Ayushman Bharat Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojana is a national public health insurance fund of the Government of India that aims to provide free access to health insurance coverage for low income earners in the country. Roughly, the bottom 50% of the country qualifies for this scheme. People using the program access their own primary care services from a family doctor. When anyone needs additional care, then PM-JAY provides free secondary health care for those needing specialist treatment and tertiary health care for those requiring hospitalization.
The programme is part of the Indian government's National Health Policy and is means-tested. It was launched in September 2018 by the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare. That ministry later established the National Health Authority as an organization to administer the program. It is a centrally sponsored scheme and is jointly funded by both the union government and the states. By offering services to 50 crore (500 million) people it is the world's largest government sponsored healthcare program.The program is a means-tested as its users are people with low income in India.
Ayushman Bharat Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojana providing a cover of ₹5 lakh per family per year for medical treatment in empaneled hospitals, both public and private; offering cashless payment and paperless recordkeeping through the hospital or doctor's office using criteria from the Socio Economic and Caste Census 2011 to determine eligibility for benefits no restriction on family size, age or gender; all previous medical conditions are covered under the scheme; it covers 3 days of pre-hospitalisation and 15 days of post-hospitalisation, including diagnostic care and expenses on medicines; the scheme is portable and a beneficiary can avail medical treatment at any PM-JAY empanelled hospital outside their state and anywhere in the country providing access to free COVID-19 testing.