Health expenditure at 1.84% of GDP, moving steadily to 2.5%: JP Nadda

Nadda said that health is a State subject and the Centre’s role is to provide financial, technical support, and handhold states in fulfilling their targets.

“We are now setting up four more NIVs, in addition to the one in Pune — in Jammu, Bangalore, Dibrugarh and Jabalpur. We are focusing on setting up a second campus of NIMHANS in Bangalore,” Nadda said, adding that the Centre is “going as fast as we can go” in filling vacancies of staff and faculty in institutions like AIIMS.

He said that around 15,000 Jan Aushadhi centres are currently functioning and 25,000 centres will be set up in next two years.

CPI(M)’s V Sivadasan raised the issue of ASHA workers protesting in Kerala and said, “ASHA workers are requesting an increase in incentives from the Union government… the Union government is not willing to invest money in developing infrastructure of government hospitals…”

Nadda said: “Under the leadership of PM Modi, the scope of work of ASHA workers and their incentives has increased… In the Mission Steering Group… their work has been incentivized, and formidably so.”