We now think of prevention, early detection: Nadda on Indian healthcare

Union Minister of Health and Family Welfare JP Nadda on Thursday emphasised the country's focus on affordable and accessible healthcare while sharing his insights on India's journey towards a stronger, more inclusive healthcare future.

Addressing the FICCI Heal 2025 program, the Minister stated that the country, through the health policies signed in 2017, aimed to promote preventive healthcare and early detection.

The Union Minister said that India developed a new health policy in 2017 after waiting since 1998, when it was last developed. He highlighted that this health policy was not decided or discussed solely at Nirman Bhavan, but included all stakeholders.

"In 2017, we developed a new health policy following discussions with all the stakeholders. The change it brings is that we now think of preventive healthcare and early detection. When we say accessible healthcare, we expanded the base of healthcare by establishing 1.7 lakh Ayushman Arogya Mandirs for equitable, accessible and affordable healthcare..." Nadda said.

Speaking in detail about the medical schemes in the country, the Minister expressed happiness and stated that the Ayushman Bharat scheme had become the world's largest health coverage programme.

"World's largest health coverage program covering over 62 crore people with Rs 5 lakh health cover and now includes special provisions for those over the age of 70..."

Emphasising the availability of other schemes, Nadda said that the Jan Aushadi scheme had also made medicines affordable to the people, further stating that the country had also made significant investments in the medical infrastructure.

"We also have initiatives like Jan Aushadi now which offer affordable medicines to the people of the country...The country today has also made significant investments in the medical infrastructure..." he further stated.

Nadda said that insufficient expenditure was among the problems faced in the country's healthcare system

"Funds is not the problem, the problem is the expenditure... the state needs to have the money to spend on health schemes... we need to expand the capacity of our spending... that is the main challenge our country is facing right now...We are trying our level best..." he further said.

During the event, the FICCI-KPMG Knowledge Paper "AI in Healthcare - Reimagine Care with AI-driven Transformation" was launched, highlighting AI's potential to transform healthcare and drive efficiency, innovation, and equitable access across India.