Cancer treatment will be decentralised in the State in a big way by linking major cancer treatment centres with medical college hospitals and other government hospitals, Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan has said.
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Inaugurating the second phase of the Aardram Mission here on Tuesday, he said that cancer screening clinics that would function once a week would be started in all government hospitals.
As part of the State’s cancer control programme, the government would make facilities in public sector hospitals for the early detection of cancer. The attempt was to decentralise cancer treatment by creating a cancer care grid, linking major cancer treatment centres with other hospitals. Cancer awareness programmes, home visits by health workers and data collection would all be part of the programme, he said.
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Three projects — One Health, cancer control and annual health screening — which are being taken up by the Health department in phase 2 of the Aardram Mission were formally launched by the Chief Minister.
The State was much ahead in utilising information technology for improving the health sector. With the help of e-Health, population-based health screening of all persons above 30 years for lifestyle diseases as well as its risk factors was being taken up by the Health department.
Lifestyle diseases
Lifestyle diseases were spiralling up in the State, threatening to offset all the gains in the health sector so far. The screening for lifestyle diseases and its data repository was expected to help planning and policy experts formulate health interventions at the regional levels, Mr. Vijayan said.
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One Health
With new zoonotic diseases gaining ground, the One Health initiative is another major initiative being taken up by the Health department. The One Health approach recognises that human health is very much interconnected with animal and environmental health and envisages a multisectoral approach for the surveillance of zoonotic diseases, which may have implications for human health too. The programme is being launched in Kottayam, Pathanamthitta, Idukki and Alappuzha districts in the first phase
The Chief Minister also spoke about the foundation laid by the State in the past one year through many public health interventions in creating a Kerala model of health
Health Minister Veena George said that even during the pandemic, the State had focussed on improving public health infrastructure .The State had successfully carried out COVID-19 vaccination drive. The transparent manner in which the State had approached COVID-19 death declarations had been appreciated even by the Supreme Court, she said.
The Health department has envisaged 10 core programmes under Aardram Misson 2, as part of Nava Kerala Karma Padhati .
Principal Secretary (Health), Rajan Khobragade, e-Health Project Director, Y. Mohammed Safirulla and senior Health officials were present at the function.