With an aim to enhance access to traditional medicine within India’s healthcare framework, plans are afoot to include AYUSH (Ayurveda, Yoga and Naturopathy, Unani, Siddha, and Homeopathy) into the central flagship Ayushman Bharat Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojana (AB PM-JAY), said Minister of State (IC) for AYUSH, Prataprao Jadhav on Saturday.
Recently, a review meeting was convened to finalize the integration, with 170 AYUSH packages identified for inclusion. A Strategic Purchasing Committee has been established to develop cost structures, ensuring affordability. This initiative aims to enhance access to traditional medicine within India’s healthcare framework, he said.
Talking to the reporters here at an event held to showcase the initiative taken by the ministry in the first 100 days of the Modi 3.0 Government, the Minister said that 170 packages have already been finalized, with the potential to increase this number based on demand. “To ensure affordability and finalize cost structures for AYUSH treatments, a Strategic Purchasing Committee has been established,” Jadhav said.
AB PM-JAY aims to provide health cover of Rs 5 lakh per family per year for secondary and tertiary care hospitalisation to approximately 55 crore beneficiaries corresponding to 12.34 crore families constituting the bottom 40% of the population.
The Minister emphasised that health of each and every citizen of the country is important and keeping this in view a special drive has also been initiated to have Prakriti Parikshan, a concept from Ayurveda that involves assessing an individual’s unique constitution or “Prakriti.”.
Secretary Ayush Vd. Rajesh Kotecha informed that reflecting the importance and wider acceptance of Ayush globally, India has signed MoUs with various countries like Vietnam and Malaysia on medicinal plants and Ayurveda respectively.
India is also promoting the “One Herb, One Standard” Initiative wherein the Pharmacopoeia Commission for Indian Medicine & Homoeopathy (PCIM&H) and the Indian Pharmacopoeia Commission (IPC) signed a pact with an aim to improve quality of medicines in the sector.
The Ministry also intends to open special medical stores at every tehsil level. “Access to a variety of herbal and traditional medicines will be made possible by these stores, improving public healthcare in both urban and rural areas,” he added.
Also, according to the report received from the National Accreditation Board for Hospitals and Healthcare Providers (NABH), the evaluation of 1489 Ayushman Arogya Mandir (Ayush) has been completed, and 1005 of these AAM (Ayush) have been certified for Ayush Entry Level Certification (AELC), he said.
This initiative is an important step in ensuring quality healthcare services under the National Ayush Mission.
