Free Medicines For All

There is a proposal in the 12th Five Year Plan draft chapter on Health about cost free access to essential medicines in public facilities for reducing out of pocket expenditure on health care. The essential features of any such scheme will include preparation of list of essential medicines, development of standard treatment guidelines, robust procurement systems; IT based supply-chain systems, drug warehousing, quality assurance, prescription audit etc.

There have been requests from many quarters to provide free essential medicines in public health facilities. The High Level Expert Group (HLEG) set up by the Planning Commission on Universal Health Coverage has also recommended provision of free essential medicines though public facilities and public expenditure on drugs to be increased to 0.5 per cent of the GDP.

Under NRHM, the proposals received from the States through their Programme Implementation Plans (PIPs) for ensuring uninterrupted availability of essential medicines to those using public health facilities have been supported by the Government of India. Further, incentives to states upto 5% of their NRHM outlay have been introduced in 2012-13 for establishing policy frameworks and systems for providing free generic medicines to all those who access public health facilities.

This information was given by Minister of State for Health & Family Welfare Shri Abu Hasem Khan Choudhury in written reply to a question in the Lok Sabha today on 23.11.12