PESHAWAR: When the previous authorities, which nonetheless holds sway withinside the province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (K-P), first brought its Sehat Card Programme withinside the summertime season of 2016, it was regarded as a huge win for inclusive fitness reforms.
Thousands of households throughout K-P who couldn’t find the money for fundamental healthcare had now located themselves protected through vast medical health insurance plans that the authorities had discovered with
Plenty pomp and glory.
Health Department Pakhtunkhwa:
According to the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Department of Health’s facts displayed on the Sehat Card website, this system is activated in over 520 hospitals throughout the province, has obtained over 2,198,114 visits, and covers as many as 6,853,887 lives.
However, six years down the road, it seems that getting the right of entry to medical health insurance and the use of the Sehat Card Programme hasn’t been clean for everyone, with many nonetheless left not able to gain its touted advantages whilst laid low with ill fitness.
Yousuf Durrani, who has spent plenty of his existence operating for Afghan refugees’ resources and is now nearing retirement, is one such character who reveals himself stuck in a loss of life-dealing catch-22 situation approximately the authorities’ medical health insurance plan.
He suffers from a debilitating kidney disorder that renders him not able to respire without everyday dialysis, for which docs advocate a right-away kidney transplant.
His wife, he says, is inclined to donate her kidney, that is a match, however, it’s for the price of the operation that his circle of relatives can’t find the money for regardless of being registered with the Sehat Card Programme.
“I even have spent much and lots of rupees withinside the highest months looking for treatment at a non-public Hayatabad sanatorium. The docs advocate a right-away transplant, however, despite the ability of the fitness care, I want 1. eight million rupees for the operation.
The sanatorium alleges that they’re now no longer receiving the specified finances from the authorities, so my handiest alternatives proper now are looking for donations or promoting my house,” stated the distressed patient.
“There are dozens of human beings like me who’re dying a gradual loss of life regardless of the authorities’ guarantees of on-hand healthcare and there may be no person to pay attention to us.
If there have been a consultant of the fitness branch found in those hospitals and a counterchanged into the installation to facilitate fitness card holders, most important operations like mine could have been plenty less complicated to finance and process,” he brought lamentingly.
Hailing from Hangu, Naseem represents any other tale of the diverse grounds that the authorities’ significantly touted Sehat Card software leaves uncovered.
Per he complains, non-public hospitals which might be greater on hand and provide distinctly higher healthcare centers generally tend to have long queues for fitness card holders, with the ones on the give up of the road regularly being again without remedy for diverse reasons.
“When I took my father for coronary heart surgical procedure to a non-public sanatorium, I had no success with the fitness card. It changed into existence or loss of life state of affairs and I couldn’t hazard ready so.
I needed to exhaust all my assets to pay for the operation out of my pocket,” he informed this reporter, including that the authorities’ medical health insurance plan wishes to provide higher insurance for non-public hospitals that obtain a large wide variety of sufferers.
Health Minister:
Health Minister Taimur Saleem Jhagra does now no longer see the hassle here. Per him, the authorities of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa have fulfilled its promise to the human beings and audited the 0.33 celebration with a fitness card, which he claims has been declared satisfactory.
“Although, the hiccups being confronted withinside the provision of getting right of entry to medical health insurance withinside the tribal districts is a hassle created through the federal authorities.
They are liable for withholding the finances, which is an act of injustice. As for the hospitals we’re receiving court cases from, we’re going to install a separate machine to make certain all sufferers get right of entry to well-timed remedy,” he informed The Express Tribune.
