Learning lessons from the universal health coverage experience in India

IGHI host special guest lecture with universal health coverage expert Professor Kanchan Mukherjee.

Staff and students gathered on 24th November for a guest lecture on ‘Being Sustainable and Smart: the ‘WIN’ strategy for UHC in India’, from Professor and Chairperson of the Centre for Health Policy, Planning and Management (CHPPM) at the Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS), Dr Kanchan Mukherjee.  

A part of the Global Health and Development Lecture Series, the event was jointly hosted by the Institute of Global Health Innovation and saw the special introduction of International IDSI Support Initiative (iDSI). IDSI is a global network of health and economics expertise that supports countries to make better decisions to get the most from every dollar they spend on health care. The initiative is led by the Global Health and Development Group at Imperial College London. 

Watch the full recording of the event above. 

Talk abstract

India is a long way away from achieving Universal Health Coverage (UHC). India’s public healthcare expenditure is one of the lowest in the world and the key is to ensure maximum returns for every rupee spent. In this context, there is a need to prioritise healthcare services and take an incremental approach towards achieving UHC. In this special guest lecture, Prof. Kanchan Mukherjee will explore some the issues and problems existing within the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), in both the global and Indian contexts, and offer insight into some key lessons for achieving UHC in India.

Through discussion of the current socio-cultural, political and research situation in India, and using data available from economic evaluation and epidemiological studies, Prof. Mukherjee will put forth the concept of smart development goals, relevant to India. These goals are cost-effective priorities and can be a starting point for India to progress towards UHC.

In addition, to the smart health interventions, Prof. Mukherjee will propose ‘WIN’ - Women, Infrastructure and Nutrition - as three actionable and sustainable strategies to address some of the key social determinants of health in the Indian context for achieving good health at low cost. 

Speaker biography – Professor Kanchan Mukherjee

Dr Kanchan Mukherjee is a Professor and Chairperson of the Centre for Health Policy, Planning and Management (CHPPM) in the School of Health Systems Studies (SHSS) at the Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS), Mumbai. Prof. Mukherjee completed his postdoctoral training in HIV/AIDS research from the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA) through the prestigious Fogarty Fellowship programme of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), USA. He also completed a Masters in International Health Policy from the London School of Economics (LSE). He is the programme convener for the new programme on MPH-Health Policy, Economics and Finance started at TISS in collaboration with LSE in 2010, which is a first of its kind programme in South Asia. Prof. Mukherjee was a visiting faculty at the Karolinska Institute in Sweden and is currently a visiting professor at the University of Liverpool in the UK.  Prof. Mukherjee’s research interests include health policy and system analysis, urban health and non-communicable diseases. Prof. Mukherjee has over 35 publications in prestigious journals.