The Tamil Nadu government will expand its flagship healthcare programme ‘Makkalai Thedi Maruthuvam’ (MTM) to workers in factories and unorganised sectors, including migrant workers, Finance Minister Palanivel Thiaga Rajan announced in his Budget speech on Monday.
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The scheme will cover 8.35 lakh workers in 711 factories across the State in the first phase. The MTM scheme aims at identifying and addressing non-communicable diseases at an early stage through proactive screening of the population. The Minister said the government was “deeply concerned about the welfare of the workers, who are the bedrock of our economy”. The expansion of scheme will help tackle non-communicable diseases among workers in factories and unorganised sectors, he said.
Health check-up camps will be held in identified factories with emphasis on non-communicable diseases such as high blood pressure and diabetes. “Migrant workers will also benefit under this scheme,” he said. It may be recalled that the State government had to recently undertake several outreach initiatives for migrant workers after disinformation spread widely on social media that they were unsafe in the State.
While talking about initiatives for the police department in the Budget, the Minister said recent attempts by anti-social elements to create panic among migrant workers were thwarted through stringent actions by the government.