Health insurance should cover preventive care as well

A wide-angled approach can pave the way for healthcare that secures our overall health much better

- SRINATH SRIDHARAN

India's health insurance system ignores one of the most effective tools in modern medicine: preventive care. Despite overwhelming global evidence that early intervention reduces hospitalizations, disabilities and healthcare costs, Indian insurance policies rarely if ever cover the cost of preventive medication for chronic and life-threatening conditions. These are the very treatments that can keep patients out of hospitals—yet they remain out of reach for many simply because their value goes unrecognized.

Worse, this blind spot sits atop a system already failing patients. Policyholders are treated as afterthoughts, left to navigate a maze that seems designed to protect the interests of hospitals, third-party administrators and insurers more than the people it claims to serve. Claims are delayed or denied on technicalities. Post-hospitalization care is minimal and short-lived. Price distortions go mostly unchallenged.

What we have today is not health insurance. It is hospitalization insurance—riddled with inefficiency, opacity and corruption. Until the Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority of India (IRDAI) begins to prioritize prevention, support continuity of care and put consumers ahead, meaningful reform will remain a distant dream.