Women at Work - National Health Policy India

NATIONAL HEALTH POLICY

We have all heard the age-old adage:” Health is Wealth”, still our ruling governments choose to defer National health policy twice, before approving it in March,2017. The last health policy was issued about 15 years ago. The policy aims to address current and emerging health problems, provision for free drugs, diagnostics and emergency health care services to public hospitals. It encompasses providing primary health care through “health and Wellness” centres, providing comprehensive health care packages for major non – communicable diseases.

The National Health Policy suggests an expenditure of 2.5 per cent of GDP by 2025, up from 1.15% currently. The policy intends to increase life expectancy from 67.5 to 70 by 2025 and reduce infant mortality by to 28 from current rate of 41 per 1000 live births. The policy also aims at achieving the global 2020 HIV target, which is by 2020 90% with HIV will know their condition,90% of all diagnosed with HIV will receive therapy and 90% of all who receive theory will have viral suppression. Currently about 2.1 million people in India have been diagnosed with HIV and 43% adults receive therapy India is home to the third largest HIV epidemic As of August 2016, there were 22,000 facilities offering HIV testing and counselling.

According to the World Health Organization data, Non-Communicable diseases account for 53% of all deaths in India. The picture of mental illness in our country is not very optimistic too. According to a government report, one in every 4 women and 10% men suffer from depression. Against this scenario, there is a shortfall of about 39,950 psychiatrist and psychologists

India’s progress in the field of providing quality health care and eradication of disease has an ambiguous graph. While polio, maternal neonatal tetanus increase in life expectancy are all positive indicators, we are still battling, leprosy and HIV. This policy draws attention to the health care system in India and recognizes its importance. The previous governments blatantly ignored this policy and it’s a positive sign that the NDA government has not only brought the issue to the table, but is also keen on implementing it with set targets.

Performance of public systems, require deployment of human resources, infrastructure and capital, and that seems to be our Achilles Heel, the policy on paper in promising and effective, it makes us expect some change in the current system and when these systems fail especially health systems, their failure can invoke strong public sentiments.

The policy outlines its key principles as professionalism, integrity, ethics, equity, how to calculate equal half yearly instalments

This policy recommends reserving an allocation in the budget and mentions a “assurance based approach”, which in itself says it is not a radical change or even a step towards making health for every citizen a right.