Jamnagar Rajkot RMC News Samachar Saurashtra Gujarat India

RMC launches health drive, targets 6.1 lakh students. Nearly 6.1 lakh schoolchildren will be checked as part of Rajkot Municipal Corporation’s health drive launched on Monday.

The three-month-long drive will end on January 9, 2010.

In Rajkot, a team of 75 MBBS doctors and 19 BAMS (Ayurvedic) doctors will be covering 1,612 anganwadi (kindergarten), 1,804 primary and 406 secondary schools, conducting health check-ups of 6,10,088 children, said district chief health officer Dr A S Sanghavi.

Sanghavi gave out details of the drive during a meeting with the district collector on Monday.

The meeting gave an overview of the health scenario in Rajkot district to the state administration through video conferencing. "Also joining this drive is a team of 23 referral doctors, 21 government doctors and two private doctors," said Sanghavi.

The drive assumes significance in the light of shocking data collected during last year's health check-up camp, in which 162 students of class VIII and IX were found to be suffering from heart diseases in Rajkot district. Of these, 13 students had to be shifted to a hospital in Chennai and operated upon.

The state government had spent Rs 13 lakh after the surgery and treatment. The remaining 149 students were moved to UN Mehta Hospital and provided treatment. This apart, several students were found to have vision problems and were provided with spectacles.

"In Jamnagar, a total of 1,400 anganwadis, 1,800 primary and 250 high schools will be covered under this drive meant for children in the age group of 1 to 17," said district health officer Dr DK Patel. The drive will be conducted under the supervision of district development officer JM Luni.

The drive is conducted every year since 1997. Health check-up of 4.5 lakh students in Kutch, 4.69 lakh in Surendranagar City, 3.0 lakh students in Bhavnagar City have already been conducted.