Withe an avowed objective of correcting the imbalances in availability of affordable and reliable tertiary level healthcare and to augment facilities for quality medical education in different states in the country, the union health ministry will soon establish at least one AIIMS-like institution in each state in the country.
To expedite the establishment of such AIIMS-like institutions, the union health minister Dr Harsh Vardhan has written letters to 13 state chief ministers asking them to identify three or four suitable alternate locations for setting up of a new AIIMS. The states which have been asked by the health ministry to identify the land included Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Goa, Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Gujarat, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Jharkhand, Karnataka, Punjab and Maharashtra.
Approximately 200 acres of land at a location are required for the establishment of one AIIMS-like super-speciality hospital-cum-teaching institution. The location should have road connectivity, availability of water and electricity. The state government has to undertake to provide, free of cost, land and other required infrastructure such as suitable road connection, sufficient water supply, electricity connection of required load and regulatory/statutory clearances. Cost of construction and running of the new AIIMS would be met by the central government under the Pradhan Mantri Swasthya Suraksha Yojana (PMSSY), Dr Vardhan in his letter to the chief ministers said.
Under the PMSSY, six AIIMS-like institutions have already been established by the union health ministry in different states of Madhya Pradesh, Odisha, Rajasthan, Bihar, Chatisgarh and Uttarakhand. Two batches of MBBS studtents and the first batch of BSc nursing students are receiving education at each of these six AIIMS.