The health department of Telangana state is planning to expand the realm of Aarogyasri health insurance scheme to smaller hospitals in the rural areas. With this move, the state government is intending to make healthcare more accessible and affordable to the poor in the remote areas of the state.

Moving further to expand the realm of Aarogyasri health insurance scheme in Telangana, the state government is coming out with a comprehensive healthcare policy. In order to extend the benefits of Aarogyasri to the people in the smaller towns and villages the state government has decided to expand the scheme to smaller hospitals with at least 25 beds in the rural areas and has even decided to add more diseases to be covered under the popular healthcare scheme.

Earlier the Aarogyasri healthcare scheme was extended to only 50 and above bedded hospitals and about 938 different kinds of diseases were treated under the scheme. Extending further, the Telangana health department has proposed to add 100 more new diseases including seasonal diseases like dengue and malaria to its fold.

Moreover the state government is also planning to strengthen the existing healthcare infrastructure in the rural areas. As part of this the state government has decided to install all the required infrastructure and medical equipments in all the PHCs across the state. Earlier PHCs were not allowed to conduct any major surgeries due to lack of infrastructure and facilities, now the state government has decided to allow conducting surgeries at PHCs also.

In addition to strengthening infrastructure in government hospitals, the Telangana health department is also coming out with plans to encourage the hospital staff and doctors by giving them benefits and due recognition for their services.

“We are drafting a comprehensive healthcare plan for Telangana state. Our aim is to improve healthcare accessibility and provide quality and affordable healthcare services to the poor in the rural areas. We are working out modalities to implement Aarogyasri scheme in PHCs and CHCs, for this we have proposed to strengthen the existing healthcare infrastructure such as PHCs and CHCs (Community Health Center) and will provide all required infrastructure and appoint doctors and staff wherever necessary. To encourage doctors and the staff, we are also planning to offer huge benefits in recognition to their services,” said, Dr T Rajaiah, Deputy CM and Medical and Health Minister of Telangana.

Unlike earlier, where Aarogyasri scheme was implemented only in big private and corporate hospitals and huge sums of money was diverted to the private sector. Now the Telangana government wants to strengthen the government hospitals and planning to provide all the healthcare services under Aarogyasri in government hospitals, thereby making healthcare more accessible to the poor and at the same time spend major chunk of Aarogyasri funds to further improve healthcare in the state.