The meet began with a presentation by O Srirangappa, District Health Officer (DHO), who provided a brief overview of the steps taken to tackle dengue disease to go with an audio visual presentation of the same prepared by the Department of Health and Family Welfare, Government of Karnataka.
Although there are 1,500 private medical institutions in the district along with government hospitals and health care centres, authentic dengue detection machinery (ELISA testing) is available only in three places i.e. the district laboratory, Fr. Muller Hospital and KMC Hospital, Mangalore. In line with this authentic testing of samples, so far 35 and 57 cases have been found to be ELISA positive from government and private hospitals respectively in the district, making the confirmed dengue figure a total of 92 cases. Although 4 deaths have been reportedly caused due to dengue in the district, only one of them (Kinya case reported from KMC hospital) has so far been confirmed to be caused by dengue as per the ELISA testing standards set by the government, the DHO said.
Nalin Kumar Kateel, Member of Parliament, asked the DHO as to whether the families of the other three reported deaths are also being considered for compensation from the government. Elected representatives cutting across party lines demanded that the cases be also considered for compensation to which the DHO said that a report will be submitted to the government and a final say on the matter will be taken by the government.
Elected representatives of the Panchayat raised a number of objections against the approach and modus operandi of the Health Department and demanded explanations from the DHO. Mamatha Gatty said that no prior preventive measures were taken by the Health Department in the months of April and May to check dengue in the approaching monsoon months. While personnel from Mangalore City Corporation undertook cleaning of drainages in city limits, no cleaning of drainages was taken up in rural areas. The Health Department gets adequate funds from the centre through the National Rural Health Mission (NRHM) programme which has lied unutilized. The Health Department could at least have supplied bleaching powder to each house and monitored cleaning of drainages with the funds it has, Ms. Gatty said.
M S Mohammed and Devraj raised the issue of Taluk Health officers not being prompt in their duties. Mr. Devraj who represents Guttigar region, brought to the notice of the meet that his area has been the worst hit as far as dengue is concerned and groused that no adequate primary health facilities are in place. Mr. Kateel directed the DHO to install an ambulance service in the region and have better dengue detection facilities in health centres around the region.
'Let meeting proceedings be held in Tulu'
Santosh Kumar Rai said that a legislator was denied an opportunity to take oath in the Assembly in Tulu language while other legislators took oath in Marathi. The proceedings of DK Zilla Panchayat meetings must be held in Tulu language, he demanded.
Responding to the demand, Koragappa Naik, President, DK ZP, said that since many officials of different departments in the Zilla Panchayat do not speak Tulu, it is apt to conduct official meetings in Kannada itself.
Comments
Add new comment