Context: NITI Aayog has released its second edition of comprehensive Health Index report titled, “Healthy States, Progressive India”.

What you need to know about the report?

The report has been developed by NITI Aayog, with technical assistance from the World Bank, and in consultation with the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare (MoHFW).

The report ranks states and Union territories innovatively on their year-on-year incremental change in health outcomes, as well as, their overall performance with respect to each other.

It aims to establish an annual systematic tool to measure and understand the heterogeneity and complexity of the nation’s performance in Health.

Background:

States and UTs have been ranked in three categories namely, Larger States, Smaller States, and Union Territories (UTs), to ensure comparison among similar entities.

How are states ranked?

The Health Index is a weighted composite Index, which for the larger States, is based on indicators in three domains: (a) Health Outcomes (70%); (b) Governance and Information (12%); and (c) Key Inputs and Processes (18%), with each domain assigned a weight based on its importance.

Significance:

Health Index has been developed as a tool to leverage co-operative and competitive federalism to accelerate the pace of achieving health outcomes.

It would also serve as an instrument for “nudging” States & Union Territories (UTs) and the Central Ministries to a much greater focus on output and outcome-based measurement of annual performance than is currently the practice.

With the annual publication of the Index and its availability on public domain on a dynamic basis, it is expected to keep every stakeholder alert to the achievement of Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) Goal number 3.

Performance of various states:

• Kerala has emerged as the top-ranking state in terms of overall health performance.
• Uttar Pradesh is the worst when it comes to overall health performance.
• Gujarat, Punjab and Himachal Pradesh stood at fourth, fifth and sixth spots.
• Kerala, Andhra Pradesh and Maharashtra have emerged as the top ranking states based on historical performance across health indicators.
• Haryana, Rajasthan and Jharkhand top the index based on incremental performance.
• Among the UTs, Chandigarh jumped one spot to top the list with a score of (63.62), followed by Dadra and Nagar Haveli (56.31), Lakshadweep (53.54), Puducherry (49.69), Delhi (49.42), Andaman and Nicobar (45.36) and Daman and Diu (41.66).
• Only about half the States and UTs showed an improvement in the overall score between 2015-16 (base year) and 2017-18 (reference year).
• Among the eight Empowered Action Group States, only three States — Rajasthan, Jharkhand and Chhattisgarh — showed improvement in the overall performance.