Ayushman Bharat launch LATEST updates: Hailing the launch of an ambitious health insurance scheme by Prime Minister Narendra Modi as historic, BJP president Amit Shah Sunday said the government has given the poor the right to live with dignity with its various schemes.
Modi on Sunday launched Centre's flagship Ayushman Bharat-National Health Protection Mission (AB-NHPM) in Jharkhand and said that it will benefit over 50 crore people.
He also said that 1.5 lakh wellness centres will be opened in the country in the next four years. Describing it as a "game changer", Modi said the scheme was a step towards serving the poor people of the country and it would come into effect from Sunday.
"Some call it Modicare, some call it a scheme for the poor. It is definitely a scheme to serve the poor," he said.
Union minister JP Nadda said that the scheme will be completely "paperless" and "cashless". The scheme will bring a major change in India's healthcare sector, he added.
The ambitious scheme, renamed the Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Abhiyan (PMJAY), aims to provide a coverage of Rs five lakh per family annually, benefiting more than 10.74 crore poor families for secondary and tertiary care hospitalisation through a network of Empanelled Health Care Providers.
Jharkhand chief minister Raghubar Das said the scheme will benefit about 57 lakh families in the state. Talking to ANI, Das said, "It is our good fortune that Ayushman Bharat is being launched from Jharkhand. I congratulate Prime Minister Narendra Modi for this. In the state, 57 lakh families will be covered under this scheme. All arrangements have been made."
He added that 106 private hospitals and 217 government-run clinics have been listed under the scheme, where people can avail medical facilities.
The scheme will provide cashless and paperless access to services for the beneficiary at the point of service. It will help reduce expenditure for hospitalisations which impoverishes people and will help mitigate the financial risk arising out of catastrophic health episodes. Eligible people can avail the benefits in government and listed private hospitals.
"71st Round of National Sample Survey Organization (NSSO) has found 85.9 percent of rural households and 82 percent of urban households have no access to healthcare insurance/assurance.
"More than 17 percent of Indian population spend at least 10 percent of household budgets for health services. Catastrophic healthcare related expenditure pushes families into debt. More than 24 percent households in rural India and 18 per cent population in urban area have met their healthcare expenses through some sort of borrowing," an official statement said.
The venue of the event. Twitter @MoHFW_INDIA
The scheme will target poor, deprived rural families and identified occupational category of urban workers' families, 8.03 crore in rural and 2.33 crore in urban areas, as per the latest Socio-Economic Caste Census (SECC) data. It will cover around 50 crore people.
The entitlement is being decided on the basis of deprivation criteria in the SECC database. The beneficiaries are identified based on the deprivation categories (D1, D2, D3, D4, D5, and D7) identified under the SECC database for rural areas. For the urban areas, the 11 occupational criteria will determine entitlement.
In addition, the Rashtriya Swasthya Bima Yojna (RSBY) beneficiaries in states where it is active are also included.
There is no cap on family size and age in the scheme, ensuring that nobody is left out. One would only need to establish one's identity to avail benefits under the scheme and it could be through Aadhaar card or election ID card or ration card. Having an Aadhaar card is not mandatory.
In case of hospitalisation, members of the beneficiary families do not need to pay anything under the scheme, provided one goes to a government or an empanelled private hospital.
"The objectives are to reduce out of pocket hospitalisation expenses, fulfil unmet needs and improve access of identified families to quality inpatient care and day care surgeries," the statement stated.
The National Health Agency (NHA), the apex body implementing the AB-NHPM, has launched a website and a helpline number to help prospective beneficiaries check if their name is there in the final list.
One can visit mera.pmjay.gov.in or call up the helpline (14555) to check their enrolment. A beneficiary needs to key in his or her mobile number, which is verified through an OTP and then complete the KYC (know your customer) online without any need for human interface with other documents.
Each empanelled hospital will have an 'Ayushman Mitra' to assist patients and will coordinate with beneficiaries and the hospital. They will run a help desk, check documents to verify the eligibility and enrolment to the scheme.
All the beneficiaries will be given letters having QR codes which will be scanned and a demographic authentication conducted for identification and to verify his or her eligibility to avail the benefits of the scheme.
Modi had announced the launch of the scheme from ramparts of the Red Fort during his Independence day speech. As many as 30 states and Union Territories have signed MoUs with the Centre and will implement the programme over the next two to three months, after its launch Sunday.
Remaining states and UTs which include Telangana, Odisha, Delhi, Kerala and Punjab have not signed, so the scheme will not be implemented there till they come on board.
With inputs from agencies
