India spends about 6 per cent of its GDP on health, but public (Central, State and Local Governments combined) expenditure as a percentage of total health expenditure amounts to a meagre 20 percent of total expenditure on health which is among the lowest in the world. Households account for almost 70 per cent of the total health expenditure, (MOHFW, GOI). A number of studies have established that poor faces both high amount of direct and indirect cost of expenditure in case of falling sick. It is also agreed upon that large section of urban poor live in slum areas, in overcrowded house, unhygienic condition, drink contaminated water and go for open toiletries. Therefore they are at greater risk of falling sick and more prone to epidemics than their rural counterpart. Therefore the present paper has focused on the health seeking behavior of urban poor. A survey was conducted among 300 households of three slum areas of Mumbai. The objective was to understand how urban poor utilize health and health care services in case of falling sick. It also tried to find out the coping strategy adopted by urban slum dwellers to meet health expenditure.
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