Members of the Progressive Organisation of Women (POW) and Progressive Youth League (PYL) staged a novel demonstration by carrying a person on a cot here on Thursday in a symbolic protest against the government’s alleged apathy towards handling the issues of sanitation and preventing the outbreak of seasonal diseases in various mandals across the district. The protesters marched through the main streets of the town before staging a demonstration outside the office of the district medical and health officer here. They displayed banners demanding that the public healthcare delivery system be strengthened to safeguard public health. Addressing the demonstrators, the PYL and POW leaders alleged that poor sanitation led to the outbreak of fevers in Chintakani and several other mandals in the district in the past few weeks. They said that about 40 posts for auxiliary nurse midwives (ANMs) including other posts were vacant in the 22 Primary Health Centres (PHCs) all over the district.
They demanded that the govt. immediately fill up all the existing vacancies in the PHCs, implement a special drive to improve hygiene and sanitation in all the gram panchayats, besides converting the PHCs into 24 X 7 facilities.
