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Bringing an additional 809 ailments and medical procedures under the Aarogyasri, Chief Minister Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy directed the Medical and Health Department to ensure that the required number of doctors were present in all hospitals while ensuring that there was no scarcity of medicines.
During a review meeting held on Friday, the Chief Minister formally launched the additional services. He said that the addition of new procedures and ailments would take the total number of free medical services under Aarogyasri to 3,255. The number of ailments treated under Aarogyasri which stood at 1,059 during the TDP tenure went up to 2,059 in January 2020 after the YSRCP came to power. Then to 2,200 in July 2020 and 2,436 in November 2020 (with 235 procedures including bone marrow), to 2,446 (including 10 COVID-19 pandemic procedures) in May-June 2021 and to 3,255 now, he said.
Mr. Jagan Mohan Reddy said that the spending under the Aarogyasri went up to ₹3,481.70 crore. It was three times of what was spent during the TDP regime. The scheme was being implemented prestigiously. With the government clearing the pending bills of Aarogyasri instantly, all empanelled hospitals had become more confident and were extending medical services to all declared diseases, he said.
Besides providing all facilities in hospitals, the government had filled up 46,000 posts in the Health Department with the sole aim of extending quality medical services to the people. Now, it was the duty of the officials to make use of the facilities and staff in a proper manner without giving room for lethargy, he said.
Monitoring of staff
The Chief Minister asked the officials to introduce facial recognition methods for attendance in the department while ensuring that sufficient number of doctors and medical staff were present in all hospitals.
Stressing the need to create a block-level supervisory system to monitor the working of the staff in the department, Mr. Jagan Mohan Reddy directed the officials to send suitable proposals. He also wanted them to work in coordination with the Women and Child Welfare Department and get regular reports on sanitation, air pollution, drinking water, cleanliness and toilet maintenance at anganwadis.
He said there was a need to pay special attention towards high-risk pregnant women during delivery and anaemic women to bring down the health risks among them, while periodically updating the health history on all Aarogyasi Cards for enabling family doctors to treat the patients effectively.
Medical and Health Minister Vidadala Rajani, Chief Secretary Sameer Sharma, Principal Secretary (Medical and Health) M.T. Krishna Babu, Director (Health and Family welfare) J. Nivas, AP Vaidya Vidhana Parishad Commissioner Dr. V. Vinod Kumar, APMSIDC VC and MD D. Muralidhara Reddy, Aarogyasri CEO M.N. Harindra Prasad, DG (Medical and Health-Drugs) Ravisankar and others were present.
