Modi’s Ayushman Bharat scheme put hospital treatment within reach of tens of millions of Indians for the first time. But the government’s unpaid bills may derail the reforms
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hen the world’s biggest healthcare scheme works, it allows tens of thousands of Indians petrified of the catastrophic cost of hospital treatment to breathe easy – Indians such as Mahesh Kumar Sharma, a 60-year-old farmer from Madhya Pradesh who is a patient at the National Heart Institute in the capital, Delhi.
A top cardiologist, Dr OP Yadava, has carried out open-heart surgery to replace his mitral valve. The immaculate ward, medicine, food, tests and treatment are of the same standard provided to paying patients at the institute. But for Sharma, it is all free.
Under the Ayushman Bharat medical insurance scheme, launched in 2018, poor patients are entitled to cover worth 500,000 rupees a year for each family. Most importantly, the treatment is available not only at the crowded and frenetic government facilities but also at private hospitals across India that offer a better standard of care. So far, 822m Ayushman Bharat health account (ABHA) numbers have been issued.
