A Conference for Community Organizations and Policy Makers at India Habitat Centre, New Delhi on November 1st and 2nd 2006. The aim of the conference is to disseminate new information on the contribution of community health financing toward low-cost health insurance for poor and rural population segments in India.
With an cross cultural study group the analysis of the household survey conducted by this project started and this study group was an extraordinary event itself: 30 student researchers from India, The Netherlands and Germany together with their supervisors spent four intensive weeks on getting first insights out of this data. The Indian partner in this effort and beyond is the Birla Institute of Management Technology (BIMTECH) which also hosted most of the events. Well reputed national and international experts and high ranked Indian officials participated in this effort; committed to the idea of developing health insurance for groups which currently do not have access to the same two further experts decided to help speeding up the analytical work: Ruth Koren, an expert from Tel Aviv University (Israel), and Marion Danis from the National Institutes of Health (USA).
Karuna Trust is an NGO that has been working successfully on health and development issues for nearly two decades. In 2002, Karuna Trust, in a partnership with the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), decided to implement a pilot health insurance scheme for its target population. The non-governmental organization (NGO) collaborated with the state-owned National Insurance Company (NIC) in designing a health insurance product that complements the public healthcare infrastructure and compensates for some of its weaknesses.Karuna Trust acts as an agent for NIC. The insurance product compensates the insured for the loss of income in case of hospitalization at a public health facility. Furthermore, a drug fund was set up to supply medicines that are unavailable in public facilities. People with income around the poverty line receive treatment in public health facilities free-of-charge. A tight network between the insurance scheme and the public infrastructure has evolved.
The Yeshasvini Cooperative Farmers Health Scheme is a young but incredibly successful microinsurance scheme in Karnataka. Having started in 2003 with 1.6 million insured right away, it covered 2.2 million lives in its second year of operation, but in the third year it dropped to 1.45 million members after doubling the premium.This (still) amazing success is possible through a tight partnership with the cooperative sector enabled through the Karnataka Department of Cooperation. The department used its influence to encourage cooperative societies to market the product actively. The marketing strategy applied by the societies’ secretaries varies: while most convince their members to join, a few simply enrolled their members.
May we introduce ourselves?
WE are a consortium of not for profit research and business organizations sharing a common goal: help to establish health insurance for the poor in India using microinsurance. Based on RESEARCH on microhealthinsurance we develop recommendations which will be used to TRAIN people involved in microhealthinsurance today and in the future to contribute to preparing the ground for new insurance schemes. We will COMMUNICATE our activities and findings in order to have our work constantly reviewed and stimulated by discussion. Read more about the project.
What is microinsurance?
Microinsurance is a form of health, life or property insurance, which offers limited protection at a low contribution (hence “micro”). It is aimed at poor sections of the population and designed to help them cover themselves collectively against risks (hence “insurance”). Normally, microinsurance schemes are linked to associations (besides non-governmental organizations for instance trade unions, religious congregations and hospitals), whose main area of work puts them in direct contact with the target groups. They may, but must not necessarily, act as the insurance provider: in many cases, they have transferred the risks of the insurance business to a professional insurer.