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India to get a National Health Card
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Independence day announced the National Digital Health Mission, under which every Indian citizen will get a unique health ID that will ease access to medical services. (1/n)
India to get a National Health Card
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Independence day announced the National Digital Health Mission, under which every Indian citizen will get a unique health ID that will ease access to medical services. (1/n)
The health ID will store every individual's medical records and the mission will herald a new revolution in the health sector, ensuring a universal public healthcare system and paving the path to streamlined government-run medical services, like the NHS in the UK.
The Aadhar-like health ID will store the individual's medical records, including doctor visits, diseases, the line of treatment and drugs taken. Patients will give their doctors, or health providers, one-time access to this data during visits to the hospital or for consultation.
The scheme will map every citizen's health with a unique ID, consisting of their age, sex, caste, medical and family history. This will also come integrated with the facility of using telemedicine, e-pharmacy, creating a national health registry. This ID will become essential.
The key feature of this mission is the technology part - it will leverage open digital systems to provide high-quality healthcare for all. It will integrate various digital health services to create an ecosystem which can assimilate existing health information systems.
The origin of the National Digital Health Mission goes back to the National Health Policy of 2017, which proposed a new National Digital Health Authority. In July 2019, the National Digital Health Blueprint was released by a committee headed by a former UIDAI chairman.
The coronavirus pandemic in India has infected nearly 4.2 Million people, of whom over 71, 642 have died. Over 90,633 new cases and 1065 deaths are being recorded every 24 hours. India is the second most infected country in the world, with the highest infection rate.
Many have expressed concern over the data collected, its purpose, and storage.
Amid fears over data confidentiality, the government said access to medical data will have to be given separately for each visit and that doctors could only access it for a limited time.
Amid fears over data confidentiality, the government said access to medical data will have to be given separately for each visit and that doctors could only access it for a limited time.
It is important to note that India still lacks a law on data protection. The digital health mission and the semblance of the policy to Aadhaar is expected to trigger privacy concerns in the days to come, similar to the Right to Privacy judgement from 2018.
Patient anonymity also stands at risk- If the card collected sex, caste, and other sociological data with the lax laws that exist, medical and personal details may be leaked to the masses.
It also puts groups like pregnant women looking to get an abortion, or patients unwilling to disclose caste at a disadvantage, unless the government enforces stricter security measures.
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Read the news shaping the Indian political economy and more, every Wednesday at #WWW!
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