- विज्ञापन -
Chandigarh: The Chief Secretary made a surprise visit to Civil Hospital Mohali, reviewed the provision of free medicine facilities in District and Sub-Divisional Hospitals and CHCs.
Punjab Chief Secretary Anurag Verma paid a surprise visit to District Hospital located in Phase 6 of Mohali today. Talking to the media personnel after the inspection, he said that the purpose of this visit is to ensure Chief Minister Maan’s decision to provide people-friendly facility of free medicines to patients in government hospitals.
Verma also interacted with the patients coming out of the civil hospital and asked them whether all the medicines prescribed by the doctors were given to them free of cost. All the patients confirmed that they got free medicines and appreciated the public welfare initiative of the government.
Verma said that 276 essential drugs list (EDL) has been prepared by the health department with the advice of doctors. 90 percent of these have been contracted regarding the rate of medicines. For the remaining medicines and government prescriptions, the Senior Medical Officer (SMO) will procure the medicines from the market and provide them to the patients so that the patients do not have to pay any money out of pocket for the purchase of the medicines prescribed by the doctors. 25 crores have been sanctioned by the Chief Minister for this purpose. The financial strength of SMOs has been increased from Rs 25,000 to Rs 2.5 lakh so that they can purchase these medicines.
The Chief Secretary said that there are 23 district hospitals, 41 sub division hospitals and 161 community health centers in the state. The said system has been implemented in all these hospitals. He further said that yesterday on his instructions, all the Deputy Commissioners of the state inspected their respective district hospitals in order to ensure the implementation of the said decision. Apart from this, all the Deputy Commissioners held a detailed meeting with the Civil Surgeons and SMOs in this regard.
