Govt kicks off ground work for Ayushman Bharat plan
NEW DELHI: The central government has begun work on rolling out its ambitious healthcare scheme, Ayushman Bharat, day after the Union Cabinet gave its approval for the launch of the insurance project that aims to fund hospitalisation cost of an estimated 10 crore economically deprived people.
Union health minister Jagat Prakash Nadda on Thursday said the government has set June-end as the target for on-ground assessment of the information technology (IT) system, which he described as the “backbone” of the “totally cashless and paperless” National Health Protection Scheme (NHPS).
The minister said the ~10,000 crore scheme, which will provide a cover of ~5 lakh per family per year, will include protection for 1,347 diseases, with the possibility for addition to or deletion from this ‘package list of diseases’.
“The insurance scheme will take care of secondary and tertiary treatment, including treatment for cancer, cardiac and neuro surgeries. It will do away with out-of-pocket expenditure as comprehensive packages covering expenditure incurred in travelling to and from hospital are also being drafted. Patients will pay absolutely nothing from their pockets,” Nadda said.
Under the first phase of imple-
mentation, organ transplantation surgeries will not be included. “We are still fine-tuning the list. It will take some time,” said Preeti Sudan, secretary, health ministry.
The NHPS is a cashless scheme that can be availed at any government or private empanelled hospital across the country. “It (the scheme) is not linked to Aadhar and no eligible person will be denied the benefits if they don’t have the Aadhaar,” Sudan added.
The government has also decided not to issue any new card or number as part of the scheme. “We tried distributing cards for Rashtriya Swasthya Bima Yojna (RSBY) but failed as it took us about a year to just distribute the cards. For this scheme, we will make use of the QR code already assigned to the families by the rural development ministry. The families can retain the code by printing it out,” Sudan said.