Telangana Budget to focus on health, medical infra

Health and medical infrastructure will remain major thrust areas in the upcoming Budget of the Telangana government, with flagship initiatives including nine new medical colleges and five super-speciality hospitals in Hyderabad and Warangal set to be completed in the coming 10-12 months, Health Minister T Harish Rao said on Sunday.

The Health and Family Welfare Department will receive special attention in the Budget, which is vital to consolidate the gains that have been made in the past one year, Harish said while releasing the annual health report of Telangana. “2023 is crucial for Telangana’s Health Department. On multiple fronts, major development activities are under way and this year, they will come to fruition,” he said.

In the next one week to 10 days, a total of 1,147 Associate Professors in Telangana will be promoted as Professors and posted to the nine new medical colleges which are coming up in Rajanna Sircilla, Kamareddy, Vikarabad, Khammam, Karimnagar, Jayashankar Bhupalpally, Kumarambheem Asifabad, Jangaon and Nirmal under the direct administrative control of the Director of Medical Education (DME), Telangana, Harish said.

“Apart from the medical colleges, in the next 10-12 months, the people of Telangana will witness the completion of six super-speciality hospitals, including the expansion of NIMS, health city in Warangal and four speciality hospitals in Hyderabad, which together will provide nearly 9,000 super-speciality beds. The works related to these hospitals are on schedule,” Harish said.

The government tertiary hospitals in Hyderabad will also witness a major infrastructure upgrade in the coming months. The 300-bed new block at the MNJ Cancer Hospital, the new block at the Koti ENT Hospital and the major infrastructure upgrade of SD Eye Hospital will be taken up in the coming months, the Health Minister said.

During the presentation of the new annual report, Harish also took a swipe at the Congress and BJP-led States that are lagging behind in all major healthcare indices. “All BJP-led States, including Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh and Karnataka, and the Congress-led States of Chhattisgarh and Rajasthan should learn from Telangana. It would be a pleasure for the BRS government to present this annual health report to these States so that they can learn something from us,” Harish said. Telangana Today