Centre to launch health insurance scheme, asks states to do so

New Delhi, July 19 (UNI) The Centre is planning to launch a health insurance scheme at the national level soon to strengthen the health care delivery system in the country.

The Union Government has also asked the State Governments to launch their own health insurance programmes and offered all possible help and support to them in this regard.

This was revealed by Health Secretary P K Hota at the Chief Secretaries meeting organised by the Cabinet Secretary B K Chaturvedi here today to address the problems and prospects for improving Public Service Delivery in core public services.

The meeting assessed the status of implementation of National Rural Health Mission, National Rural Employment Gurantee Mission, Bharat Nirman, Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan, Mid-day Meal Scheme etc.

Mr Hota told chief secretaries that his ministry would be writing to them and state health secretaries asking their assessment of the monitary assistance required to launch the health insurance schemes, especially for the poor.

The Centre also asked the State Governments about the status of implementation of NRHM, a flagship programme for the UPA government.

The state governments provided their reports about the appointment of ASHAs, constitution of the District Health Societies and the resources spent on the programme.

To improve the health care delivery system, the Bihar government has outsourced the various services like monitoring of presence of doctors at Primary Health Centres, Mr G S Kang, Chief Secretary of the state informed. He said that number of patients visiting OPD had increased ten times since the outsourcing of monitoring process was adopted.

Moreover, the state government is providing free medicine to patients at all government hospitals and the response is so overwhelming that now it is planning to increase the budget for the scheme from present Rs 350 crore, he said.

Uttar Pradesh is planning to bring its own insurance scheme and it has made a lot of progress in appointment of ANMs and ASHAs. The state has to appoint about 130,000 ASHAs and it has already made appointment of 50,000 and providing them training. The Panchayati Raj Institutions are being involved in implementation of NRHM in the state.

Tamil Nadu, which is among the better performing states in health care with more doctors available said that the programme to appoint Indian System of Medicine doctors at PHCs has given good results.

About 30 to 35 patients prefer ISM doctors especially for ailments like back pain, headache and gout etc.

The Chhattisgarh Government is making a lot of efforts, but is facing difficulties in implementing programmes in areas affected by naxal violence. The state also suffers from lack of medical colleges. The Centre is providing help in this regard.

The meeting was held as the UPA government attaches a very high priority to improving the delivery of public services to its citizens. The emphasis of the conference was also on citizen-centric governance focused on delivery of high quality public services designed around the needs of the citizens more like valued customers and to enable citizens to hold public servants accountable for the services delivered.

UNI AJ SHB BST1904