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IMA doctors shy away from setting up DOTS centres
Families of electrocuted labourers await financial aid
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Journalists’ union criticises media policy
It’s visionless, says Khaira
Clinical Establishment Bill
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IMA doctors shy away from setting up DOTS centres
Jalandhar, September 9 Considering the IMA as one of the largest NGOs, and seeking its effective participation in the RNTCP, the World Health Organisation (WHO) has provided funds, running into crores of rupees, to the IMA, under the Global Fund for AIDS, TB and Malaria. As TB patients have to take medicine for a minimum of six months and the chances of discontinuation of medicine doses is high with them, it is expected from private doctors to set up a DOTS centre where free medicine is provided to TB patients thrice a week under the direct observation of the DOTS provider in their clinics. However, despite repeated motivational campaigns, barring a few, doctors are still reluctant to set up such centres in their clinics. What makes the scenario worrisome is the fact that being a hub of private medical facilities, more than 50 per cent undiagnosed patients of TB first report to private clinics. District Tuberculosis Officer Dr Rajeev Sharma revealed that the amount offered as an honorarium by the government might not be considered lucrative by private doctors. “Moreover, there are a few doctors who refer such patients to establish DOTS centres and government-run diagnostic facilities. In such conditions, a large number of patients go unreported and serve as a carrier of infection for the community,” he added. IMA president Dr Sanjeev Sharma said the IMA was encouraging the doctors by organising various conferences and seminars in this regard. “However, the multi-speciality and speciality hospitals are not coming forward to adopt such schemes as the treatment of such patients hardly falls under the ambit of such specialities. General practitioners and GAMS doctors are more inclined to set up DOTS centres in their clinics,” he said. |
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Families of electrocuted labourers await financial aid
Shahpur Jajan (Dera Baba Nanak), September 9 He was the sole breadwinner for his family comprising his wife and a brother. On September 2, six labourers were electrocuted for no fault of theirs, leaving their kin walking on the knife’s edge for survival. Sarabjit Singh (32) of the same village, too, died in the incident, leaving his poor parents at the mercy of nature. Three other youths who were electrocuted, Gurpreet Singh, Gurmukh Singh and Lakhwinder Singh, were from the adjoining Niko Saran village, while the sixth youth, Contractor Harpreet Singh, under whom the labourers were working, belongs to nearby Teja Kalan village. The contractor did not have a permit to lay the 11-KV cable from the transformer to Dera Khokhran Wala village which would have ensured 24-hour supply to the village. The labourers never knew that the contractor did not have a permit and paid with
their lives. Sarwan Singh’s brother Chanchal Singh said Punjab Speaker Nirmal Singh Kahlon, accompanied by local SAD leaders, attended the cremation of the labourers and promised a financial grant of Rs 1 lakh to the family of each of the deceased. However, Chanchal claimed that the family was yet to receive the grant. Deputy Commissioner Pirthi Chand said he had sent a report of the sequence of events to the Chief Minister. He confirmed that cheques for Rs 1 lakh each, as promised by Kahlon, were ready and would be handed over to the affected families on Sunday when their bhog would be held in the Shahpur Jajan gurdwara. Like Rani, Sarabjit’s parents are yet to come to terms with the tragedy. A relative of Sarabjit says, “We have nowhere to go. Sarabjit was our sole breadwinner and now we have lost him.” A villager disclosed that Agriculture Minister Sucha Singh Langah visited the kin of the deceased and assured them of some financial aid but nobody knew when it would come. This aid was in addition
to the one announced by the Speaker. |
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Journalists’ union criticises media policy
Jalandhar, September 9 If publications were
shut down, who would avail the so-called benefits announced by the government, he questioned. The government has inserted this pre-condition on its own even though the mandatory publication of just 5,000 copies was still being followed by the Centre. Moreover, a publication would be registered only after three years of regular publishing which was not the case earlier, he added. The affiliation of Punjabi newspapers from other parts of the state would be cancelled and state-sponsored advertisements too would dry up, causing financial losses, he said. The number of accredited journalists would come down as the conditions for getting accredited had been made more stringent. The right to challenge the non-grant of accreditation had been retained, giving a blow to the affected persons. The decision to form accreditation committees at the district level was a step in the wrong direction as this would aggravate the existing factionalism among journalists and publications. The union opposed the practice of issuing identity cards to those in this field on honorary basis. The district public relations officers should visit newspaper offices to ascertain the status of journalists and whether they conformed to the Working Journalists Act and were being paid by their respective
institutions as per norms. |
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It’s visionless, says Khaira
Jalandhar: The Congress has debunked the “belated and visionless so-called media policy” of the government released yesterday.
Bholath MLA Sukhpal Singh Khaira said the SAD had made tall promises in its election manifesto, promising freedom and independence of the Fourth Estate,
besides making lofty promises to journalists.
Any policy adopted by the state should be a vision document full of farsightedness but unfortunately the one-page pamphlet was nothing but a futile attempt to hoodwink the media fraternity. The meagre promises of free bus travel, an insurance cover of Rs 5 lakh each and setting up an accreditation committee could not be termed a media policy. Those who prepared the document should have studied the problems being faced by field journalists and made
correcting measures to ensure free, fair and transparent reporting. — TNS |
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Clinical Establishment Bill
Nawanshahr, September 9 State IMA president Dr R.S. Parmar presided over the meeting, in which 80 doctors from different districts participated. In the first phase, the IMA would organise a state-level rally at Ludhiana on September 12. Besides, a detailed memorandum in Punjabi would be prepared to highlight the ill-effects of the Bill on healthcare at the grassroots level. The IMA would submit the memorandum to MPs and MLAs as well as among the masses to make them aware that the Bill would virtually make healthcare services out of the reach of the poor and the middle class.
— OC |
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Call it indifferent attitude of city-based doctors towards contribution to the eradication of tuberculosis or the paltry honorarium provided by the government under the TB eradication project, private doctors, especially members of the Indian Medical Association, in the city are hardly impressed with the various schemes offered to them to enhance their involvement in the Revised National Tuberculosis Control Programme (RNTCP).
