The letter comes over two years after the Modi government unveiled a draft health policy proposing a health cess to fund free healthcare services and about five years since an expert panel appointed by the Manmohan Singh-led government similarly proposed universal healthcare funded by tax revenues. "In this environment, health remains a low political priority, although we've seen changes in some states." "No health system in the world is perfect or has satisfied all users," said Rajendra Badwe, director of the Tata Memorial Centre Hospital, Mumbai. "No single model is likely to work for all health issues, so we'll need to distil features from different models," he said. The TMC today started hosting a three-day conference of health experts from India, Brazil, Thailand, Iran, France and Cuba, among other countries, to discuss the challenges a country faces in efforts to introduce universal health coverage.

Source: The Telegraph January 27, 2017 21:24 UTC