Swasthya Sathi: ‘Rs 150 cr spent for heart-related surgeries last fiscal’

MP, 20 Apr 2023, Bengal government had spent Rs 150 crore as the cost of carrying out heart related surgeries on the patients under the ‘Swasthya Sathi’ scheme in the last financial year. 

Thanks to Bengal’s flagship scheme ‘Swasthya Sath’ that a huge number of beneficiaries are able to undergo various surgeries at completely free-of-cost. Sources in the Health department said that a large number of people undergo heart surgeries under the ‘Swasthya Sathi’ scheme. 

Heart-related surgeries which have been carried out are mostly installation of pacemakers, valve replacements, and angioplasty and bypass surgeries as well. Thousands of cancer patients have undergone radiotherapy and chemotherapy in various private hospitals and also some state-run hospitals in the last financial year, sources said. 

Patients received cancer treatment completely free-of-cost which they would have to otherwise pay a minimum around Rs 50 crore if the treatment was done in any private hospitals under any health scheme other than ‘Swastya Sathi’. 

Health services also included advanced treatment like application of image guided and linear accelerator machines. Apart from heart and cancer treatment, a huge number of patients had undergone knee replacement. 

Health department sources said that people in Bengal have availed knee replacement surgeries completely for which the state government had spent a fund of Rs 23 crore in the last financial year. Also Read - AIIMS hiring graft: CID quizzes BJP MLA Niladri Sekhar Dana The Budget allocation in the health sector in Bengal has gone up from Rs 3,584 crore in 2010-11 to Rs 17,576.90 crore in current fiscal clearly indicating the emphasis given by Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee to this sector. 

After the Mamata Banerjee government came to power, the budgetary allocation in the health sector has increased manifold in the past couple of years with various health schemes seeing huge allocation. 

According to the state government figure, around 24.85 lakh beneficiaries have availed the health services of the Swasthya Sathi scheme since its inception. 

The government has already spent Rs 3,212.72 crore for the scheme. More than 2.2 crore families have enrolled in the flagship scheme as on December 31 last year. https://www.millenniumpost.in/bengal/swasthya-sathi-rs-150-cr-spent-for-heart-related-surgeries-last-fiscal-515813?infinitescroll=1