Rural health centres or garbage dumps?

Severely criticising the government's flagship programme, the National Rural Health Mission, the Public Accounts Committee has said it is a 'fiasco'.

In its report tabled in Parliament on Thursday, the PAC said it found that health centres were being used as "godowns for storage of foodgrains and cow dung".

No water supply

“A large number of sub-centres, primary health centres and community health centres are located in sub-standard environment such as garbage dumps, cattle sheds and stagnant waterbodies, and functioning in unhygienic conditions.” Besides, these centres lacked water supply and storage tanks, facilities for disposal of sewage and biomedical waste and separate utilities for men and women.

Shockingly enough, the health centres were supplied with substandard and expired medicines, and they lacked trained accredited social health activists (ASHAs) equipped with drug kits. There was no common drug formulary in many States, and mainstreaming or integration of Indian systems of medicines with the national health care system is lacking, the report said.

The PAC expressed surprise that the government conducted no study after the launch of the NRHM to assess its performance and make course corrections. Taking note of the glaring deficiencies, infirmities and want of effective monitoring mechanism, the committee said the NRHM called for a thorough re-appraisal and restructuring. Also, district and vigilance monitoring committees should be constituted by the government.