Health insurance to a person aged 70 years and above, six crore people to be directly benefitted

Lucknow| Prime Minister Narendra Modi will gift health insurance to citizens aged 70 years and above before Diwali. PM Modi will launch Ayushman Bharat Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojana (AB PMJAY) for senior citizens. This will benefit about six crore citizens from about 4.5 crore families.

Official sources said that under this scheme, every person aged 70 years or above, whether poor or rich, is eligible to get Ayushman card. Once the extended scheme is launched, senior citizens will be able to get free treatment up to Rs 5 lakh in any empaneled hospital under AB PMJAY. Women account for 49 per cent of the beneficiaries of the current scheme. The Health Ministry had earlier reported that the general public had benefited under the scheme to the tune of over Rs 1 lakh crore.

A total of 29,648 hospitals, including 12,696 private hospitals, have been listed under AB PMJAY as of September 1, 2024. The scheme is currently being implemented in 33 states and union territories except Delhi, Odisha and West Bengal. In this application based scheme, people will have to register on PMJAY portal or Ayushman app, people who already have Ayushman card will have to apply again for the new card and complete their eKYC again.

Senior citizens aged 70 years and above belonging to families already covered under AB PMJAY will get additional top-up cover of up to Rs 5 lakh per annum for themselves. They do not have to share it with other family members, who are under the age of 70. All other senior citizens aged 70 years and above will get a cover of up to Rs 5 lakh per year.

PM Modi will also launch the U-WIN portal developed to maintain the electronic registry of routine vaccination on Tuesday. Some other projects will also be started on the same day. The U-Win portal is currently being operated on a pilot basis. The platform has been developed to keep a permanent digital record of vaccination of pregnant women as well as children from birth to age 17 under the vaccination programme. U-Win is a replica of the COVID-19 vaccine management system Co-Win.

Senior citizens aged 70 and over, who are under private health insurance policies or the Employees’ State Insurance Scheme, will be eligible to receive benefits under the scheme, officials said earlier. However, those who are already availing the benefits of other public health insurance schemes like Central Government Health Scheme (CGHS), Ex-Servicemen Contributory Health Scheme (ECHS) and Ayushman Central Armed Police Forces (CAPF) can either avail their existing scheme. Can choose or opt for AB PMJAY.