Universal health care is a health concept that provides quality health services to an individual irrespective of their economic and social status. India is a welfare state and as such it has the responsibility not to deprive any of its citizens of health benefits. For this, arrangements for public health care have also been made in India. Here government hospitals treat patients either free of cost or at a very low fee.
But treatment is not easily done in these government hospitals. One, they do not have that strong infrastructure, secondly there is a mess in the system here. There are many complexities in the arrangement from making the form to getting the date to see the doctor. Understand it like this that in big government hospitals like AIIMS, the date is available up to 3-8 months. In such a situation, the patient gets tired and runs towards the private hospital, but the fees there are so expensive that the patient and his family go below the poverty line while getting treatment.
Now if the poor health care system is to be improved, then there are two ways for it-
(1) Public health service should be improved, that is, the health infrastructure should be improved. But the funds given by the budget for health are insufficient to improve the health infrastructure. (2) Insurance system should be adopted in the health sector, that is, sick people should get their treatment done with the amount of insurance. In this direction, the Government of India has started Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojana under Ayushman Bharat Yojana, in which BPL category families are given insurance up to ₹ 5 lakh for a year. The number of such families is about 10 crore and their members are in the evening.