Bhubaneswar, April 19: “Odisha is moving ahead impressively in malaria control and prevention”, said Chief Secretary Aditya Prasad Padhi.
Chairing a meeting to review the progress of malaria control and prevention programmes in Odisha here on Monday, Padhi said the conditions in as many as eight districts have improved to move to pre-elimination and elimination phase.
The chief secretary said he has directed the Health and Family Welfare department to intensify State sponsored malaria elimination scheme named Daman in remote districts from the month of May, 2016.
He assured that the State government would provide the required fund for the purpose from its own resources.
Padhi directed the Health and Family Welfare Department to ensure availability of malarial medicines at PHCs and Health Centres and cautioned the department that no person should be deprived of getting medicine in time. Dr Madan Mohan Pradhan, Joint Director, Health while presenting the national survey figures said that conditions have improved significantly in eight costal districts where Annual Parasite Incidence (API) per 1000 population is less than one.
“Looking to block API data, it was decided to move to elimination phase in 3 districts namely Puri, Kendrapara and Jagatsinghpur. Other five districts including Bhadrak, Balasore, Jajpur, Cuttack and Khurda would move to pre-elimination phase”, he said.
Replying to media query after the meeting, Joint Secretary, Health and Family Welfare Surjit Das siad that the scheme Daman is an innovative and integrated approach for control and prevention of malaria. “The scheme is sponsored and funded by the State government”, he said, adding the implementation of the scheme would be intensified in 8 districts which have reported more than 10 API.
These districts include Gajpati, Kalahandi, Kandhamala, Koraput, Malkangiri, Nabrangpur, Nuapada and Rayagada.
“An amount of Rs 25 crore has been estimated for the purpose. The services to be provided would include diagnosis, treatment, intensive mass awareness, behavioural change communications, haemoglobin test, nutrition test, supply of medicines, etc”, Das said.
He added that as many as 25 entomological units would be set up in various districts including five municipal corporations to address malaria and other vector borne diseases including dengue, chikangunia, etc. Around 1.52 crore LLI nets would be procured from Global Fund for TB , AIDS and Malaria (GFTAM) control through the Centre within 6 months.
“This would meet present requirement of the State. Besides, the ongoing programmes like indoor residual spray, diagnosis and treatment within 24 hours would also be intensified”, the official said.
