-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 Indian Express Rising cases of leprosy among Adivasis call for urgent public action. India officially eliminated Leprosy in 2005 by bringing the Prevalence Rate below 1/10000 at the national level. However, the National Health Policy 2017 (NHP), which will guide the Health policy direction of the country over the next decade or so, still has elimination of Leprosy as a national level target. It is highly unlikely that India achieves elimination...

-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 Indian Express Many BJP-ruled states deny children a food choice that could address malnutrition Two of every five Indian children are stunted. Eggs are nutrition-dense superfoods packed with proteins and essential vitamins. Washington University researchers, for example, have demonstrated with a randomized control trial that feeding infants eggs daily decreased stunted growth by almost half and underweight by three-quarters. Berkeley researchers have also validated that Healthy school meals even improve test...