How is the Penetration of Health Insurance Impacting the Indian Healthcare?

The Indian healthcare sector is booming tremendously with its huge urban and rural population. To add to the fact, a number of private players in the market are mushrooming across the nation in order to meet the growing demand for quality healthcare facilities. The progressive industry is prone to witness various emerging trends in the market that would change the entire healthcare scenario in the upcoming years and contribute to its growth and development. With the increase in healthcare costs by private players and inadequate public funding from the government, there is expected a significant rise in out-of-the-pocket medical expenditure. All these factors bring in the need for the healthcare industry to offer value and convenience to consumers so that they can manage their health expenses well. This is where the role of health insurance comes to play.

As the healthcare cost is becoming increasingly expensive, more and more people are looking for alternative ways to support their outlays. As a result, healthcare insurance has been becoming a necessity among both rural and urban population to encase their medical treatments as a provision for financial protection. There is a sizable penetration of health insurance in the recent years and has changed the entire healthcare scenario, particularly providing access to high-end medical treatments and quality healthcare services for both urban and rural population.

Current State of Health Insurance in the Country: 

The country is currently enduring the burden of communicable and non-communicable diseases. This has led to a high financial burden on the poor population in bearing the health costs of getting quality healthcare. In that case, a large proportion of people in the country are incurring heavy expenses due to financing for hospitalization. In India, only a minuscule of healthcare is financed through government schemes or community financing, and most of the situation that exists is taken care of through out-of-pocket payment and health insurance schemes.

There are reasons why health insurance is the need of the hour for the Indian population as they encounter high levels of stress, both physically and mentally. The unhealthy lifestyle changes, weakened immunity levels, longer working hours with little physical activity, and the environment changes have put Indians at a greater risk of contracting an illness. Moreover, the rise in non-communicable diseases and communicable diseases in the country has largely affected a huge number of people, particularly in urban areas. The increasing breakthroughs in the medical domain have resulted in unbelievably expensive cures, incurring high operating expenses. In addition, the incomplete financial planning, inefficient government financing, and added indirect costs swell up to the financial burden, seriously impacting one’s finances and savings to meet the healthcare costs. 

Given the aforementioned scenario, health insurance stands as the key pillar for the financial well-being of the general public as it reduces the impact of untoward health expenses and increases the payment capacity of an individual to go for high-end medical treatments, thus enabling them to gain access to quality healthcare services. However, the present condition of health insurance in India is underpenetrated because a large number of population is still unaware of using health insurance as a means to finance medical expenditure. It is high time that public and private insurance players be proactive in expanding coverage and distribution of health insurance products/services by spreading the right knowledge and awareness about insurance to the population. It is necessary that the common masses understand the nuances of buying health insurance and should start seeing it as an investment rather than as an expense. With the right insurance, people get the promise of financial protection against their future medical expenses.

Growth Opportunities in the Healthcare Sector of India:

India has a high potential market with a grooming diverse population of various demographic, socio-economic, and geographical spread. With the private players entering the health insurance industry, there is expected a tremendous growth in the next few years. To enhance the insurance business, insurers have come up with appropriate products and distribution systems to cater the need of each and every segment. Targeting the growing middle-class segment of the nation, the health insurance industry has started leveraging new channels that expand outreach and reduce selling cost. As of now, the penetration of health insurance in the healthcare market is witnessing a steep growth and has emerged as one of the fast-growing business segments in the healthcare sector. On the other hand, the growing awareness in people about the benefits of health insurance and the government regulations on liberalizing private insurance market is increasing the availability of health insurance programs to the high-risk population.

In that sense, the healthcare sector is burgeoning with new opportunities across all its sub-segments and the health insurance industry is no exception. There are ample jobs for management professionals in the healthcare industry, for which they need to be well equipped and trained. Having the right foundation in healthcare management education will propel graduates into finding the right opportunity and embarking on a potential career. We, at the International Institute of Health Management Research, New Delhi, offer globally relevant standards of health management education to cater to the needs of the industry.

IIHMR is a premier organization, providing industry-oriented academic education and training to produce highly skilled healthcare professionals that can efficiently bridge the rising gap between the demand and availability of well-educated and knowledgeable professionals in the healthcare industry of the nation. IIHMR possesses proven excellence in the educational field, imparting executive training programs that enhance the technical and managerial skills and abilities in students to prepare them for a prospective career in the burgeoning healthcare sector.

IIHMR is aware of the growth opportunities prevailing in the healthcare industry, and has hence accordingly designed its courses to arm its students with improved practical skills and analytical approach so that they can perform with efficiency in identifying and delivering the needs within healthcare and its sub-segments like health insurance and benefit from the growth opportunities present therein.