Minister for Finance and Revenue Shaukat Fayaz Ahmed Tareen on Friday said that the government has established Covid-19 Emergency Fund and Rs 100 billion have been proposed to be kept for meeting exigencies related to the Coronavirus. In a budget speech at the National Assembly, Shaukat Tareen said that to protect the country’s population from COVID-19, around $1.1 billion dollars will be spent on importing vaccinations.
In addition, the government will provide funding for increasing the local production of vaccines. Our initial estimate is that more than 100 million people should be vaccinated by June 2022, he added. Sharing details about Universal Health Coverage, he said that the Prime Minister’s universal health coverage scheme will be rolled out further in collaboration with the provinces. He added every household will be provided with a Sehat-Card.
He said that the excellent health insurance program launched by the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government a few years ago has transformed the lives of low-income groups who are now availing free-of-cost hospitalization services from the leading public and private hospitals.
The government has allocated Rs 5 billion for Covid-19 response and other natural calamities control programme under the Public Sector Development Programme (PSDP) 2021-22. The allocation was part of the total amount Rs 88.5 billion, earmarked for the special programmes in the PSDP-2021-22, said the document. Other programmes include Sustainable Development Goals supplementary funds and Viability Gap Funding (VGF) for PPP (Public Private Partnership) projects.
