Tamil Nadu marching ahead: Ensuring better medicare for all

Chennai: Going beyond creating infrastructure to improve basic medicare, the state government, led by Chief Minister J. Jayalalithaa, has introduced a holistic approach towards improving the well-being of the people by establishing yoga and naturopathy clinics in all medical college hospitals and district headquarters hospitals across the state.

This apart, the Chief Minister's Comprehensive Health Insurance Scheme has come as a blessing in disguise to the needy who could not afford expensive treatment procedures at corporate hospitals. The schemes, which include treatment to 1,016 procedures, 23 important diagnostic procedures and 113 follow-up procedures, have benefited about 10.40 lakh persons for an approved sum of Rs 2,182.74 crore. Of this, 4.19 lakh beneficiaries were treated in government hospitals for an insurance coverage of Rs 791.39 crore.

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The government had created a corpus fund of Rs 10 crore to meet the expenditure towards specialised surgeries costing more than Rs 1.5 lakh. So far, 2,192 beneficiaries have been approved for these costly surgeries. Smart cards have been issued to 1.40 crore families. In addition to families with an annual income of Rs 72,000 and below, the government included Sri Lankan refugees living in camps and living outside the camps — but registered as refugees in local police stations have also been included under this scheme without income ceiling.

About Rs 4 lakh insurance coverage is being provided to each family in four years. The families of differently-abled are eligible for enrolment under the scheme without income ceiling. Nearly, 783 hospitals, including all the government medical college hospitals and the district headquarters hospitals are empanelled to provide treatment.

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Another milestone in improving the health of the people, particularly the future generation is providing Amma Baby Care Kit, containing 16 materials for a value of Rs 1,000 to 6.7 lakh children born in government hospitals, at an overall cost of Rs 67 crore.

The upgradation of primary health centres as taluk hospitals in the newly-formed 10 taluks for Rs 25 crore, establishment of reverse osmosis plant at a cost of Rs 24.50 crore in 45 government hospitals attached to government medical colleges and dental colleges, 30 district headquarters hospitals and 240 taluk and non-taluk hospitals, providing digital X-ray machine to12 government hospitals at a cost of Rs 13.20 crore and C-arm X-ray machine to 31 government hospitals at a cost of Rs 9.30 crore are some of the unique achievements.

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Assistance to pregnant women: Financial assistance to pregnant women under the Dr Muthulakshmi Reddy Maternity Benefit Scheme was enhanced to Rs 12,000 and, so far, 26.72 lakh pregnant women benefited to the tune of Rs 2,477.95 crore. Leaving no stone unturned in its efforts to cater to all sections of society, the government under Ms Jayalalithaa’s leadership had introduced free sanitary napkins and distributed them annually to 32.79 adolescent girls, 729 women prison inmates and 525 in-patients in government mental hospital under the menstrual hygiene programme.