Letters to the EDITOR: Senior citizens deserve medical cost

sentinelgroup@gmail.com

Senior citizens deserve medical cost

Almost six crore senior citizens have crossed the 70-year milestone in the country. These people are often neglected by their children, who forget their filial piety. Above the age of seventy, the physical ailment becomes a norm rather than an exception. In this phase of life, the treatment becomes costlier year by year, and the increasing medicine cost as well as hospital-related developments such as surgical operations emerge as an unbearable liability for many poor families. A tiny segment of senior citizens has been covered by government health schemes such as the Central Government Health Scheme (CGHS), Ex-servicemen Contributory Health Scheme (ECHS), and the Ayushman Central Armed Police Force (CAPF) in this critical phase of life. The latest decision taken by the central government to bring all senior citizens above 70 years under the purview of government health beneficial schemes would be the watershed decision. This is an incisive and welcome scheme of the Central government, bringing all the senior citizens aged 70 years and above under the Ayushman Bharat Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojana (AB PM-JAY), providing health coverage of Rs 5 lakh, regardless of their income. It would become a light bulb moment for many poor families whose septuagenarian or octogenarian elders are suffering from chronic maladies.  In traditional families, filial piety is rightly observed, but nowadays, in the nuclear families mired with the hustle and bustle of contemporary life, the elderly are often forgotten and neglected. This health scheme indubitably would reduce the financial tension and make their lives easier shortly.

Mintu Sarma

Rani gate, Guwahati