73,199 smart-card holders benefited from insurance scheme: Health Minister

SHIMLA: As many as 73,199 smart-card holders have benefited from the National Health Insurance Scheme in the past two years in the state, Health and Family Welfare Minister Kaul Singh Thakur informed the House during the question hour today.

Tribune News Service

Shimla, March 30

As many as 73,199 smart-card holders have benefited from the National Health Insurance Scheme in the past two years in the state, Health and Family Welfare Minister Kaul Singh Thakur informed the House during the question hour today.

Replying to BJP MLA Govind Singh Thakur’s question, he said 8,81,133 beneficiary families were covered under the scheme, but only 4, 79,606 families have got smart cards.

Replying to supplementary question by Jairam Thakur of the BJP regarding huge gap (almost 50 per cent) between total beneficiary families and

smart-card holders and how families without smart card were availing the services of “Outdoor patients”, he said: “While 74,000 drivers refused to get smart cards, there were about 30 to 40 per cent duplicate beneficiaries which need to be deleted.”

He said: “After the card is made, the information is sent to the government of India and locked for a year.”

He assured the House that the government would ask the insurance company to visit every panchayat at least twice to ensure that no person of any family was left out.

Kaul Singh said OPD patients who were marked as critical by doctors were being given facilities such as Rs 1,000 for fare and up to Rs 1.75 lakh for indoor treatment and three prestigious institutes —

IGMC, Shimla; Dr Rajender Prasad Government Medical College, Tanda; and PGI Chandigarh — have been identified for referral; institutions for critical patients.

Replying to a question raised by BJP MLA Rajiv Bindal, he said the scheme was started in Shimla and Kangra districts in 2008 and in March 2010 in remaining 10 districts.

“We will ask the PGI director to allot a room to open office where the official doctor to assist patients referred from Himachal to PGI can sit. Presently, the

doctor is sitting in the shopping complex at PGI.”

While replying to another question of Krishan Lal Thakur (MLA), the Health Minister said as per norms minimum population was 1.20 lakh in the plains and 80,000 in hills for opening a Community Health Centre (CHC).

“There is no proposal to upgrade the Primary Health Centre (PHC) at Rameshehar in Nalagarh area in Solan district to CHC as it did not conform to population criteria.”

He informed the House that there were 78 CHCs in the state and the average population covered was 80,320 and assured to consider the demand when the population increases.

Replying to queries of Ishwar Das Dhiman, Ravinder Singh Ravi, Satpal Singh Satti and Bikram Singh regarding upgrade of PHCs and CHCs, the minister said 10 PHCs and 7 CHCs have been upgraded in

the state.

Replying to another supplementary of ID Dhiman, he admitted that there was shortage of doctors in the state for which the interviews are being conducted every Tuesday. The minister said PHCs had minimum six beds, CHC 30 beds, Civil Hospital 50 to 100 beds and zonal-level Civil Hospital 200 to 300 beds.