Strengthening Healthcare

The Hindu     28th October 2021     Save    
QEP Pocket Notes

Context: The Ayushman Bharat Health Infrastructure Mission (ABHIM) aims to fix the weaknesses in India’s health system.

Ayushman Bharat Health Infrastructure Mission (ABHIM)

  • Objectives: Strengthening of urban and rural primary care, stronger surveillance systems and laboratory capacity as well as creation of critical care capacity at different levels of health system.
  • Health infrastructure development: With support for 17,788 rural health and wellness centres (HWCs) in seven high-focus States and three north-eastern States.
    • 11,044 urban HWCs will be established in close collaboration with Urban Local Bodies.
  • Comprehensive capacity building and emergency preparedness: Network of centres will build a trained public health workforce that can perform routine public health functions while effectively responding to a public health emergency.
  • Critical care hospital blocks, with 50-100 beds, will be established in 602 districts, to enable care for those with serious infectious diseases without disrupting other services.
  • For enhancing the level of disaster response readiness, 15 health emergency operation centres and two container-based mobile hospitals will be created.
  • Universalisation of primary healthcare: Various measures of this scheme will extend primary healthcare services across India.
  • Expansion of healthcare services: Areas like hypertension, diabetes and mental health will be covered, in addition to existing services.
  • Information technology-enabled disease surveillance system: With support for 3,382 block public health units (BPHUs) in 11 high-focus States and establishment of integrated district public health laboratories in all 730 districts.
    • The hub-and-spoke model of block, district, regional and national public health laboratories will enable effective microbial surveillance.
    • A National Platform for One Health to be established.
    • Four Regional National Institutes of Virology will be established.
    • Laboratory capacity under the National Centre for Disease Control, the Indian Council of Medical Research and national research institutions will be strengthened.
    • Fifteen bio-safety level III labs to augment capacity for infectious disease control and bio-security.
  • Towards continuum of care at different levels: HWCs will be linked with Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojana, for all entitled beneficiaries.
  • Private sector participation in service delivery may be invited by States, as per need and availability.
    

Way forward

  • Train and deploy a larger and better skilled health workforce: Upgraded district hospitals offer the best opportunity for creating new training centres.
    • Scale up institutional capacity for training public health professionals.
  • Leverage public health expertise: In programme design, delivery, implementation and monitoring in many sectors that impact health.
  • Timely financing and effective implementation: For augmenting capacity in several areas and creating a framework for coordinated functioning at district, state and national levels.
  • Change of bureaucratic mindsets: Enabling the data-driven decentralised decision-making and people-partnered primary care at block level while strengthening national connectivity for delivering universal healthcare.
  • A cultural shift in Centre-State relations: As many independently functioning programmes will have to work with a common purpose by leaping across boundaries of separate budget lines and reporting structures.
  • Citizen-centric: The platforms shall offer space for active citizen engagement.
QEP Pocket Notes