‘The Union Budget was largely muted in terms of healthcare initiatives for the current year’
With the promise of an overall increase in healthcare spending, the Union Budget was largely muted in terms of healthcare initiatives for the current year. Aimed largely at the masses, the Budget focused on a single field of speciality – dialysis. The announcement aims to subsidise the costs and delivery through the PPP route (thereby keeping the private sector involved) and lower import duties on dialysis equipment. The Budget largely ignored other specialties/diseases, addressing the gap in healthcare infrastructure, the pharma sector and the entire medical devices segment (though a landmark FDI clearance for medical devices was given in the last year itself).
The new Health Protection Scheme providing a cover of Rs 1 lakh per family (belonging to the poor and weaker sections) including the buffer for senior citizens (60 years) is a welcome move. This can provide access to high cost treatments for families. The cover size also makes it attractive for private hospital operators to encourage patients from such schemes. But this will require clarity around collections, pre-existing diseases, participation of accredited insurance players etc.
Providing access to affordable generic medicines with the set-up of 3,000 stores under the Jan Aushadhi Yojana is again an effort aimed towards the masses. The Budget avoided addressing the larger issue of the price regime in the market.
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