India: Premium on mega healthcare scheme lower than estimated: NITI

• Government’s premium on insurance cover of INR500,000 for every eligible household under the new National Health Protection Scheme (NHPS) would be around INR900-1000 per family annually, lower than the earlier estimate of INR1000-1,200, a senior NITI Aayog official said.
• The official further said that representatives of all states with the exception of Tripura, where the assembly elections are on, participated in a meeting on NHPS, organised by the government think tank and the ministry of health and family welfare.
• Earlier, West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee had reportedly expressed apprehensions about joining the NHPS.
• About 10 million people in West Bengal would be eligible to join the scheme, the official said, adding if the state opt out, it would lose INR6bn of Centre’s share.
• Under the funding arrangement, the Centre will provide 60% fund, while the remaining money would have to come from concerned states. In case of special category states, the Centre will provide 90% of fund.
• Earlier, it was estimated that the premium for providing healthcare to an eligible family would be around INR1000-1200.
• In his Budget for 2018-19, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley had provided an initial corpus of INR20bn for NHPC which aims to provide medical cover of up to INR500,000 to over 100 million poor and vulnerable families, constituting 40% of India’s total population.
• With the debate on the fiscal burden of the National Health Protection Scheme (NHPS) continuing, a report has pegged the cost of the new healthcare plan under INR120bn citing the likely low claim ratio in the first few years.
• SBI Research in a report on 20 Feb 18 said, “the initial cost under the scheme will be less than the market estimate of INR120bn (the Budget has already provided INR20bn and INR110bn is proposed to be mobilised through a cess) because the claim ratio in the first few years will be low as it generally takes time for awareness to increase”.
• The report notes that while there is a lot of debate that the scheme would increase fiscal deficit by 10-15 bps, the new initiative is the need of the hour as many developed and developing countries have already started universal healthcare scheme in the early 40s of the last century. 32 of the 33 developed countries have universal healthcare.

External Link : https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/economy/policy/modicare-to-initially-cost-less-than-rs-12000-cr-a-year-report/articleshow/63002030.cms

External Link : https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/economy/policy/premium-on-mega-healthcare-scheme-to-be-rs-900-1000-niti/articleshow/63002782.cms