Rs 6,400 crore allocated for Ayushman Bharat
The health sector witnessed a 18 per cent hike in Union Budget, from Rs 52,800 crore to Rs 62,659.12 crore for 2019-2020—highest in the last two financial years. Of this, Rs 6,400 crore has been allocated to the centre's flagship health insurance scheme Ayushman Bharat- Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojana (AB-PMJAY).
The flagship health scheme aims at providing annual health cover of up to Rs 5 lakh per family for secondary and tertiary care hospitalisation to over 10.74 crore vulnerable families (approximately 50 crore beneficiaries).
The Government has allocated Rs 2,49.96 crore for setting up Ayushman Bharat Health and Wellness Centres under the National Urban Health Mission to provide comprehensive primary care close to the community, while Rs 1,349.97 crore has been earmarked for setting up health and wellness centres under the National Rural Health Mission.
The allocation for the National Health Mission (NHM) for 2019-20 was raised to Rs 32,995 crore from the last budgetary allocation of Rs 30,129.61 crore. The Government allocated Rs 2,500 crore to its National AIDS and STD Control Programme an increase of Rs 400 crore from last budget's allocation of Rs 2,100 crore while the budgetary allocation for AIIMS has been increased to Rs 3,599.65 crore from Rs 3,018 crore.
However, the National Mental Health Programme and National Programme for prevention and control of Cancer, Diabetes, Cardio-vascular Disease and Stroke saw a decline from Rs 50 crore to Rs 40 crore and to Rs 175 crore from Rs 295 crore respectively.
Similarly, the total budgetary allocation for the tertiary care programmes saw a Rs 200 crore dip, from Rs 750 crore in 2018-19 to Rs 550 crore in this fiscal.
The traditional alternative medicine sector under the AYUSH Ministry too got impetus with around 15 per cent hike in budgetary allocation to Rs 1,939.76 crore against the revised estimates of Rs 1,692.77 crore of the last fiscal.
The Government allocated Rs 40 crore for the All India Institute of Ayurveda, New Delhi, for financial year 2019-2020, while Rs 50 crore was earmarked for the National Institute of Homoeopathy in Kolkata.
For strengthening of AYUSH Delivery Systems, the Centre granted Rs 92.31 crore. The Government had earmarked Budget estimates of Rs 71.36 crore in 2018-19 which was later revised and increased to Rs 101.86 crore.
While Union Health Minister Dr Harsh Vardhan hailed the Health budget as 'visionary', Alliance of Doctors for Ethical Healthcare, a group of doctors from across the country was not impressed as it said that the allocated fund was not enough to meet the need of the people and the medical care is left to unregulated private healthcare sector, said Dr GS Grewal from ADEH. The All India Medical Devices (AiMeD) too rued that the domestic medical devices manufacturers continue to be neglected by the Government. "Despite umpteen reminders, the Budget 2019-20 has not heeded to our suggestions on extending tax and non-tax protection to our industry", said Rajiv Nath, forum coordinator Of AiMed.