Johari Digital Healthcare sees that the Union government’s flagship scheme, Ayushman Bharat Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojana (AB-PMJAY) which completed two years has led to an increase in demand for hospitals, which in turn has boosted the demand for new-age medical devices and pharmaceuticals for treatment.
The introduction of the scheme led to the easy availability of healthcare services to the economically weaker section across the country. Besides the end-consumers, the scheme has benefitted all the prime stakeholders the hospitals, medical device industry, and pharma industry. The scheme has already provided relief to over 10 crore families, said Satyendra Johari, chairman & founder, Johari Digital Healthcare.
In December 2019, the government decided to procure essential medical devices for the empanelled hospitals under the scheme, the move has helped lower the cost of medical devices and thereby, decrease in the overall cost of healthcare. Indian medical devices industry is growing at an exponential pace and set to become a $50 billion industry by 2025. The current per capita spend on medical devices is very low compared to other western countries. As the country builds/improves its hospital capacities to serve the growing demand, meet the prescribed standards, it will give a boost to the medical equipment and device manufacturing industry, he stated.
The Budget 2020-21 mentioned requirement of 20,000 more hospitals under the scheme which is likely to increase going forward. The healthcare delivery sector would be the largest beneficiary as the scheme increases its coverage to a larger population of the country. India needs 3 beds per 1,000 people to meet the WTO norms.
Effective implementation of the AB-PMJAY scheme, incentivizing the industry to produce quality equipment domestically will go a long way in building the Indian healthcare industry, said Johari.
|