BENGALURU: Public health experts and doctors rejoiced over a total budget of Rs 8,822 crore for health sector, which is 4 per cent of the total budget outlay. A total of Rs 6,645 crore has been allocated to the Department of Health and Family Welfare (an increase of Rs 1,000 crore from last year) and Rs 2,177 crore to medical education which is a marginal increase from last year.
Karnataka’s flagship universal health scheme — Arogya Bhagya — that was supposed to be rolled out last year on Kannada Rajyotsava (November 1) will finally be rolled out in February this year, announced Chief Minister Siddaramaiah, who also holds the finance portfolio. However, there have been no allocations in the budget.
Announcing the scheme while calling it ‘Arogya Karnataka Yojane’, instead of ‘Arogya Bhagya’, the CM said, “Arogya Karnataka Yojane (Universal Health Coverage, or UHC) will be started in February 2018 and will be implemented in the entire state by the end of this year in order to make primary and specific secondary and tertiary treatment available to all the people in the state.”
Presently, Karnataka spends Rs 1,022 crore annually on various government insurance schemes. In August last year, when Arogya Bhagya was first announced, Law and Parliamentary Affairs Minister T B Jayachandra had said it would cost the government Rs 869 crore. “A continued cause of concern with these schemes is the model of empanelling private hospitals. The private hospitals have been cornering an overwhelming 82 percent of the scheme funds which comes to Rs 838 crore annually. This is 13 percent of the total health budget which is a huge proportion of public money being siphoned off to private hospital coffers,” said Akhila Vasan, convener, Karnataka Janarogya Chaluvali.
“Under the present UHC scheme, the state government should reverse this pattern and allocate only 20 percent of the funds to the private sector. The rest 80 percent of the funds under the UHC should be earmarked only for government facilities,” she added.