Shortage of medical facilities, community kitchens in Attappadi: LOP

Shortage of medical facilities, medicines, specialist doctors and even community kitchens was the ground reality in the tribal hamlets of Attappadi here, where recently three infant deaths occurred due to various reasons including sickle cell anemia, and the Left government was not aware about it, Leader of Opposition (LOP) in the state assembly V D Satheesan claimed on Monday.

Satheesan, speaking to the media after a UDF delegation visited Attappadi in the morning, claimed that the government was not aware of what was the ground reality in the tribal hamlets where there was no nodal officer, monitoring committee or coordination mechanisms in place.

He alleged that the recent visit by state Health Minister Veena George on Sunday has not improved the situation in Attappadi and instead the only change was a reduction in medical facilities available there.

Satheesan said that during the Oommen Chandy government, a mini cabinet was set up in Attappadi to deal with the issue of infant mortality rate by implementing a scheme to ensure food and medical care for all.

After the LDF government came to power, these systems worked for a while and then stopped functioning, he alleged and added that presently none of the schemes were in place and the only hospital in the area no longer had the facilities which it had earlier.

Now patients were being referred from there to other districts for specialist treatments, but there was no mode of transportation, like ambulances, available there and even the roads were not in good condition, he alleged.

Later in the day, George, speaking to the media, said she visited Attappadi to assess the ground level activities there and there was no controversy behind it.

She said that she had evaluated the Anganwadi centres there and personally talked to the people in the villages.

The minister said that she also spoke to pregnant women, Asha workers and Anganwadi workers in the villages and was of the view that the functioning of the departments there need to be carefully reviewed. There will be more such visits in future, she said. She also said that under the special intervention plan formulated for Attappadi, personal care would be provided to each of the 426 pregnant women presently living in the area. On November 26, a three-day old infant at a tribal hamlet died, the third such incident in that week.

The state government had ordered a multi-departmental inquiry into the incident. The deaths occurred at Agali and Puthur regions in the area.

Medical officers said some were Intrauterine Deaths (IUD) and other children died due to sickle cell anemia.

(This story has not been edited by Devdiscourse staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)