Praja Arogya Vedika seeks higher health outlay in 2026-27 Budget

A delegation from Praja Arogya Vedika met Finance Minister Payyavula Keshav and Health, Medical Education and Family Welfare Minister Satya Kumar Yadav in Amaravati on February 11 (Wednesday) and submitted a memorandum seeking a significant increase in allocations to the health sector in the 2026-27 Budget.

In a press statement, PAV president MV Ramanaiah and general secretary T. Kameswar Rao said that the memorandum underlines what they say is persistently low public health expenditure in Andhra Pradesh. They noted that the Budget 2025-26 provides ₹ 19,264 crore for health, which amounts to about 1.05% of the GNH and is significantly below the benchmarks recommended by the National Health Policy 2017 and the World Health Organization.

Inadequate funding has led to gaps in primary and preventive health services, human resources shortage, poor rural and tribal infrastructure, and inadequate measures to address malnutrition and anemia among women and children, they said.

Among the key demands, the organization demanded an increase in health allocation to at least 2.5% of GDP; this will require an additional ₹20,000 to ₹25,000 crore over the previous expenditure. It also called for prioritizing basic and preventive health services, introducing a special health package for tribal areas, strengthening the Public Distribution System to combat high levels of malnutrition, filling vacancies and plugging infrastructure gaps, improving 104 and 108 emergency services and disbursing pending dues under NTR Vaidya Seva.

The delegation expressed concern about what it called privatization and over-reliance on public private partnership models in the health sector. He demanded that RCD Hospital in Visakhapatnam be converted into a super specialty children’s hospital, strengthening of AIIMS in Mangalagiri, expansion of Kakani Cancer Data Center and upgrading of VIMS to a postgraduate and research centre.

Members called on the government to focus on publicly funded and equitable healthcare rather than medical tourism or high-end public private partnerships, warning that these could increase inequalities. They also called on opposition MPs to highlight these issues during debates on the State Budget in the ongoing Parliament session.