A recent feedback survey revealed that the revolutionary programme of the PTI Government – National Sehat Card – has become hugely popular with the majority of the beneficiaries because of the hard work put in by the relevant authorities for its implementation.
It showed that 96% beneficiaries were satisfied with the treatment provided by the Sehat Sahulat Programme; 72% were satisfied with the hospital services; and 98% were satisfied with the behaviour of the staff at the relevant hospitals.
It is, indeed, a landmark programme aimed at ensuring that the identified under-privileged citizens across the country get access to their entitled medical health care in a swift and dignified manner without any financial obligations.
It is known to all that medical and treatment services in government facilities were not up to the mark because of rush of patients and non-availability of required financial resources.
The well-to-do families were in a position to get quality treatment from health institutions of their choice in the private sector but the poor were not in a position to benefit from these facilities.
It is in this backdrop that the Sehat Sahulat Programme has become popular, affording opportunities to the disadvantaged segments of the society to get treatment both from the public and the private sector health institutions in a dignified manner.
The speed with which the coverage of the programme has been expanded is also praiseworthy as so far over 15.45 families have been enrolled and there have been over 2.8 million visits to the empanelled hospitals.
For a variety of reasons, a large number of the population is suffering from diseases like heart, diabetic, hepatitis, cancer and liver/kidney failure but they were unable to get proper treatment because of the huge expenditure involved.
Now the Government has allocated one million rupees per family per year to cover expenditure on treatment of these diseases as well as maternity services, fractures and injuries.
As a number of hospitals have been enlisted for the programme in the vicinity of card holders, this would prevent unnecessary load on treatment facilities in major cities and towns.
While appreciating the programme, we would propose that its scope should be further expanded to include specialists’ consultation and free of charge medicines as prescribed by these specialists.
Similarly, medicines prescribed for post-admission period should also be provided by the hospital concerned.
