Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif has constituted a high-level committee to determine whether the Sehat Sahulat Card should become a permanent programme under the federal government.
He has instructed the committee to submit a report within one week. According to sources, the committee includes Federal Ministers Ahsan Iqbal and Mustafa Kamal, the finance secretary, the planning secretary, Head of Health Card Programme Mohammad Arshad, and the State Life Insurance chief executive officer.
The committee will assess whether to cover the programme’s expenses under the current budget or allocate funds from the development budget.
Millions of families are expected to benefit from the universal coverage of the Sehat Sahulat Card under the federal system.
Residents of Islamabad, Azad Jammu and Kashmir, Gilgit-Baltistan and Tharparkar District are already included in the federal health card initiative.
It is worth noting that residents of the federal capital have remained without access to the Sehat Card facility for several months.
