The Centre’s flagship health insurance programme, Ayushman Bharat, completes one year since its launch on September 23, 2018. A two-day event is being organised to mark this on September 29 and 30 and it is expected to see the participation of Prime Minister Modi and Health Minister Harsh Vardhan. The programme aimed to provide an annual ₹5 lakh insurance per family for secondary and tertiary care hospitalisation and was expected to cover about 10.74 crore economically weak families, extending to about 50 crore beneficiaries. A section of health workers were unhappy with the programme’s insurance model, even as the programme encountered issues on funding and roll-out. One year will be a good time to take stock of how the services have panned out.

comment COMMENT NOW