US becomes loan guarantor for India’s primary healthcare expansion

MUMBAI: The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) on Thursday issued a loan guarantee to RBL Bank Limited providing loans totaling $9 million to Wellspring Healthcare Private Limited (Healthspring). This is the first loan guarantee that USAID will provide in the country’s health sector.

Healthspring operates a network of primary healthcare centers that provide medical services, including 24×7 emergency response, diagnostics, etc. The money will be utilized to expand into new regions and cover over 3million people.

“Improving access to quality, essential primary healthcare services is one of USAID’s most important goals in India. This loan guarantee will expand affordable, quality healthcare services in urban areas through an innovative integrated private primary care network in Mumbai and other major cities,” said Ambassador Jonathan Addleton, USAID Mission Director to India.

“Our innovative model has demonstrated that high-quality primary healthcare can be provided at affordable cost. It has shown that the private healthcare sector can help in improving access and utilization of primary health services, significantly improve health outcomes and reduce out-of-pocket health expenditures,” said Kaushik Sen, Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer, Healthspring.

“The healthcare sector in India is largely dominated by unorganized private players that offer a limited range of services and often are not able to scale up their infrastructure and delivery standards,” said Vishwavir Ahuja, Managing Director & CEO, RBL Bank.