-Financial Express After presenting the Budget 2018, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley gave a name to government’s ambitious healthcare scheme Ayushmann Bharat: Modicare. He said that nobody knew whether Obamacare was successful but Modicare will become successful in every possible way. Dubbed as “world’s largest government-funded health care programme” aims to provide health insurance coverage of Rs 5 lakh per family per annum to 10 crore poor and vulnerable families. While the programme...

-The Telegraph New Delhi: The Union health ministry on Thursday said Aadhaar cards were not required for treatment under the National Health Protection Scheme, but guidelines released by the Centre suggest that beneficiaries can seek treatment only once without the 12-digit biometric identity. The ministry said a notification "being issued" enables implementation agencies to ask beneficiaries for their Aadhaar card to authenticate identity. "In order to authenticate the identity of beneficiaries accurately,...

-Firstpost.com There is nothing to prevent the government from making Aadhaar mandatory for Ayushman Bharat. Even as the Courts reopened and news on the Aadhaar verdict is awaited, a Union health ministry notification issued on 4 July has confirmed that Aadhaar will be mandatory for the ‘Ayushman Bharat’ national health insurance scheme. While details of the scheme were out in June, the new notification also sets a deadline for enrolment for those...

-The Times of India NEW DELHI: India currently spends a little over 1% of GDP on health, far below Singapore which has the lowest public spend on health at 2.2% of GDP among countries with significant universal health coverage (UHC) service, according latest National Health Profile (NHP) data. India's per capita public expenditure on health increased from Rs 621 in 2009-10 to Rs 1,112 (around $16 at current exchange rate) in 2015-16....

-The Hindu Business Line The Ayushman Bharat programme must aim to reverse poverty caused by healthcare expenses The state of India’s healthcare system is somewhat dichotomous — the country is a global supplier of life-saving, affordable and good quality generic medicines, yet lakhs of families are driven into poverty because they are forced to spend much of their earnings and savings on medications to treat chronic and life-threatening diseases. The poor, particularly,...