A ‘buddy’ for migrant workers

Mobile health clinic visiting labour camps

April 02, 2020 07:10 pm | Updated 07:10 pm IST - Kochi

For migrant workers settled far away from the comfort of their homes, a ‘buddy’ dropping in every now and then enquiring about their well-being can be so comforting.

Bandhu, meaning buddy in Bengali, a mobile health clinic deployed on a pilot basis at migrant workers’ camps since last Saturday has that soothing effect for a largely marginalised community.

The project has been implemented under Athithi Devo Bhava, the National Health Mission (NHM) campaign to coordinate migrant welfare projects, in association with the Centre for Migration and Inclusive Development (CMID). While Mangalore Refinery and Petrochemicals Limited sponsored the purchase and customisation of vehicle, ESAF Small Finance Bank is bearing the expenses of its operations.

Quality healthcare

“This is arguably the first-of-its-kind initiative for migrant community anywhere in the country. It is aimed at ensuring migrant workers access to quality healthcare surmounting the barriers of language, location and timing, which often denied them conventional healthcare services,” said Benoy Peter, executive director, CMID.

The deployment of ‘Bandhu’ was fast-tracked in the wake of the COVID-19 outbreak though the customisation of the vehicle was yet to be complete.

“The mobile clinic now focusses on awareness creation on COVID-19 and active screening of migrants. Since its deployment, it has covered around 20 migrant camps screening around 1,400 migrant workers,” said Akhil Xavier Manuel, nodal officer for Athithi Devo Bhava.

Migrants found to be in need of medicines and further follow-up will be taken care of by the Primary Health Centres (PHCs) concerned. “Though the focus is on COVID-19, workers do come up with other ailments like chronic back pain arising out of their harsh working conditions and for which they could not afford medicines or treatment till now.”

The mobile clinic has one doctor, two junior health inspectors, and a coordinator, nurse and a driver each. The nurse is multilingual and helps overcome the language barrier. It can also rope in 11 migrant link workers, if needed, trained by NHM.

0 / 0
Sign in to unlock member-only benefits!
  • Access 10 free stories every month
  • Save stories to read later
  • Access to comment on every story
  • Sign-up/manage your newsletter subscriptions with a single click
  • Get notified by email for early access to discounts & offers on our products
Sign in

Comments

Comments have to be in English, and in full sentences. They cannot be abusive or personal. Please abide by our community guidelines for posting your comments.

We have migrated to a new commenting platform. If you are already a registered user of The Hindu and logged in, you may continue to engage with our articles. If you do not have an account please register and login to post comments. Users can access their older comments by logging into their accounts on Vuukle.