LAHORE - Punjab Chief Minister Sardar Usman Buzdar has said that Prime Minister Imran Khan’s dream of providing the best healthcare facilities to people has been materialised through Naya Pakistan National Health Card scheme.  The facility had been introduced in the Rawalpindi division today to accommodate about three million families to avail free treatment of one million rupees per annum through 56 hospitals on the panel. He was addressing the launching ceremony of the New Pakistan National Health Card at the PM Office in Islamabad on Wednesday, said a handout issued here. Usman Buzdar said the Punjab government would spend Rs400 billion on Universal Health Insurance Programme and by the end of March, every family in Punjab would have access to free treatment through this card. He said 110 million people of 36 districts of Punjab would benefit from this historic programme. The CM said the Punjab government had paid special attention to the improvement of the health sector and Punjab would be developed as a model province for providing health facilities, he maintained. He said that 23 new hospitals were being built in the province along with the up gradation of health facilities. Compared to the previous government, the incumbent government had increased budget of the health sector 200 times, he noted and said that eight mother and child hospitals were being set up in remote areas of Punjab. 

In three-and-a-half years, 158 hospitals had been upgraded and 78 new health facilities had been built, he said.