Govt to increase public expenditure on health in 11th plan

Bangalore, Aug 1 (UNI) Public expenditure on health, a meagre 0.9 per cent of the GDP now, will be hiked to two to three per cent in the 11th five-year plan, to be launched next year, Planning Commission Deputy Chairman Montek Singh Ahluwalia informed today.

''People are spending much more than the Union and State Governments on healthcare, amounting to five per cent of the GDP, while the Governments' share had been low at just 0.9 per cent. This will be either doubled or trebled,'' he said.

Inaugurating Asha Dinesh Institute for Advanced Surgery at Narayana Hrudayalaya here, Mr Ahluwalia said the Planning Commission was outlining these issues in the approach paper for the 11th plan.

The stress would be on how better the health insurance schemes could be supported from the government side. Supporting people by extending subsidy on health insurance schemes would be better than pumping all the money into primary health care. National Health Insurance system was a better alternative to provide specialist healthcare to common people, he said.

Mr Ahluwalia said that apart from free medical care provided by the government, mainly in primary health, there should also be an alternative that offered speciality care for the poor. Though public and private partnership in extending healthcare had brought good results, alternative ways of providing modern healthcare to all should also be explored.

He called upon the people to go in for self insurance in health as specialist medical care costed more. The government would extend help by providing subsidy to the poor to help them pay for the insurance schemes. It had been taken up under the National Health Mission and its scope would be widened, he said.

Mr Ahluwalia, considered one of the champions of liberalisation process in the country, agreed to a suggestion that public healthcare could not be left to the market. ''We can't leave the market to play a major role in public health. This can be learnt from the example of the United States, where despite availability of modern technology, health outcome had turned worse. Leaving everything to market driven solutions in healthcare will not bring good results,'' he added.

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