Evaluation of the Rashtriya Swasthya Bima Yojana scheme in India

 

Out-of-pocket costs represent a substantial barrier to access to maternal and reproductive health services in India. In 2008, the government of India launched the Rashtriya Swasthya Bima Yojana (RSBY) health insurance scheme to improve access to health services for families below the poverty line. The program provides eligible families with cashless healthcare for inpatient services capped at INR 30,000 (USD 500) annually. RSBY gained additional significance in 2018, when it was announced that it would serve as the model for expanding health insurance to roughly a half-billion people from financially vulnerable populations through a new initiative, Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojana (PMJAY).

With the planned expansion of the RSBY model to a population corresponding to 1 in 15 global residents, understanding its effects is critical. However, its impacts on utilization of health services and health outcomes, as well as social inequalities in these indicators, have not been rigorously evaluated. The objective of this project is to examine the role of health insurance and specifically the RSBY program in shaping social inequalities in the access to healthcare services and major causes of morbidity and mortality, particularly for women and children.

This 3-year research project is a collaboration between researchers at the Institute for Health and Social Policy at McGill University and the Indian Institute of Management - Bangalore.

 

Arijit Nandi

PRINCIPAL INVESTIGATOR

Arijit Nandi is an Associate Professor jointly appointed at the Institute for Health and Social Policy and the Department of Epidemiology, Biostatistics, and Occupational Health. An epidemiologist by training, Arijit is broadly interested in the impact of social and economic factors on population health. His primary research interests are: (1) assessing multilevel associations between economic characteristics and population health; (2) investigating the relation between social and economic policies and population health and health disparities in a global context; and (3) estimating causal effects of economic interventions on mental health. A former Robert Wood Johnson Health and Society Scholar at Harvard University, Arijit received a PhD from the Department of Epidemiology at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.

Arnab Mukherji

Arnab Mukherji is an applied micro-economist with interests in health and governance. His recent work on health has been in the context of understanding how government-financed health schemes reduce mortality and provide financial protection to the poor. In addition, he has been working on a number of governance-related concerns in a range of different contexts. His work on Bihar explores how sub-national governance can constrain or promote state-level growth. He teaches health economics, applied econometrics, and public policy analysis in the MBA, Masters in Public Policy & Management and doctoral programs at the Indian Institute of Management - Bangalore. In the past, he has contributed to the MachEquity inter-university collaborative, and to Columbia University’s research programme on Indian Economic Policies. He has been the principal investigator on a number of internationally funded research projects and has consulted for the World Bank, the Asian Development Bank and for different state governments in India.

Caroline Joyce

Caroline Joyce is a PhD candidate in the department of Epidemiology at McGill University, where she is supervised by Dr. Arijit Nandi. She is interested in policy evaluation, specifically in relation to maternal, sexual, and reproductive health. Her thesis work is examining the impact of India’s national health policy on social inequalities in IUD uptake and interpregnancy interval among women of childbearing age. Previously, she conducted research ranging from examining the impact of state policies on childhood vaccine coverage, to novel interventions for smoking cessation among pregnant women. Caroline received her Master’s in Public Health from the University of Pennsylvania, and a BA in Psychology from Scripps College.

Deepti Sharma

Deepti Sharma is a PhD scholar in public policy at Indian Institute of Management Bangalore (IIM-B), where she is supervised by Professor Arnab Mukherji. Her research interests are in policy evaluation, specifically in child health and womens’ well being . She is working on assessing the economic impact of health shocks (mainly COVID-19) and public health insurance scheme evaluation in India. Prior to her doctoral research, she conducted research examining the socioeconomic impact of the Sardar Sarovar Narmada dam water in Arid and semi Arid regions of Gujarat, several policy evaluation projects for Ministry of Agriculture, India and the Japan International Cooperation Association (JICA). Deepti has completed her Master’s in Economics with a specialization in Agribusiness from Gokhale Institute of Politics and Economics and a BA (Hons.) in Economics from Delhi University.