Problems and Prospects of Health Care Services in India

India as a nation has been growing economically at a rapid pace particularly after the advent of New Economic Policy of 1991. However, this rapid economic development has not been accompanied by social development particularly health sector development. Health sector has been accorded very low priority in terms of allocation of resources. Public expenditure on health is less than 1 per cent of GDP in India. It has further witnessed decline during the post economic liberalization period. The meager resource allocation to health sector has adversely affected both access and quality of health services. The unequal access to health services is reported across strata, gender and location (i.e. urban and rural areas). With a view to improve access and quality of health services, government should enhance public spending on health sector in the vicinity of 3 per cent of GDP. Today, the healthcare system in India faces a challenge in raising the service quality and ensuring equitable access to people while simultaneously gearing up its capabilities to tackle the changing disease incidence profiles. This challenge needs to be addressed through a concerted effort of both public and private sectors by their agreeing on suitable public policy initiatives which incentivize financing and provision of healthcare, and thereby increase healthcare access to the people. This paper examines the problems and prospects of health care services in India.