FM Nirmala Sitharaman announces ramping up of health infrastructure in final tranche

Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman announced ramping up of public expenditure for Health as she unveiled the final tranche of the Aatmanirbhar Bharat package on Sunday. In order for India to effectively deal with pandemics in the future, FM Sitharaman announced that the government intended to increase expenditure on Health in both urban and rural areas, with a specific focus on increasing investments in grassroot health institutions. 

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Further, in order to prepare India to deal with pandemics in the future effectively, FM Sitharaman announced that all districyts in the country will have Infectious diseases Hospital Blocks. The strengthening of the lab network and surveillance was also addressed as the FM revealed that there would be Integrated Public Health labs in all districts & block level labs and Public Health Units to manage pandemics. In order to encourage research, FM Sitharaman revealed the National Institutional Platform for one health under the ICMR. Keeping in mind PM Modi's urge for the country to go digital, FM Sitharaman announced the National digital Health Mission which will involve the implementation of National Digital Health blueprint. 

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FM announces ramping up of health infrastructure

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FM Nirmala Sitharaman, while announcing the final tranche of Rs 20 lakh crore stimulus package on Sunday, said that the government will now allocate an additional Rs 40,000 crores to MGNREGS (Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme) to provide a boost to employment. The existing allocation was Rs 61,000 crore, taking the total to Rs 101,000 crore. The scheme is critical for providing employment amid the COVID pandemic, which has left a large section of the workforce unable to work to earn a living.

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