The draft National Health Policy 2015 comes up almost 12 years after the last such plan citing the main reasons-changing health needs of the people, inadequate healthcare expenditure by the governments and high out-of-pocket spending. The draft policy plans to introduce a health cess to fund basic healthcare infrastructure. Incidentally government introduced cess for education a decade ago in its 2004-2005 budget and we all know today what the state of education is. So here also by imposing a cess for infrastructure development things are not going to improve much but could worsen further. So the policy document in the long run may turn out to be a decorative document to be confined to the annals of archives. The document has failed to address contentious issues such as role of private sector players in this vital sector and extending the medi-care benefits to the weaker and needy section of the society. Though high in rhetoric the policy says it will aim to reduce the common man’s pain on healthcare but fails to tell how, when and where. Considering that the Union Government slashed the health budget last week one wonders a document like this can bring the change we are looking for at ground level. Though at the nascent stage, the policy really fails to address the ailing problem of healthcare especially in the direction of infrastructure development, improving the doctor-patient ratio, reaching out to the grass-root level and economically weaker segment of the society, addressing issues like maternal mortality and medical expenses. It looks like another unhealthy move from the Union Government to provide better healthcare to the people.
