Indian finance minister Arun Jaitley has announced a new ambitious new health insurance scheme that will provide 100 million poor families, or approximately 500 million individuals, with a health cover of INR500,000 ($7,850) for free treatment of serious ailments.
“We are now launching a flagship national health protection scheme to cover 10 crore poor and vulnerable families. This is approximately 50 crore beneficiaries, by providing them up to INR5 lakh per family per year for secondary and tertiary care hospitalisation,” Jaitley said.
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“My government has decided to take health care protection to a new aspirational level,” Jaitley said. “Adequate funds will be provided for smooth implementation of this program.”
Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s ambitious plan, called the National Health Protection Scheme (NHPS), is expected to cost the government $1.71bn annually. It is estimated that the premium for insuring each family would be approximately INR1,100 ($17.15).
To fund this scheme, the government has decided to levy an additional 1% tax that is expected to generate INR110bn annually.
According to the National Family Health Survey-4 (2015-16), just 28.7% families in India have at least one person who is covered by some form of health insurance.
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By GlobalDataFollowing the announcement, shares of insurance companies jumped in India.
