Mumbai: The Maharashtra government has decided to provide free medical services and treatments to the people across all the state-run health institutions. The decision was taken at the cabinet meeting, health minister Tanaji Sawant has said.
“This is a revolutionary decision. It will be implemented at all the 2,418 health institutions being run by the state health department. At all these places some fees were being charged to prepare the ‘case paper’. Now, they won’t have to spend anything on case papers or any other diagnostic tests etc. The decision will also save their time and the treatment will be quick,” Sawant said while explaining the decision.
“We plan to bring the out-of-pocket expense of all the citizens across the state to zero as we are completing the Aazadi Ka Amrit Mahotsav,” Sawant said. The decision will be implemented at all the PHCs, rural hospitals, women’s hospitals, district general hospitals, sub-divisional hospitals, super speciality hospitals and the cancer hospitals being run by the state government. Presently over 2.55 crore people are treated at all these institutions every year, Dr Sawant said adding that this is our way of implementing the Right of Health that article 21 of the Constitution has given to all citizens of the country.
