The government proposes to transform the State’s public health sector by providing free health care for all citizens through the integration of the numerous current health insurance and beneficiary schemes, including Karunya, into a comprehensive health-care insurance scheme, providing free insurance coverage for all diseases.
An estimated Rs.1,000 crore would be required for floating this free and comprehensive health insurance scheme, Finance Minister T.M. Thomas Isaac announced in his revised budget on Friday.
The scheme would cover medical treatment for all illnesses including cancer, heart diseases, stroke, and other chronic renal, liver, or neurological disorders.
Focus on prevention
The State’s public health system would be so modified that the focus would be on reducing the State’s morbidity burden through an effective preventive and primary health-care programme.
The health system would be transformed in such a way that disease control and prevention, curative care, and palliative care would be a continuum, Dr. Isaac said.
Detailed plan
Upgrading and strengthening medical colleges, general hospitals, district and taluk hospitals by scientifically evaluating the requirements of each and preparing a detailed plan for each institution and improving the human resource in the health sector have been given priority in the budget with a corpus fund of Rs.1,000 crore, of which expected expenditure for the current financial year is Rs.250 crore.
As part of infrastructure improvement in hospitals, cath labs would be started in all general hospitals and dialysis units in all taluk hospitals, he said.
