Poor immunisation and health facilities affecting rural areas

New Delhi, Sep 13 (UNI) Lack of immunisation, low birth registration, and inadequate health facilities due to poor health infrastructure are the main factors impacting the wellbeing of children and women in the country, experts said here today.

Analysing the findings of a Government of India-UNICEF survey conducted in 43 districts of the country, having predominantly rural areas, experts pointed to the striking disparities between districts and states in the status of children and women surveyed.

In a blow to the objectives of the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, barely five per cent children were found to be fully immunised in Gaya district of Bihar and Lalitpur of Uttar Pradesh against 90 per cent in Tumkur district of Karnataka, according to the Government of India-UNICEF Country Programme of Cooperation Cycle of 2003-2007, released here recently. Within Karnataka itself, Raichur could immunise only 23 per cent of its children.

In the matter of birth registrations for children less than a year old, the contrast was again stark. Eleven districts showed sub-10 percentage levels with Muzaffarpur and Gaya in Bihar reporting 1.1 and 1.2 percentage birth registration. Ranged on the other side were Chadrapur (96.7 per cent) and Nandurbar (97 per cent) in Maharashtra and -- surprisingly -- Rajnandgaon in Bihar having 96.5 per cent.

Despite the high level of registration, at the all-India level it was 39.4 per cent only.

Institutional deliveries lagged in West Singhbhum district of Jharkhand, Dangs of Gujarat and Koraput of Orissa, all tribal districts, as less than 10 per cent deliveries occurred in institutions. On the other hand, the percentage of institutional deliveries was as high as 84 per cent in Tiruvellore district of Tamil Nadu.

Regarding the percentage of children in the 12 to 35 months who had received immunisation in the 43 districts it stood at 47 at the all-India level, with 71.2 per cent receiving BCG, 58.1 per cent getting DPT 3 vaccine and 63.9 per cent Polio 3 immunisation.

The baseline survey covered 2,580 villages on sample basis from 43 districts of 14 states, which are the focal districts of the survey. Data for the survey was collected between March and May 2005.

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