Every pregnant woman wants a healthy baby and a delivery without complications. Telangana government is all set to give Rs 12,000 cash in three instalments to women and a special kit worth Rs 2,000 having all the necessary items required for a newborn would also be given to the mothers who deliver their babies in government hospital.
To reduce the Infant Mortality Rate(IMR) and Maternal Mortality Rate(MMR), Government of India (GOI) has introduced various schemes and vested the implementation responsibilities with respective State Governments. All the states in the country are implementing these schemes with various names. But women and child development programmes are limited to only few people, because of which the expected results are not being seen. These programmes are applicable for only those mothers who get admitted in government hospitals or Primary healthcare centers(PHC). Normal delivery is not covered under Aarogya Sri programme in both the Telugu states. So eventually, these programmes are restricted to only certain population. The women who are giving birth to children in private hospitals are not able to avail these programmes.
In the past due to high homebirths, the IMR and MMR were very high. To encourage delivery at hospitals, government started various programmes. In 2005 Janani Suraksha Yojana was started to promote institutional delivery among the poor pregnant women. They are giving Rs 6000 worth facilities to the mothers, which increased incrementally year after year. State governments are giving different names to these programmes and are showcasing as if they implementing it on their own. Even now there is no clarity as to whether the “KCR Kit” scheme will be part of the recently announced similar scheme by the Centre.
Home births have significantly reduced over the years based on the survey conducted by Ministry of Health and Family. In Telangana 1.2percent and in Andhra Pradesh 1percent of births are taking place at home. In Gujarat 8.8percent, Karnataka 9.3 percent, Haryana 6.3, Maharashtra 4.5 and Kerala 0.5 percent of deliveries are happening at home. The government is working hard to make these percentages zero and is constantly pushing them to go to government hospitals.
However, in the country as such, only 41percent of deliveries are taking place in government and related hospitals. Kerala tops the chart with 52percent while in Andhra Pradesh only 38percent and in Telangana 43percent of births are happening in government hospitals. Gujarat is at 36percent, Maharashtra at 42percent, Delhi at 33percent, Tamil Nadu at 29percent, Karnataka at 26percent.
Whenever a child takes birth, the birth certificates were given by the local municipal bodies. Now even hospitals including private hospitals can issue the initial documents. If a private hospital is able to give a government certificate, then the government programmes also should be applicable in private hospitals. The proportion of the government hospitals is very less when compared to the number of births. Many government hospitals across the country lack in numbers for doctors and especially specialists, vehicles, beds, saline stands etc. They don’t have enough hygienic facilities.
The governments should extend the central and state government programmes to private hospitals as well. Not everyone who goes to private hospital can afford the expenses. If government wants everyone to go to PHC and government hospitals, they should try to increase number of beds relative to number of birth and other facilities. Even though the programmes are being implemented for more than decade now, the number of admissions into private hospitals did not see any significant drop, due to lack of facilities in government hospitals. The differences should be set aside and the programmes should be made applicable till the number of births in government hospitals increases significantly. Moreover, newborn babies should be treated equally wherever they are born in the country.
