Health Insurance in India: Problems and Prospects

Human development is the expansion of people's freedoms to live long, healthy and creative lives. The capability to enjoy healthcare requires that people are not refused treatment because they cannot pay or they do not have access to health insurance. Health Insurance is an important enabler in expanding the freedom horizon of people. Since the liberalization of insurance sector in India,the health insurance segment underwent a metamorphosis with strong linkage effects. It emerged as the fastest growing business with high growth potential and became a game changer. Emergence of new set of demand including medical tourism, products, technology, organizations, stakeholders, business value chain, business processes, regulations, benchmarks, lifestyles,etc, led to unprecedented dynamism and complexities at macro as well as micro levels in health insurance market thereby influencing various themes and issues of technological, social, economic, and legal framework. Using a comprehensive analytic tool, the Stakeholders Model, the book identifies the problems, recommends the solutions and envisions the prospects of health insurance touching lives of people including the poor and the old.