Context: In this episode of the Perspective Prog. based on Boosting Health Infrastructure. Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Monday launched PM Ayushman Bharat Health Infrastructure Mission which will be one of the largest pan-India scheme for strengthening healthcare infrastructure across the country.

• This mission will have three major aspects with an aim to strengthen the critical healthcare network from village to block to the district to the regional and national level in the next 4-5 years.
• It will provide support for more than  17000 rural Health and Wellness Centres in 10 High Focus States and establish 11,024 urban Health and Wellness Centres in all the States.
• Critical care services will be made 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.
• People will also have access to a full range of diagnostic services in the Public Healthcare system through Network of laboratories across the country.
• It will also work towards building up trained frontline health workforce to respond to any public health emergency. To further analyse this new mission and the need for boosting health infrastructure in the country.

Why is the scheme significant?

• India has long been in need of a ubiquitous healthcare system. A study (‘State of Democracy in South Asia (SDSA)–Round 3’) by Lokniti-CSDS in 2019 highlighted how access to public health care remained elusive to those living on the margins. The study found that 70 per cent of the locations have public healthcare services. However, availability was less in rural areas (65 per cent) compared to urban areas (87 per cent).
• In 45 per cent of the surveyed locations, people could access healthcare services by walking, whereas in 43 per cent of the locations they needed to use transport. The survey also found that proximity to healthcare services is higher in urban localities: 64 per cent of the enumerators in urban areas observed that people can access healthcare services by walking, while only 37 per cent in rural areas can do so.
• The Prime Minister had recently launched another scheme, the Ayushman Bharat Digital Mission (ABDM), a flagship digital initiative involving the creation of not just a unique health ID for every citizen, but also a digital healthcare professionals and facilities registry.