Monday, 12 December 2022 | Dr BKS Sanjay & Dr Gaurav Sanjay
GUEST COLUMN
The Universal Health Coverage Day is commemorated each year on December 12. Universal health coverage is promoted as an instrument to help advance the more broadly conceived human right to health, which is based upon a number of international agreements, or widely affirmed international documents. Under the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals, all UN member States have agreed to try to achieve universal health coverage by 2030.
Universal Health Coverage (UHC) entails ensuring all people have access to quality health services including prevention, promotion, treatment, rehabilitation and palliation without incurring financial hardship. The concept covers three key elements of access, quality and financial protection. The theme of Universal Health Coverage Day this year is “Build the world we want: A healthy future for all”. The day is celebrated and is promoted by the World Health Organisation to provide financial risk protection, access to safe, effective, quality and affordable essential health care services including essential medicines and vaccines by all nations to their citizens. Every person irrespective of caste, creed, race, region and religion needs health, education and nutrition for his or her growth. Even ancient Indian scriptures mention that all humans should be healthy and disease free and none should suffer in any way. According to an Arabian proverb where there is health, there is hope and where there is hope, there is everything. We believe that health is not only an asset but a resource too. Hence, good health for one and all should be the highest priority of all governments. Although progress is being made by all countries of the world, millions of people still have no access at all to affordable quality health care. As the governments around the world are working towards providing good quality health care to the people even the Indian government is doing its bit to achieve UHC. The authorities are taking measures for the welfare of the citizens from time-to-time. These include awareness about medical issues, ensuring adequate infrastructure and promoting health insurance facilities. Universal health care services enable people to develop their potential and to achieve their goals to help not only themselves but to help others as well.
Human resources are the greatest resource on planet earth. Health, education and nutrition are the basic foundation stones for the growth and development of humans. Supporting the health care services is a foundational investment to develop our human resource. The President Droupadi Murmu during her address at the convocation in the Doon University recently said that the progress of any country depends on the quality of its human resources which in turn depend on the quality of the education. Education is the only tool to bring about a change in society. Being orthopaedic surgeons, we can say for sure that quality health care services will significantly reduce the burden of deformity and disability not only in the family and the community but at the national level as well. Currently, about 2.1 per cent of the Indian population is suffering from some or the other kind of disability with 20 per cent of them having orthopaedic disability which is mainly related to locomotion.We would like to suggest to all policy makers to give additional attention towards gathering solutions to these problems related to locomotion because if a person is healthy and mobile then only one can contribute his or her share in nation building.
Although medical treatment is very expensive in developed nations, even in India it is becoming more expensive and some treatments are still out of the reach of the poor people. In our country most of the people are getting the treatment after selling their assets like jewellery, land, vehicle, animals and property etc. The amount spent on universal health coverage can also be reduced by increasing the awareness about the value of their health. In addition to the Central Government Health Scheme (CGHS) and Employees State Insurance scheme (ESI), the current government of India under the leadership of Prime Minister Narendra Modi has started several new health insurance schemes to improve the health care services in India. One of the schemes Ayushman Bharat Yojana which was launched on September 23, 2018 is working as a milestone to extend the health care services to 10 crore poor families or approximately 50 crore beneficiaries providing coverage of up to Rs five lakh per family per year for secondary and tertiary care hospitalisation.
This scheme provides cashless benefits from any public or private empanelled hospital across the country. The status of implementation of Ayushman Bharat Yojana as on September 2020 has been impressive. Under this scheme 12.13 crore families have benefited all over the country. Over six lakh hospital admissions have been done under Ayushman Yojana in Uttarakhand alone till date. Ayushman Bharat Health Wellness Centres (AB-HWCs) are aimed at transforming 1.5 lakh sub-centres and primary health centres into Health and Wellness Centres to provide affordable and quality primary care to the last mile. There are other schemes like Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojana or National Health Protection Scheme, Pradhan Mantri Suraksha Bima Yojana, Aam Aadmi Bima Yojana (AABY), Janshree Bima Yojana, Universal Health Insurance Scheme (UHIS) etc. There are four public sector general insurance providers who have implemented Universal Health Insurance Scheme (UHIS) with the intention of enhancing people’s access to health care especially for people at or below the poverty line. This not only includes individuals but groups or families also.
As the WHO is focusing on universal health coverage, so is our government. The WHO asserts following countless studies that nations which invest in universal health care make a sound investment in their human resource. Access to affordable health care will not only truly improve someone’s health and life expectancy, but will also reduce poverty, create jobs and drive economic growth of the nation in a sustainable way in the due course of time.
(Padma Shri recipient Dr BKS Sanjay and Dr Gaurav Sanjay are orthopaedic surgeons based in Dehradun. Views expressed are personal)
