Modi-fied Plan

[Unkotare]

How much will it cost Modi politically to back off his campaign promise about universal health care?

 

[Vikrant]

I did not know he had a universal health plan whatever that means in Indian parlance.

As far as India is concerned, they love imitating U.S. There were quite a few hospitals in the vicinity where I grew up in India. A good number of these hospitals were run by Hindu organizations. They were very good and costed nothing. There were quite a few hospitals run by local government as well but they were sort of crappy even from my Indian standard. The bottom line is that healthcare was never an issue for me because of Indian tendency to decouple healthcare from money making enfranchises. It was always available, it met my needs and it costed pretty much nothing. As a matter of fact, I missed this aspect of India even long after I moved to the U.S.

Anyway, to make the long story short, now they want to imitate U.S. Those hospitals are not free anymore. They have same doctors and same equipment but they now are geared towards bankrupting patients. They are buying into the bizarre notion that a healthcare system has to be expensive in order to be good. Healthcare is becoming too expensive for average Indian now. So now they have healthcare insurance companies just like the U.S.

I have been watching this development in India with disappointment for healthcare is one thing you do not want to copy from the U.S. There are so many good things one can learn from the U.S. and healthcare system is not one of them.

 

[Unkotare]

During his campaign, Modi made quite a lot of promising universal health care. Trying to make that a reality has proven far more costly than anticipated and is probably impossible at this point.

 

[Vikrant]

I was not aware that Modi promised anything like that. However, I do know one thing that Indians have commercialized healthcare. Now doctors are all about making money. There is no regulation on them so they charge whatever they feel like charging. Under these circumstances, it will be hard but not impossible to implement universal healthcare plan. I am fine if Indians want expensive healthcare to feel as if they have good healthcare but they do need universal healthcare more than any other nation in the world. Not just universal healthcare, they also need some sound regulations with respect to doctors and insurance companies.

 

[Unkotare]

Exclusive Modi government puts brakes on India s universal health plan Reuters

 

[Vikrant]

Exclusive Modi government puts brakes on India s universal health plan Reuters

That dude reminds me of Republicans in the U.S.