Healthcare body seeks ₹50,000 cr infra fund | 20 November, 2025

Healthcare industry body Nathealth has asked the government to declare the sector as core infrastructure and create a healthcare infra fund of ₹50,000 crore for providing long-term, lower-cost capital for hospitals and diagnostic networks.

It said the fund would aim to cater new projects that have long gestational periods requiring flexible midterm financing.

In its pre-budget recommendations to the government, Nathealth has also asked for increasing the public spending on healthcare to over 2.5 per cent of GDP from the current 1.9 per cent, along with taking urgent action to tackle noncommunicable diseases.

With chronic diseases contributing to 65 percent of all deaths in India and a low uptake of preventive screening, Nathealth recommended a tax deduction for preventive health checkups of upto ₹10,000.

“This increases preventive care uptake, early detection of NCDs, and expected long-term reduction in treatment costs and productivity losses,” the body added.

It has also asked the government to set up a national network of accredited reference laboratories with an outlay of ₹1,000 crore. It has also asked for creation of national infrastructure for ethical animal testing and pre-clinical validation of medtech innovations.

Among other demands, Nathealth also mooted setting up of an innovation fund for deeptech and provider collaboration with an outlay of ₹5,000 crore to ₹7,000 crore, stating that there is a fragmented innovation ecosystem with limited provider-startup collaboration.

“There is a need for pilots, AI research, and scale-up funding, which accelerates commercialisation of high-impact solutions,” it said.

(Source: Business Standard)