There is substantial increase in investment in Health Infrastructure and the Budget outlay for Health and Wellbeing is Rs 2,23,846 crore in BE 2021-22 as against this year’s BE of Rs 94,452 crore, an increase of 137 percent.
PM Atma Nirbhar Swasth Bharat Yojana:
The Finance Minister announced that a new centrally sponsored scheme, PM Aatma Nirbhar Swasth Bharat Yojana, will be launched with an outlay of about Rs 64, 180 crore over 6 years.
This will develop capacities of primary, secondary, and tertiary care Health Systems, strengthen existing national institutions, and create new institutions, to cater to detection and cure of new and emerging diseases.
This will be in addition to the National Health Mission. The main interventions under the scheme are:
- Support for 17,788 rural and 11,024 urban Health and Wellness Centers
- Setting up integrated public health labs in all districts and 3382 block public health units in 11 states
- Establishing critical care hospital blocks in 602 districts and 12 central institutions
- Strengthening of the National Centre for Disease Control (NCDC), its 5 regional branches and 20 metropolitan health surveillance units
- Expansion of the Integrated Health Information Portal to all States/UTs to connect all public health labs
- Operationalisation of 17 new Public Health Units and strengthening of 33 existing Public Health Units at Points of Entry, that is at 32 Airports, 11 Seaports and 7 land crossings
- Setting up of 15 Health Emergency Operation Centers and 2 mobile hospitals and
- Setting up of a national institution for One Health, a Regional Research Platform for WHO South East Asia Region, 9 Biosafety Level III laboratories and 4 regional National Institutes for Virology.
Vaccines:
Provision of Rs 35,000 crore made for Covid-19 vaccine in BE 2021-22.
The Pneumococcal Vaccine, a Made in India product, presently limited to only 5 states, will be rolled out across the country aimed at averting 50,000 child deaths annually.
Nutrition:
To strengthen nutritional content, delivery, outreach, and outcome, the Government will merge the Supplementary Nutrition Programme and the PoshanAbhiyan and launch the Mission Poshan 2.0. Government will adopt an intensified strategy to improve nutritional outcomes across 112 Aspirational Districts.
Universal Coverage of Water Supply:
Jal Jeevan Mission (Urban)
- The Finance Minister announced that the JalJeevan Mission (Urban), will be launched for universal water supply in all 4,378 Urban Local Bodies with 2.86 crore household tap connections, as well as liquid waste management in 500 AMRUT cities.
- It will be implemented over 5 years, with an outlay of Rs. 2,87,000 crore.
Swachh Bharat Mission:
- Moreover, the Urban Swachh Bharat Mission will be implemented with a total financial allocation of Rs 1,41,678 crore over a period of 5 years from 2021-2026.
- Also to tackle the burgeoning problem of air pollution, the government proposed to provide an amount of Rs. 2,217 crore for 42 urban centres with a million-plus population in this budget.
Vehicle scrapping policy:
- A voluntary vehicle scrapping policy to phase out old and unfit vehicles was also announced.
- Fitness tests have been proposed in automated fitness centres after 20 years in case of personal vehicles, and after 15 years in case of commercial vehicles
