strategy development and will enhance capacity building.
Key Points
- There is an increased govt share in the total GDP, for the year 2017-18. The increase has registered to 1.35% in 2017-18 from 1.15% in 2013-14.
- In terms of per capita, the government’s health expenditure has increased from 1042 to 1753 billion 2013-14 to 2017-18.
- The share of primary healthcare has also increased from 51.1% in 2013-14 to 54.7% in 2017-18. Primary and secondary care together accounts for more than 80% of the current govt. Health expenditure.
- The share of social security expenditure on health which encompasses social health insurance programmes,govt financed health insurance schemes and medical reimbursement in the public sector,has also led.
- Due to the rise in the share of government expenditure in the total budget to 40.8% there has been a decline in out of pocket expenditure to 48.8% for 2017-18. This has been possible due to the increased utilisation of government health facilities and reduction in the cost of services at the health care facilities.
- The government initiatives like Ayushman Bharat,Pradhan mantri Jan arogya yojana, Rashtriya bal swasthya karyakram, janani shishu Suraksha karyakram etc has helped the beneficiaries to access the healthcare facilities hence maximising the coverage of public health sector.
Issues with Health sector: The Hindu Analysis
- Limited existence of primary healthcare services,with limited services like pregnancy care,childcare and provision of national health programmes.
- Lack of training and supervision has led to the poor health management skills and has compromised the quality of health services for example As per the report of John Hopkins Bloomberg school of public health in 2019, nearly one out of every 100 children does not celebrate their 5th birthday either due to diarrhoea or pneumonia.also suboptimal access to clean water and sanitation have challenged the eradication of such diseases.
- Lack of funding- India spent only 1.8% of its GDP on health in 2020-21 and its total out of pocket Expenditure is around 2.3% of GDP.its is comparatively low with regard to OECD countries average 7.6% and Brics countries average of 3.6%.
- India has less than the required number of doctors i.e one doctor over the population of 1445 against the norm of 1:1000.
Way forward
- India needs to optimize it’s primary healthcare services so that non-communicable diseases can be early detected and prevented and children could be given protection from diarrhoea and pneumonia.
- There is a need to encourage investment in other colleges in lines of AIIMS to ramp up quality health services in low costs
- Public private partnership should be emphasised to leverage the expertise of the private sector.
- Research and development should be incentivised by additional tax deductions to further support greater investments in new drug developments and reducing GST on life saving and Essential drugs.
- More attention is required to be given towards training,reskilling and knowledge upgradation of the existing healthcare workforce so that quality services could be provided.
- There is a need to have a single authority responsible for public health that is legally empowered to enforce compliance of the health standards.
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Plutus IAS Current Affairs Team Member
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