The union Budget 2018 promised several measures in improving the quality and reach of healthcare through the country.
Finance minister Arun Jaitley announced two new initiatives under the Ayushman Bharat program in his budget speech today. Under the program, he announced a new Flagship Health protection Scheme which will provide health care insurance of up to Rs 5 lakh per year to every poor family. The scheme aims at covering 10 crore families and 50 crore beneficiaries. The scheme would be applicable to all private hospitals as well.
Touted as “Modicare” by many, the scheme is the largest healthcare program to be rolled out in the world. The finance minister also said that the government is slowly progressing towards universal healthcare coverage.
In addition to this, Jaitley also proposed 1.5 lakh new healthcare centres which will provide comprehensive health care which would include provisions for women and childcare. The scheme, under the national health policy 2017, was allocated Rs 1200 crores. Rs 600 crores for allotted for the treatment of tuberculosis patients also.
In a move to improve the supply of doctors and infrastructure of district public hospitals, the budget also proposed the opening of 24 medical colleges through the country with the aim of at least one medical college in every state.
