Sixty percent of Aasandha budget spent already!
We are now witnessing that these measures failed to be implemented as statistics from the Finance Ministry show that Aasandha has already utilized 60 percent of the budget allocated for the year.
The Maldivian healthcare system is questionable, to say the least. But one thing that Maldivians have always felt was the highlight of their healthcare system was the introduction of the national health insurance policy ‘Aasandha’ which was introduced in 2011.
Since its inception, the state-funded insurance policy has been through many stages. And while it has served the benefit of citizens time and time again, over the years, the budget of Aasandha appears to become bigger yet the budget is unable to accommodate the insurance expenses throughout the year.
Initially, when Aasandha was started out, the budget was set at MVR 100,000 under the name ‘husnuvaa Aasandha’. While the name suggests that Aasandha insurance is unlimited, just like any other insurance policy, Aasandha also has its own limitations. Certain procedures and hospitals as well as clinics are not covered by Aasandha, and an annual budget is set.
In order to reduce the increasing Aasandha budget, in 2022 the state discussed the implementation of measures in order to introduce a price cap among other measures. A year later, in 2023 we are now witnessing that these measures failed to be implemented as statistics from the Ministry of Finance show that Aasandha has already utilized 60 percent of the budget allocated for the year.
For the year 2023, MVR 1 billion was set aside, and within the first quarter of the year, Aasandha has now used up MVR 600 million. This is no surprise considering Aasandha surpassed the budget in 2022 as well. One major difference is that the speed at which the Aaandha budget is being spent this year is much faster compared to 2022, leading to many wondering how much over-the-budget spending is going to go this year.
While the World Bank has recommended the Government take measures by reducing spending on subsidies such as Aasandha, these measures also seem unrealistic to implement in the Maldives as healthcare without Aasandha is unaffordable.
While the Government could implement the measures that were discussed in 2022 in order to reduce the amount being spent on Aasandha, it appears that they have failed to implement these measures even to this day.
