bdnews24.com :
The government has launched the Universal Health Coverage (UHC) project on a pilot basis in a bid to change the face of the healthcare delivery system by 2032.
The project, taken up in three upazillas of Tangail district, is being seen as a huge step in revolutionising the healthcare delivery system for the poor by introducing insurance. Poor people, selected under certain criteria, will get a card to receive treatment for 50 diseases commonly found in them.
The treatment will take place in government health facilities of the district.
“This is the first such project in Bangladesh. We’ll gradually spread this across Bangladesh,” health minister Mohammad Nasim said on Sunday . The Health Economics Unit of the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare along with Green Delta Insurance Company Limited signed the agreement for the pilot project.
The signing took place at the Secretariat. UHC has become a buzzword in the health sector as the World Health Organisation and the World Bank are promoting this as a way of preventing people from falling into poverty due to heavy out-of-pocket expenditure during medical treatment.
The concept is that people should have access to healthcare without getting into financial trouble.
In Bangladesh, people have to spend about 64 percent of their entire health expenditure on their own, which pushes 5 percent of them into poverty every year.
This dismal picture prompted the government to devise a financing strategy, 2012-2032, to achieve UHC.
The success of the Tangail project will decide the launching of UHC across Bangladesh.
“This is just the beginning,” Md Ashadul Islam, Director General of the Health Economics Unit, said while explaining the pilot project at the signing. He said they had already selected 100,000 poor families-landless, having only a home for living, and being casual day labourers-in those three Upazilas.
The government has launched the Universal Health Coverage (UHC) project on a pilot basis in a bid to change the face of the healthcare delivery system by 2032.
The project, taken up in three upazillas of Tangail district, is being seen as a huge step in revolutionising the healthcare delivery system for the poor by introducing insurance. Poor people, selected under certain criteria, will get a card to receive treatment for 50 diseases commonly found in them.
The treatment will take place in government health facilities of the district.
“This is the first such project in Bangladesh. We’ll gradually spread this across Bangladesh,” health minister Mohammad Nasim said on Sunday . The Health Economics Unit of the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare along with Green Delta Insurance Company Limited signed the agreement for the pilot project.
The signing took place at the Secretariat. UHC has become a buzzword in the health sector as the World Health Organisation and the World Bank are promoting this as a way of preventing people from falling into poverty due to heavy out-of-pocket expenditure during medical treatment.
The concept is that people should have access to healthcare without getting into financial trouble.
In Bangladesh, people have to spend about 64 percent of their entire health expenditure on their own, which pushes 5 percent of them into poverty every year.
This dismal picture prompted the government to devise a financing strategy, 2012-2032, to achieve UHC.
The success of the Tangail project will decide the launching of UHC across Bangladesh.
“This is just the beginning,” Md Ashadul Islam, Director General of the Health Economics Unit, said while explaining the pilot project at the signing. He said they had already selected 100,000 poor families-landless, having only a home for living, and being casual day labourers-in those three Upazilas.
