Should we be looking at free healthcare for all or affordable healthcare?

Dear Sudip I agree with you.

There has been a rural urban divide and bias was created in providing life saving services.

But the misery is not ended there by just generalizing that urban population has all the healthcare facilities.

According to statistics and data,Health of the urban poor is considerably worse off than the urban middle and high income groups and is as worse as the rural population.

There are thousands of easily preventable maternal, child and adult deaths each year and millions of days of productivity lost each year.

One in ten children in slums do not live to see their fifth birthday. Malnutrition among urban poor children is worse off than in rural areas.

Only 42 % of slum children receive all the recommended vaccinations. Over half (56 %) of child births take place at home in slums putting the life of both the mother and new born to serious risk. Poor sanitation conditions in slums contribute to the high burden of disease in slums. Two-thirds of urban poor households do not have access to toilets and nearly 40 % do not have piped water supply at home.

Infrastructure:

There is no proper infrastructure wich this section of population can be able to afford and access. To know this one has to just take a rounf=d of any slum or a municiple hospital. there are many factors which is hindering the accessibility to urban poor. Slums inhabiting land belonging to other agencies and therefore illegal and vulnerable to eviction, rapid migration and mobility among slum population also affect health delivery in urban poor communities.

THERE IS NO URBAN CENTRIC POLICY. THE POLICY IS ONLY FOCUSSED ON RURAL HEALTH CARE,

Therefore there is an urgent need to address this issue with very committed efforts.

Mr. Bhattacharya,

I think you are bit confused about the concepts of the affordability and accessibility. 

How come an individual be able to access the healthcare if it is not affordable at all?

Secondly, it reflects from your argument that you limits Health care only as the hospitalization and providing secondary or tertiary level hospitals care services.

However, there are large unmet needs in the population in the urban poor and rural people for primary care itself.

there is huge provider and access gap in the primary healthcare. Government should first provide the free and accessible health care at primary health care level.

we must not depend on the technology driven magic bullet and medicalization of the entire health care.

The concept of affordability is also very context specific. In Indian context the world bank supported reforms creat the havoc by making affordable health care services from the free primary health care services.

Secondly,

Even if the government has come up with the insurance the key lies in implementation.

for example many government health care schemes and plans are utilized by the private medical and hospital health care sector for purely minting money.

these profit motives providers not only bleeding the government ex-chequer but also committing crime of infant, neonatal and maternal mortality.

For example, Governement of Mharashtra has started the Jeevandayi scheme but beneficiaries of these schemes are very few.

Mumbai alone having various bug hospitals registered under trust and according to the Mumbai Public Trust Act,they are entitled to admit and provide the services to arleat 20% poor population. the beds msut be reserved for these patients but in reality, these big players are pretending to serve the community but in fact are cheating community by eating on heavy subsidies from governemnt in the name of charity.

therefore the affordable concept id useless and the healthcare is the right to life according to constitution hence state should safeguard this right by providing free health care. 

Yes i support it

I feel that every treatment should include the free part & payment part.

Affordable services are always better to choose upon but that should have the been provided with adequate quality.

In india where 50 % of population is under the level of poverty who is going to pay ? NOBODY

I personally feel that EMERGENCY CARE should be 100% free (and should be only provided by the government) and other services(beyond emergency) should be charged on the parameters decided by the goverment to make it more affordable to everyone.

No system can survive on only free services and this is true here also but no goverment can deny the right of its people to be get basic treatment to servive and exist (one of their fundamental right).

SURVIVAL IS THE CORE PHILOSOPHY IN HUMAN EXISTENCE.