Ayushmaan Bharat on cards today

New Delhi:

With the nation gearing up to celebrate its 72nd independence on August 15, 2018, Prime Minister Narendra Modi is likely to launch Ayushman Bharat-National Health Protection Scheme (AB-NHPS) on Wednesday. The full roll-out of the world’s largest government-funded public health insurance scheme is expected to be announced from September 25 onwards.

The announcement is expected to come during PM Modi’s Independence Day speech at Delhi’s Red Fort.

Ayushman Bharat, also referred to as ‘Modicare’, is the national healthcare policy launched by the Government of India in February this year. The ambitious healthcare policy promises to cover over 10 crore poor and vulnerable families (approximately 50 crore beneficiaries) providing coverage up to Rs 5 lakh per family per year for secondary and tertiary care hospitalisation.

Benefits of the scheme are portable across the country and a beneficiary covered under the scheme will be allowed to take cashless benefits from any public/private empanelled hospitals across the country.

The scheme is entitlement based, with the entitlement decided on the basis of deprivation criteria in the Socio-Economic and Caste Census (SECC) database. The beneficiaries can avail the facilities in both public as well as empanelled private healthcare centres.