NGOs urge upgradation of health worker scheme

Rita Dutta - Mumbai

To improve the detection and treatment of disease in tribal areas, health activists have decided to urge upgradation of Pada Swayam Sewak Scheme (PSSS), the existing hamlet level health worker scheme in the tribal districts of Maharashtra.

Selected hamlets in the districts of Gadchiroli, Nandurbar, Thane, Amravati and Nashik, ravaged by high levels of malnutrition deaths and infant mortality have been identified for the upgradation of the scheme by the NGOs.

A proposal to this effect would soon be submitted to the government of Maharashtra by a conclave of 10 NGOs. The NGOs have already met the Commissioner, Tribal Development, Dr P S Meena, twice to apprise him about the proposal.

The key points in the proposal are to appoint hamlet level health workers who would work around the year, train them in treating minor ailments and appoint only women under the scheme. Under the current PSSS launched in 1996, the government appoints local people as PSS from the tribal villages during the monsoon and post-monsoon period (June to December).

One PSS is appointed per hamlet to chlorinate wells and report outbreak of monsoon related diseases like malaria, gastro-enteritis and measles to the government. The PPS are paid Rs 400 per month for a span of six months.

Says Dr Abhay Shukla, co-ordinator of the SATHI cell of Centre of Enquiry into Health and Allied Theme (Cehat), “We want to propose appointment of fully trained hamlet health workers who would function throughout the year, so as to enable diagnosis and treatment of minor ailments like diarrhoea and other common diseases, in the hamlet itself. We also want hamlet health workers to monitor the government health services being provided to the adivasi people.”

The NGOs would urge the government to seek their help in training and monitoring the scheme. The training module would be devised by the NGOs, for which pictorial books would be published for less educated and non-literate health workers.

“We want the PSS to be accredited by the Yashwantrao Chavan Maharashtra Open University (YCMOU),” said Dr Shyam Ashtekar of the Nashik-based NGO, Bharat Vaidyaka Sanstha and honourary director, School of Health Sciences, YCMOU.

Dr Shukla dismisses the fear that the project might meet the same fate as that of the scrapped government-run community health worker scheme. Cehat is running a community health worker scheme in Dahanu taluka of Thane district in collaboration with a community organisation, Kashtakari Sanghatna.

About the suggestion to have only women as health workers, Amita Pitre, assistant co-ordinator of the SATHI cell, reasons, “Tribal women are preferred as they always stay in the village and provide good quality care while men often migrate.”