Modicare to have 1,366 treatment packages

New Delhi: The Centre has planned to launch the ambitious National Health Protection Scheme (NHPS) with 1,366 types of hospital packages for better implementation of the scheme across the country. According to sources, the final Cabinet note is ready and it is likely to be approved in the Cabinet meeting scheduled on Wednesday.

The sources also said that all the states would submit their approval note by the end of this month and it would be left to the states to implement the plan on either Trust mode or through insurance companies.

According to an official, the rules and regulations, including the implementation of the entire structure, would be formalised only after the approval of the Cabinet. The Director General of Health Services (DGHS) has recommended inclusion of 1,366 packages of the insurance scheme in the NHPS, the sources said, adding that there were about 1,300 packages for treatment under health cover, which have been extended to 1,366 by removing some outdated packages in the NHPS.

Recently, World Health Organisation (WHO) director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus had lauded NHPS and Ayushman Bharat initiative, saying that the scheme has the potential of transforming the lives of hundreds of millions of countrymen.

"The new NHPS has the potential not only to improve health but to help lift people out of poverty," Ghebreyesus had said at a gathering of health officials and experts at the NITI Aayog.