Maharashtra Becomes First State to Provide Free Health Cover to All People in the State

Mumbai: Maharashtra Health Minister Rajesh Tope has announced to provide free and cashless health cover to all by the government. With this, Maharashtra has become the first state in the country to provide free health cover to all people. Tope made the announcement on Friday on the occasion of the Maharashtra Day program in Jalna.

Health Minister Rajesh Tope took the important decision to provide free health benefits to each-and-every person of the state through Mahatma Jyotiba Phule Jan Arogya Yojana on the occasion of Maharashtra Day yesterday. @rajeshtope11 @CMOMaharashtra #maharashtraday pic.twitter.com/1qExYcvTgm

— Policenama English (@PolicenamaE) May 2, 2020

So far, 11,506 cases of corona have been reported in the Maharashtra, out of which 9,142 are active cases. So far 485 patients have died from Corona. Maharashtra Health Minister Rajesh Tope said that the Uddhav Thackeray government will connect all the people of the state with free and cashless health cover scheme to deal with the corona epidemic. He informed that a memorandum of understanding has been signed with the General Insurance Public Sector Association. Under this, COVID-19 patients can be treated in private hospitals in Pune and Mumbai.

The Health Minister of Maharashtra further explained that packages have been designed for various diseases in a similar way. Under this, fees for treatment in hospitals have been fixed, which is relatively low so that the needy do not have to wander around for their treatment. He said that earlier there were 496 hospitals covered under the scheme, but now more than one thousand hospitals will come under it. Rajesh Tope said that a memorandum would be signed to include government, semi-government employees and Ujala ration card holders so that private hospitals can not charge more money from patients.