Center expands beneficiary base of AB PM-JAY to 120 million families

Currently, these beneficiary households are identified on the basis of certain deprivation and occupation-based criteria from the Socio-Economic Caste Census of 2011.

The Center will share the financial burden of the states and encourage populous states like Uttar Pradesh to include more beneficiaries. The expansion will benefit 12.6 million additional households including 60 million individuals.

AB PM-JAY is the world’s largest health insurance scheme. It was launched in September 2018 with an aim to provide free health cover of up to 5 lakh per eligible beneficiary for secondary and tertiary care hospitalization.

Since its launch, the scheme has grown exponentially as it is currently being implemented by 33 States/UTs (excluding Delhi, Odisha and West Bengal), providing 1,949 treatment centers through a network of 26,000 empaneled hospitals. procedures are offered. Over the years, PM-JAY has benefitted over 42 million people who have received free treatment, while 210 million eligible beneficiaries have been empowered with Ayushman cards. “The government has projected 11.7% population growth till 2021 since the 2011 census. When PM-JAY was implemented in 2018, the government selected about 107.4 million poor and vulnerable families (about 500 million individual beneficiaries) under PM-JAY, so that the government could cover 40% of the population,” said the person cited above. said, adding that the scheme would now cover at least 560-570 million persons.

“However, the population census has not been conducted after 2011. But we are assuming 11.7% decadal growth of population and hence, the central government has now allowed 120 million beneficiary base under PM-JAY. With this move, more eligible beneficiaries will benefit from the family scheme,” the person said.

The move is aimed at encouraging the state governments to add more eligible beneficiaries under the scheme as the Center will support the states by sharing their financial burden.

For example, states like Uttar Pradesh will get maximum benefit as it already has a base of 11.8 million beneficiaries. In addition, the government will also increase the budget allocation for PM-JAY. allocated by the government 6412 crore to AB PM-JAY for 2022-23, which is set to increase further.

Queries sent to spokespersons for the health ministry and the National Health Authority remained unanswered till press time.

Peppermint Earlier the FY24 Union Budget was reported to be likely to extend the coverage of AB PM-JAY to the non-poor sections of the society, often referred to as the missing middle.