In Health Index, NITI Aayog Tries To Make a Case for UP – But Experts Aren’t Convinced https://thewire.in/health/niti-aayog-health-index-uttar-pradesh They warned that the report is incomplete because its health-outcome indicators exclude non-communicable diseases and mental illness.
In 2018-2019, Kerala had a score of 81.6, and in the reference year, of 82.2 – an improvement of 0.6 points. On the other hand, the scores of Uttar Pradesh, which has been at the bottom of the ranking, jumped from 25.06 in the base year to 30.57 in the reference year – a change of 5.52 points.
“Isn’t it common-sensical that if the baseline is low, the scope of incremental change is the highest?” T. Sundararaman, a public health expert and global head of the People’s Health Movement, asked The Wire Science.
The various indicators that Aayog researchers used to calculate the health indices were also grouped into three domains:
1. Health outcomes
2. Key inputs and processes (health infrastructure and human resources)
3. Governance and information (quality of data collected and healthcare sector efficiency)
Most indicators in the ‘health outcomes’ domain were concerned with states’ performance on maternal and child health, and to some extent about tuberculosis and AIDS. But the domain didn’t capture states’ performance against non-communicable diseases (NCDs). According to the National Health Portal, 5.8 million people die of heart and lung diseases, stroke, cancer and diabetes – all NCDs – every year in India. So this is a major oversight.
Another key missing aspect was mental health.