Eighty-two per cent of the persons with disabilities in the country do not have any health care protection despite the claims of the government to the contrary. Forty-two per cent of them are not even aware of the central government’s flagship programme for people’s health, Ayushman Bharat Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojana (ABPMJAY), according to a recent national survey by the Centre for the Promotion of Employment for Disabled People.

The number of persons with different kinds of disabilities in the country is enormous, 26.8 million or 2.21 per cent of the population as per the 2011 census. While the next census, which was due in 2021 but postponed to this year, can provide the most dependable update since it covers the entire population, other studies, which, too, cannot be ignored since they are based on scientific statistical sampling methods, have shown a marked increase in this number; the NFHS-5 (2019-21) reported it to be 63.28 million people, equivalent to 4.52 per cent of the population.

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This is not to say that those already covered under some government-sponsored schemes are getting hassle-free healthcare. The overall health of the health sector is not well. The experience of the enrolled suggests that many of the hospitals empaneled refuse the treatment with great impunity; the needy have either to pay, if they can, out of pocket or go without treatment if they can’t, and live or die with the disease.

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The Ayushman Bharat scheme, wherever it is accepted, covers only in-patient costs, not the out-patient services that comprise a significant 80 per cent of healthcare needs. Another issue is massive corruption at different levels in the implementation of the scheme, as observed by the CAG in one of its reports. Coming to healthcare in general, the pure commercial interest and market force philosophy takes precedence over the public health responsibility of the government. The health infrastructure is neither adequate nor suitable for the masses of people in the country. It encourages private profits and helps private insurance. It has a poor 1:1,500 doctor-to-patient ratio and 1.7 nurses to 1,000........

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