Washington: April 30, 2010

The World Bank has approved a US $117.70 million loan from the International Development Association (IDA) to India designed to improve quality of and access to health services in the south Indian state of Tamil Nadu. This comes as additional financing to the Tamil Nadu Health Systems Project, which was approved on December 16, 2004 with an IDA credit amount of US $110.83 million, the Bank announced. "Tamil Nadu has made impressive progress in improving maternal and child health and further improvements would be achieved by improvement in the overall quality of care, particularly for provision of comprehensive emergency obstetric and neonatal care," World Bank Senior Public Health specialist and project team leader Preeti Kudesia said.

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Guwahati: April 28, 2010

The Government of Assam on Tuesday launched a Rs 300 million project offering nutritious meals and compensation for wage-loss to indoor patients, besides post-natal care to the mother, in an initiative that is expected to revolutionise the region's rural healthcare sector. Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi launched the two initiatives — Morom (Assamese for Love) and Mamta (Care), seen as yet another step forward in bolstering rural healthcare facilities in the state after Assam last week won the best performing state award for implementation of the National Rural Health Mission.

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Jaipur: April 28, 2010

The “Pilani recommendations” released at the end of a three-day international conference on women's empowerment at the Birla Institute of Technology and Science (BITS) in Pilani over the weekend called for delivery of an integrated package of health and nutrition to women with a “robust political will” to ensure both maternal and child survival. Gender experts, researchers and policy-makers from 18 developing countries took part in the global round-table, organised by the Women Studies and Societal Development Unit of BITS and the Centre for Science and Technology of the Non-Aligned and Other Developing Countries, New Delhi, with the support of UNICEF-Rajasthan.

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Mysore: April 27, 2010

Despite numerous special schemes and financial allocations, tribal communities in Hunsur taluk lead a life of poverty, marked by severe malnutrition. In Bettada haadi in the taluk, tribal residents grapple with appalling health conditions. Eight people in 28 families have tuberculosis, five have died in the past six years, and many others are malnourished and anaemic. They live in dilapidated houses that lack sanitation. Defunct borewells, broken pipes and non-functional streetlights are common sights.

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New Delhi:  April 23, 2010

Congress president Sonia Gandhi’s intervention on the Food Security Act seems to have done the trick. The government has now agreed to provide 35kg of foodgrain every month to roughly 8.5 crore families living below the poverty line. The empowered group of ministers (EGoM), headed by Pranab Mukherjee, will meet on Friday and besides this will also consider providing 11.7kg of rice to those living above the poverty line. Planning Commission deputy chairman Montek Singh Ahluwalia met the expenditure and food secretary on Thursday in order to finalise the panel’s recommendations to the EGoM.

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Puducherry: April 21, 2010

At the end of five years, the National Rural Health Mission (NRHM) has made considerable progress in terms of improving infrastructure, healthcare delivery and health indicators in the Union Territory. Under NRHM, the Puducherry State Health Mission (PSHM) has made good progress from 2005 to 2010 in the Union Territory, according to Mission Director, PSHM Vijaya Balakandan.Under this ambitious programme of the Central government, Rs. 20 lakh each has been granted to all district hospitals and Community Health Centres (CHC) for upgrading facilities.

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New Delhi: April 20, 2010

The Delhi Cabinet on Monday gave its nod for introduction of Public Health Standards for Primary Urban Health Centres (PUHC) in the Capital. As per the plan, for every 50,000 population, one such health care unit would be identified, strengthened and upgraded to a PUHC. After the meeting, Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit informed the media that the public health standards for PUHCs have been approved to improve availability and access to quality health care for all citizens and in particular the poor and vulnerable sections of the population. While one unit would be upgraded for every 50,000 population, the figure would actually vary between 35,000 and 75,000 depending on the density of population in a given area. 

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Patiala: April 16, 2010

Rampant female foeticide continues to push the sex ratio of Punjab against females; unfortunately, the evil is more prevalent among the educated, the rich and the urban bred. The 2006 National Family Health Survey shows that prosperity does little to curb the evil as Punjab's overall sex ratio at birth (considered a more accurate indicator of female foeticide) was 776 against 793 in 2001. In urban areas, it goes further down to 761:1,000.

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Jaipur: April 15, 2010

Prof. V. S. Vyas, noted economist and Rajasthan Planning Board Deputy Chairman, said that the desert State should adopt a new policy for providing “both incentives and disincentives” in the health care delivery system to meet the challenges for extending facilities to the far-off areas. Addressing a workshop on “Health concerns and way forward”, Prof. Vyas observed that while significant progress had been made in all indicators in the field of education, the targets in the health care sector were yet to be achieved.

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