Odisha Govt To Reimburse Up To Rs 18,000 Per COVID-19 Patient Per Day To Private Hospitals

The Naveen Patnaik led-Odisha government on Friday, August 14, approved the reimbursement rates that private and corporate hospitals may claim from the government for treating COVID-19 patients.

The state government while capping the treatment cost for coronavirus at such facilities announced that it will pay a maximum of ₹18,000 per COVID-19 patient per day as reimbursement.

The reimbursement rates were communicated by the Health Department's letter to all Collectors, Municipal Corporation Commissioners, Superintendents of medical colleges and hospitals.

The New Indian Express reported that the government has clubbed the treatment cost on par with those private entities who have established and are operating Dedicated COVID Hospitals (DCHs) and Dedicated COVID Health Centres (DCHCs) on PPP (public-private partnership) model. These were set up to have the state-run health institutions available to cater to non-COVID patients.

Additional Chief Secretary PK Mohapatra, in the letter, informed that the government approved the standardised reimbursement rates of different consumables cost. As per the approval, the DCHs and DCHCs will be reimbursed at a rate of ₹2,950 to ₹18,000 per day per patient depending on the severity of the disease and use of medical equipment.

For the patients with no or mild symptoms admitted to such COVID Care Centres (CCCs), the private entities cannot charge more than ₹2,000 per patient per day.

As per the new price rearrangement, a DCH or DCHC will now charge ₹1,200 to ₹3,000 per day for a general isolation bed irrespective of bed occupancy and ₹1,750 for other consumables, including ₹500 for PPE, ₹300 for medicines, ₹250 for hospital consumables, ₹240 for food, ₹200 each for investigation and laundry and ₹60 for sanitiser.

For patients in ICU (Intensive Care Unit) without ventilator support, they will be paid ₹14,000 to ₹17,000, which include ₹2,000 to ₹5,000 for isolation bed and ₹12,000 for consumables comprising for medicines, PPE, investigations along with food, laundry and sanitiser.

The hospitals can raise bill ranging from ₹15,000 to ₹18,000 for ICU with ventilator. The costs include ₹2,000 to ₹5,000 for bed and ₹13,000 for consumables. The cost of treatment in CCCs has been fixed at ₹2,000, including ₹1,000 for bed and- ₹1,000 for consumables.

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