Continuous agitation by CITU for the last two-and-a-half years and a dharna organised by it near the office of the ESI’s medical director general in New Delhi have resulted in the ESI top brass assuring to build a 200-bed hospital in the place of the existing but dilapidated hospital building at Gandhigram in the city, the union claimed, and also demanded the ESI to provide more facilities for the ESI subscribers in this region.
Nearly two lakh ESI subscribers in north coastal Andhra and several lakhs more of their family members are dependent on the ESI hospital here, but due to the poor condition of the building in-patients are not being admitted for the last 100 days. Visakhapatnam Port Trust has agreed to provide the site on a 99-year lease, its city committee president P. Venkata Reddy, general secretary M. Jaggu Naidu and secretary B. Jagan said at a press conference here on Thursday.
