Hyderabad: Beneficiaries of the Central Government Health Scheme can no longer avail of cashless services from a hospital, which is causing hardship to the beneficiaries of the scheme. The cashless service was stopped from March 7, 2014.
Corporate hospitals, that are part of the scheme, have put up notices explaining their decision. With no relief to the CGHS beneficiaries, the CGHS dispensaries have stopped referring patients to the corporate hospitals.
Additional director of CGHS in Hyderabad, Dr C.L.N. Prasad, has served a show cause notice to all the 65 hospitals for violating the rules and not attending to the patients. According to sources, “The response from the hospitals is that till the pending dues are cleared, no credit will be given to the patients. At present, we will continue to charge according to the CGHS rates. But these rates are too low. If no steps are taken to revise the rates in the next three months, we will have to charge CGHS patients like we do others.”
Dr Bhaskar Rao, president of the All Super-specialty Hospitals Association says, “We have been negotiating with the department since the last seven months. Point wise, all our clauses and their impractical demands have been discussed, but there has been no response. Over '200 crore in debts are pending. How are we to survive?”
There are over two lakh CGHS employees in the city. The cataract operations and other elective surgeries, which they may have to undergo, have been put on hold. A senior citizen, a G. Vittal, who is waiting for knee replacement surgery, said, “I have no option but to postpone the surgery. The cost is too high and if the government is going to ask us to pay and then claim the money later, then what was the point in deducting the money from our salary earlier?”
Various pensioners’ associations have appealed to Dr Prasad that his office must intervene and resolve the issue and end this impasse.
The on-going tussle between CGHS and corporate hospitals is very old. The disputes have been going on since the last five years. As always, it is the citizen who is left in the lurch when the government does not honour its commitment.
