The Aasandha public health insurance scheme had spent MVR 89 million (about USD 5.7 million) in providing service to patients seeking treatment out of the country.

The state-owned Aasandha Corporation told RaajjeMV that in addition to this, there are over 2,000 pending bills to privately-owned health facilities.

The corporation’s policies dictate that payments for such bills should be made in full within a span of six months.

While such a large amount is spent on health services every year, on Saturday the corporation had announced that it would discontinue service to health facilities that are not state-owned.

The press statement announcing this decision stated that the Aasandha would amend particular criteria under which the service is extended and that its current policies are not entirely sustainable.

The government absolved itself of responsibility for the state-owned enterprise in a press statement after Aasandha announced that it has re-extended the service on Sunday,