NITI Aayog in a recent report spoke about the public-private partnership (PPP) model in healthcare.
The PPP model will work alongside the public health system and will be chargeable.
Why does the government need the participation of private sector?
India spends just than 1% of its gross domestic product (GDP) for health sector.
Countries that have robust public health systems spend much more.
Canada and the UK spend 8% of their GDP on healthcare.
India has set itself an unambitious target of 2.5% of GDP for distant 2025.
It is deducible that the low spending on health is a factor of governments and their employees being shielded from policies meant for the common people.
What are the evidences for private sector participation?
Private healthcare in India usually offers quality service but is often expensive and largely unregulated.
As per the Delhi government’s policy, the government would pay for surgeries of private citizens conducted at private hospitals.
These surgeries would be ones that the government would not be able to conduct expeditiously at its own facilities.
The Delhi government’s new scheme is a novelty for the common man but has a precedent in several government schemes for employees which use public funds to provide private healthcare.
e.g the Central Government Health Scheme (CGHS) has existed for decades and has been emulated by several states.
The states have floated similar schemes that discriminate between those who are employed by the state and those who are not.
