Uttarakhand: Treat black fungus under free health insurance scheme, says Dr AK Goyal

DEHRADUN: Even though the Covid cases - with 1,942 new infections - have seen a drop in the last 24 hours, cases of mucormycosis or the black fungus in Uttarakhand has reached 179. Eighteen fresh cases were reported at AIIMS Rishikesh. Also, the state health authority on Friday issued a letter to four authorised private hospitals in Dehradun and Haridwar to treat patients with "golden card" under the free health insurance scheme.

According to the letter issued by Dr AK Goyal, director - claim management at state health authority-Uttarakhand, mucormycosis is a severe fungal infection identified in association with Covid disease and requires to be treated aggressively owing to high morbidity and fatality. “As per the National Health Authority (NHA) guidelines, package for 'Covid-19' with stratification is available in the health insurance policy. However, this package does not have any provision for treating mucormycosis and there are no government guidelines for the same either. Therefore, we proposed the following procedure as an interim measure, so that the patient can get urgent treatment - free and cashless - on the basis of Ayushman Card,” Dr Goyal added.

As per the NHA orders, all patients undergoing IPD treatment against the Covid package should be provided expensive drugs recommended in the treatment of mucormycosis as per ICMR/ GOI guidelines which includes Amphotericin B/ Posaconazole/ Isavuconazole. The hospital claims in respect of such medicines can be submitted to SHA in offline mode and the same will be settled as per actuals and submitted invoices. The NHA also stated that the "patients presenting to hospitals for secondary manifestation of Covid after initial treatment, the surgical treatment for the same disease can be booked as an unspecified package with due justification". “This agreement will be in force till government/ NHA fix the rates,” read the government order issued for Himalyan Jollygrant Hospital, Shri Mahant Indiresh Hospital, CMI Hospital in Dehradun and Vinay Vishal Hospital in Haridwar.

Meanwhile, a few patients' kin suffering from black fungus created a ruckus at the office of chief medical officer (CMO) in Dehradun on Friday as the officials there allegedly failed to give them Amphotericin B. The incident took place a day after the state received 15,000 doses of the medicine from a pharma manufacturing firm in Rudrapur. “Among the 15,000 doses we received on Thursday, 10,000 were allotted to Doon Medical College, 2,000 to Haldwani Medical College and 3,000 to the Directorate General of Health. The DG health was supposed to distribute them further to the CMOs who could give them to private hospitals. But, the 3,000 injections which were meant for DG health were yet to arrive which is why the CMO had no stock for distribution,” said drug controller Tajbar Singh Jaggi. He added that 3,000 injections will reach Doon later tonight. To resolve the matter, DG Health Dr Trupti Bahuguna spoke to the principal of Doon Medical College and took 2,000 injections on "loan".

Moreover, among the 1,942 positive cases reported on Friday, 421 were from Dehradun followed by 295 in Haridwar, 204 in Nainital, 167 in Udham Singh Nagar, 154 in Tehri, 132 in Almora, 103 in Chamoli, 93 in Pauri, 93 in Bageshwar, 92 in Pithoragarh, 78 in Rudraprayag, 75 in Uttarkashi and 51 in Champawat. The state, till now, has reported 325,425 Covid cases.

So far, 6,251 deaths have been reported in the state along with 52 in the last 24 hours. The recovery rate reached 85.8 percent with 7,028 patients recovered from the infection on Friday, taking the total tally to 279,516.

Source: The Times of India

News Update (insurancealerts.in)