The Modi Government has a tough job on hand. Against the target of setting up 15,000 Health and Wellness Centres (HWCs) by March-end 2019 under the Government’s ambitious Ayushmaan Bharat-Pradhan Mantri Jan Ayush Yojna (PMJAY), the figures have just crossed the halfway mark with only 8030 centres being operational as on February 2, 2019.
Of these, over 2,000 centres are concentrated in two Southern States — Andhra Pradesh tops the list with 1361 centres closely followed by Tamil Nadu (1318) while other States are nowhere even near to the four digit mark. (See box1).
The Union Health Ministry, which is overseeing the centrally sponsored scheme, is, however, hopeful to achieve the target stating that approval has already been accorded to State and Union Territories for over 21,000 such centres for the current fiscal.
Overall, there are plans to convert a total 1.5 lakh Health Sub Centres and Primary Health Centres into HWCs in a phased manner by December, 2022, Union Minister of State for Health, Ashwini Kumar Choubey told the Parliament in a written reply on Tuesday.
Under the health flagship scheme launched in September last year, the Centre is providing health coverage up to Rs. 5 lakh per family per year for secondary and tertiary hospitalization as well as supporting the States for strengthening Sub Centres and Primary Health Centres as HWCs for provision of comprehensive primary care that includes universal screening, prevention and management of common non-communicable diseases like diabetes and cancer among poor people.