One million families facilitated under PM National Health Program: Saira

ISLAMABAD: Minister for National Health Services, Regulation and Coordination Saira Afzal Tarar Thursday said that one million families had been given health insurance cover so far under Prime Minister's National Health Program.

Addressing the 15th national steering committee meeting of Prime Minister's National Health Program, she said that the program was fast reaching tp more and more families below the poverty line.

The meeting was convened to take necessary decisions in the light of Prime Minister's directives regarding launching of the Prime Minister's National Health Program both for secondary and priority care in Sindh and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa with 100% federal funding.

The expansion of the program will provide the secondary and priority health coverage to the poor families whose daily income is below Rs 200.

Initially, Prime Minister's National Health Program was launched in 23 districts of Pakistan which are now being expanded to 60 districts covering 11 districts of FATA, 10 districts of AJK, seven districts of Gilgit Baltistan, 11 districts of Punjab, 12 districts of Balochistan, four districts of Sindh and KP each and ICT with the beneficiary families of three million.

The minister said to date 17,000 patients had been admitted to 81 hospitals empanelled under the program.      Thousands of enrolled patients have been successfully treated in the     best public and private hospitals, she added.

Sharing figures, she said 104 open heart surgeries had been performed, 119 treated for different forms of cancer, 643 cataract eye surgeries, 1,289 Caesarian sections performed, 1,080 normal deliveries, 796 appendix operations, 658 operated for gall stones, 866 hernia operations, 830 hysterectomy, 275 angiographies, 217 angioplasties and 469 dialysis. So far 200 million rupees payment has been made to the empanelled hospitals for treatment of the enrolled patients.

The minister said under the instructions of the Prime Minister there was a strong emphasis on monitoring sharing that under the third party evaluation by NADRA, there was more than 92 percent patient satisfaction from those treated under the program.

She said stringent monitoring was being done through federal, provincial and district level monitoring units.

She said under directions of the Prime Minister the program is being launched in Sindh and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. The federal government will pay the entire premium for Sindh and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa enrolled families with no expense of the provincial governments.

She added 45 additional districts are being added to the existing 15 districts taking the total to 60 districts in the four provinces, Gilgit Baltistan, AJK and FATA.

In the revised PC-1 an amount of Rs 8.1 billion has been allocated for the program, the minister said. Work is underway for the next phase of the program which will cover the entire country providing the service to all families living below the poverty line.

It was decided to notify an expert committee in order to initiate a pilot program in 10 districts of Pakistan on Family Practice Program and to Pilot OPD Services for diseases including Heart failure, Blood pressure, Asthma, Diabetes, Breast Cancer, COPD and Dyslipidemia.

Copyright APP (Associated Press of Pakistan), 2017