Govt's 100-day agenda: Expansion of Ayushman Bharat scheme a priority

According to data available on the National Health Authority dashboard, the scheme has, so far, covered over 345 million citizens who received free health insurance of Rs 5 lakh for hospitalisation

Expansion of Ayushman Bharat Yojana to cover everyone aged above 70 years, launch of the National Health Claims Exchange (NHCX) and a special drive against tobacco use among youngsters were among the top agenda items discussed during the first high-level meeting chaired by Union Minister of Health and Family Welfare, JP Nadda on Friday.

The meeting was called to discuss the plans which the government wants to take on priority in the first 100 days.

Other items on the 100-day agenda include a national campaign against non-communicable diseases (NCDs), and the deployment of mobile hospitals equipped with modern technology.

Nadda laid stress on expansion of health insurance coverage under the Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojana (PMJAY), which was promised in the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP’s) manifesto.   

According to data available on the National Health Authority (NHA) dashboard, the scheme has, so far, covered over 345 million citizens who received free health insurance of Rs 5 lakh for hospitalisation.

The move to expand the health insurance scheme’s coverage comes at a time when several hospitals have complained of delays in reimbursement related to the procedures performed under the scheme.

 

The health ministry had formed a 16-member committee in March this year to look into the implementation of the scheme and oversee progress in beneficiary identification, hospitalisation and modes of implementation. 

According to sources, the meeting also discussed the launch of the National Health Claims Exchange (NHCX) to expedite processing of health insurance claims, a special drive against tobacco use among youth and deployment of the U-Win portal to maintain an electronic registry of all immunisations. 

While the launch of NHCX is in the works for some time now, U-Win is at present being run on a pilot mode in two districts of each state and union territory. 

The minister also expressed his concern about the growing incidence of NCD’s and the importance of creating awareness on healthy diet and lifestyle with the help of targeted campaigns towards the youth for tobacco control. 

He also asked officials to leverage technology in programmes like immunisation and health emergency response management.