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Public Health / Sanitation

Mangalore corporation fails to seek aid for malaria control

Tuesday, 19 October 2010 09:29 administrator
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The Hindu  19.10.2010

Mangalore corporation fails to seek aid for malaria control

Sudipto Mondal

Funds available under vector-borne disease programme


OPAQUE OPERATIONS:Lack of transparency in the implementation of malaria control programmes

MANGALORE: The Union Government spends several crores of rupees every year to control malaria under the National Vector-Borne Disease Control Programme (NVBDCP).

But Mangalore, which accounts for 20 to 25 per cent of the State's malaria incidence, has never sought Central aid.

Under the programme, the Union Government supplies essentials such as anti-larval and anti-adult mosquito chemicals as well as laboratory equipment such as lancets, slides and needles free of cost. But the Mangalore City Corporation's Health Department has not made use of this scheme. On the contrary, it has spent Rs. 1.5 crore on procuring these items from private suppliers. The corporation has spent over Rs. 4 crore on the malaria control programme in the city in the past five years.

The city registered 4,600 cases of malaria and one death since January this year. “If the Central aid had been used, the money saved could have been spent on hiring more field health workers to create awareness,” said physician Shantaram Baliga.

According to District Malaria Officer Arun Kumar, there should be 60 malaria field workers but the corporation has hired only 13 for want of funds.

Srinivas Kakkilaya, who runs a medical blog, www.malariasite.com, said pumping the affected region with chemical pesticides was a practice that was on the wane. Chemicals should be used only as the last resort, and the national policy was to create awareness among the affected people. “If you do not have the manpower, how can you create awareness,” asked Dr. Baliga. Corporation Health Officer Manjaiah Shetty said, “I have never heard of such a thing as Central aid for malaria control.”

C. Anbazhagan, Karnataka's Regional Director for the programme, said the Central aid was reserved only for rural areas.

T.S. Cheluvaraj, State's Joint Director (Malaria and Filariasis), agreed with Dr. Anbazhagan and said that only seven cities in the State were eligible for Central support. (But these cities are covered under the Urban Malaria Scheme and not under the vector-borne disease control programme).

But the practice in other States casts a shadow over the claims made by Karnataka's officials.

When The Hindu contacted A.K. Chakraborty, the programme's Regional Director for West Bengal, he said the urban local bodies in that State got as much chemicals and equipment as they wanted. S.K. Choudhary, his counterpart in Uttar Pradesh, said, “The urban local bodies must submit their projected requirements through their State Government one year in advance.” K.K. Mathur, Regional Director of Rajasthan, said the same practice was prevalent there.

Dr. Kakkilaya said, “The whole operation lacks transparency.”

Last Updated on Tuesday, 19 October 2010 09:32
 

Post-fest trash piles up on streets

Tuesday, 19 October 2010 06:02 administrator
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The Decccan Chronicle  19.10.2010

Post-fest trash piles up on streets

Oct. 18: After the lavishness, the litter. Days of pomp, pageantry and processions have left in their wake, piles of leftover plantain twigs which had been brought for sale on the eve of Ayudha puja on Friday. These, along with other garbage from the festivities, remain strewn on city roads, a reminder that BBMP has yet to perform its clean-up duties.

While Bengaluru south zone alone generates 1,500 metric tonnes of garbage per day, after the festival, the garbage load has doubled, said BBMP official sources. Exacerbating the situation were street kids and pavement dwellers trying to extract the leaves from dumped twigs and stray cattle vying for a piece of the action by nosing in to grab their bite. Their efforts left the twigs scattered all over the roads, hindering pedestrian movement and in some places even slowing the free flow of traffic.

Banana leaves used to serve food during the festival, remained piled high in garbage bins, emitting an unpleasant odor and attracting stray dogs and flies.

While complaints from across the city flooded the BBMP control room right from Sunday morning, the Commissioner of BBMP, Siddaiah, had already issued directions to clear the accumulated litter on Sunday itself, as per BBMP official sources.

But, while the plantain twigs continued to remain on the roads even on Monday afternoon, the officials claimed that they had started the clean-up process from Monday morning and had even worked half-day on Sunday.

“People prefer buying the plantain twigs and its leaves on roadsides rather than in the markets. While it costs the same amount for the merchants to carry the load of plantain twigs back, they abandon the leftovers which haven’t been sold out. It is the same problem at every Ayuda pooja, where the twigs are used to decorate vehicles. We had even issued appeals in the media not to dump the leftover plantain twigs on the roads after festivals. Despite this we now have double the load of garbage, much more than our capacity,” a BBMP official explained.

Last Updated on Tuesday, 19 October 2010 06:04
 

Coming together for a clean cause

Monday, 18 October 2010 09:58 administrator
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The New Indian Express  18.10.2010

Coming together for a clean cause

BANGALORE: A group of 11 organisations are working towards easing the everincreasing load of garbage in the city.

Solid Waste Management Round Table (SWMRT), a conglomerate of like minded organisations, have been training households, apartment complexes and educational institutions for the past one year. With the intention of launching a communityfocused accreditation scheme, they have been training various sections of the society to encourage and more efficiently carry out garbage segregation at the source itself.

"We have converted over 10,000 households," a spokesperson of SWMRT said. She told Express that they regularly conducted workshops in apartment complexes and other households to encourage segregation. "We work in different areas of the city," she said and added that their teams stressed on the importance of segregation and recycling. She said that training and interactive programmes were being held to involve children also in the programme. Acknowledging the support by BBMP, she said that they were making all efforts to coordinate their interests in making the city free of garbage problems.

The city produces more than 3,000 metric tonnes of garbage and this amount is increasing with the increase in population. There are currently four dumping yards in the city and there are surveys being conducted to get more dumping and segregation units. There are also proposals to set up a recycling unit in KR Market itself as the market alone produces about 30 to 40 tonnes of waste. They have also started pilot projects to make many areas in the city 'zero garbage zones" which would later be extended to the entire city.

Last Updated on Monday, 18 October 2010 10:01
 
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