India ’s Health Insurance Experiment. Who will be the winners?

By SAURABH JHA Though the exact cost of Modicare, the government’s extension of health insurance for poor people, estimated at one lakh crore (a trillion U.S. dollars), is open for debate, what is not disputable is that the cost of insuring India’s poor won’t fall with time. A sure way of accelerating healthcare inflation, that is speeding the rate of increase of healthcare costs, is by subsidizing or paying for health insurance. Insurance is like Newton’s Second Law of Motion – the velocity keeps increasing as long as the force is applied. Healthcare is a peculiar industry. Cars get cheaper but medical care doesn’t. The Maruti eventually became cheaper than the Ambassador, and more aesthetically pleasing than its Neanderthalic predecessor. Medical care doesn’t get cheaper because a life saved from cancer is a life waiting to be killed by another disease, which needs treating, too. Survivors of cancer get heart attacks and survivors of heart attacks get cancer, and survivors of both get dementia. It’s like a restaurant where you can’t just pay for lunch – if you pay for lunch you have to pay for breakfast and dinner and may be a few samosas in between the meals. But unlike eating, consumption of medical care is not guarded by satiety. The insatiable medical sciences keep delivering even more expensive ways death can marginally be deferred. For example, the once dreaded stroke which leads to paralysis is now treatable. However, the treatment is not cheap an...
Source: The Health Care Blog - Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Tags: OP-ED Source Type: blogs