Prime Minister Narendra Modi will launch the Pradhan Mantri Atmanirbhar Swasth Bharat Yojana (PMASBY) on Monday for strengthening healthcare infrastructure across the country.
The prime minister will visit Uttar Pradesh's Siddharthnagar to inaugurate nine medical colleges in the state. Later, he will launch PMASBY. He will also inaugurate various development projects worth more than Rs 5,200 crore for his Lok Sabha constituency Varanasi, a release from the Prime Minister's Office (PMO) said.
PMASBY aims to fill critical gaps in public health infrastructure, especially in critical care facilities and primary care, in both urban and rural areas, and will operate in addition to the National Health Mission.
It will provide support for 17,788 rural Health and Wellness Centres in 10 high-focus states. Besides, 11,024 urban Health and Wellness Centres will be established in all the states.
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"Critical care services will be available in all the districts of the country with more than 5 lakh population, through exclusive critical care hospital blocks, while the remaining districts will be covered through referral services," the release said.
Under PMASBY, a National Institution for One Health, four new National Institutes for Virology, a regional research platform for WHO South East Asia region, nine biosafety level III laboratories, five new Regional National Centre for Disease Control will be set up, it added.
The scheme targets to build an IT-enabled disease surveillance system by developing a network of surveillance laboratories at block, district, regional and national levels in metropolitan areas. It also aims to operationalise 17 new public health units and strengthen 33 such existing units at Points of Entry for effectively detecting, investigating, preventing, and combating public health emergencies and disease outbreaks.
"People will have access to a full range of diagnostic services in the public healthcare system through network of laboratories across the country. Integrated public health labs will be set up in all the districts," the government said.
Meanwhile, the nine medical colleges to be inaugurated by the prime minister are situated in Siddharthnagar, Etah, Hardoi, Pratapgarh, Fatehpur, Deoria, Ghazipur, Mirzapur and Jaunpur.
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