Health Sector in Budget 2022: Despite Covid pandemic, health no longer the highlight

What is the News?

In Budget 2022, the Finance Minister has announced several initiatives for the Health Sector. But the Budget 2022-23 has not allocated much to the health sector as required despite the ongoing pandemic.

What are the initiatives announced in the Health Sector in Budget 2022?

Health Budget: The health sector saw a muted hike amid a still looming Covid-19 pandemic and its aftermath. Overall, the health budget is up merely 0.8% over the current fiscal’s revised estimates and 16% over the budgetary estimates.

Covid vaccination support to states: The government has pledged Rs 5,000 crore as support to states for COVID vaccination. Where,  FY22’s Revised Estimate shows a spend of Rs 39,000 crore on the vaccination drive that has covered over 75% of the adult population since its launch on January 16, 2021.

Schemes related to health: Budget has seen an increase of over 7% in the allocation towards the National Health Mission. Pardhan Mantri Swasthya Suraksha Yojana has also seen an allocation increase from Rs 7,400 crore to Rs 10,000 crore. The health infrastructure mission, too, has seen its budget go up from Rs 315 crore to Rs 978 crore.

PM Ayushman Bharat Health Infrastructure Mission has seen a substantial increase from Rs 585 crore last year to Rs 4,177 crore this year.

Focus on mental health: Because of rising in mental health problems in people of all ages due to the pandemic, FM announced a ‘National Tele Mental Health Programme’. It will include a network of 23 tele-mental health centres of excellence, with NIMHANS being the nodal centre. International Institute of Information Technology-Bangalore will provide the technical support. The scheme will support private players and start-ups to increase the current coverage of the locations, including tier-2 and tier-3 cities.

National Digital Health Ecosystem: It will be an open platform. It will comprise an exhaustive list of digital registries of health providers and health facilities, unique health identity, consent framework and universal access to health facilities.

Digital Health: The Budget has increased the allocation for the national digital health mission by more than two and half times to Rs 200 crore for 2022-2023, up from merely Rs 75 crore in the revised estimates for the current financial year.

Women health: Budget allocation has been improved for Mission Shakti, Mission Vatsalya, And Saksham Anganwadi And Poshan 2.0.

What are the drawbacks for the Health Sector in Budget 2022?

According to health experts, budget 2022-23 is a shift to a post-pandemic phase by the government. The drop in allocation for vaccination indicates that the government feels that adequate jabs have been administered.  The government has allocated none to Covid -19 Emergency Response and Heath system preparedness, which means covid is no longer a threat to the government.

Also, there is no mention of vaccines, betterment of hospitals, improving public health facilities. Experts are also disappointed as there are no strategic stated measures to boost domestic manufacturing of medical devices. Presently, this industry is 80-85%  import-dependent.

Source: This post is based on the following articles:

“Budget 2022: Despite Covid pandemic, health no longer the highlight” published in the Business Standard on 2nd February 2022.

“16% hike in healthcare sector allocation” published in The Hindu on 2nd February 2022.

“Finance Minister prescribes 2.5x booster shot for Mission Digital Health” published in TOI on 2nd Feb 2022.