Andhra CM seeks support of NRIs to create world-class healthcare facilities across State

Visakhapatnam Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy on Friday said the YSRCP Government is committed to improve healthcare facilities for the common man and sought the support of NRIs and benevolent persons to create world-class facilities across the State.

His address was read out by Health Minister Viddadala Rajani at the inaugural function of three-day Global Healthcare Summit being organised here by the American Association of Physicians of Indian Origin (AAPI) in collaboration with others.

He thanked Dr. Ravi Kolli, president of AAPI, Dr. T. Ravi Raju, Chair GHS 2023, India and Dr. Prasad Chalasani, Chair GHS 2023, USA and Dr. AnjanaSamaddar, president-elect AAPI for choosing Visakhapatnam and bringing together around 200 delegates from USA participating across specialties and luminaries in their respective fields from various reputed medical schools.

The conference's main theme is on mental health, nephrology, maternal and child health, oncology, gastroenterology, neurology, cardiology and ophthalmology.

The Chief Minister stated that the AP Government accords highest priority to provide healthcare facilities to the common man by earmarking 7.3% of the State budget on healthcare compared to national average of approximately 4%.

"Our main focus is to strengthen the health delivery system at village level, concentrating on preventive health. We have established Dr. YSR Health Clinic attached to each of the village secretariat with a population of 2,000 to 2500. Each village health clinic is provided with a community health officer (who is a B.Sc graduate), ANMs and 3 to 4 ASHA workers."

The government is providing 67 essential drugs, 14 diagnostic kits and tele- consultations with video calling facilities at all village health clinics.

The Chief Minister said the State stands first in creation of Ayushman Bharat Health Account numbers (ABHA id) for 72% of the population and is successful in screening the population for non-communicable diseases.

"We also stand first in tele-consultations with video calling with an average of 60,000 calls each day. We had initiated Novel family physician programme wherein one of the doctor from PHC visit each village health clinic twice a month as per fixed schedule to take care of OP, antenatal, post-natal check-ups, screening, diagnosis and treatment for various NCDs apart from visiting Anganwadicenters and schools," he stated.

Digital apps will pre-populate the data of health records and updating and on a regular basis will help in monitoring the health of the patients. The doctor also visits bed-ridden patients at their houses to take care of follow-up treatment.

The Chief Minister in his address stated "we understand the importance of providing good quality infrastructure and the human resources for providing better health care to the common man. In order to reduce out of pocket expenditure. We had taken up massive infrastructure improvement at various health facilities starting from Dr. YSR Health Clinics, PHCs, secondary health institutions and hospitals attached to medical colleges with a cost of Rs.16,850 crore under the Nadu-Nedu programme."