India, Health Inequities, and a Fair Healthcare Provision: A Perspective from Health Capability

In India, health inequality, rooted in structural elements of the public healthcare system, is a topic of much concern and discussion in research literature. However, very few articles have approached this persistent problem from a theoretical standpoint. This article addresses this gap by employing the social justice framework of the Health Capability Paradigm (HCP). After critically analyzing some features of the Indian healthcare system, the article argues that some public healthcare system features not only cause health inequalities, but more specifically cause inequities in central health capabilities to avoid escapable diseases and premature death. To address such inequities, the article argues from an HCP perspective that the Indian healthcare system should (a) revise the national health policy's underlying vision of health, (b) reshape its three-tiered public healthcare system to deliver healthcare services to all, and (c) focus on core HCP concepts such as shared health governance and shortfall inequality as guiding principles to provide universal health coverage to all.