The State Government has decided to roll out a scheme that would not only address high malnutrition among the children of particularly vulnerable tribal groups (PVTGs) but also bring in convergence among health care programmes and agencies which carry them out.
The scheme is planned to be launched in 12 districts. The Women and Child Development Department which has proposed the scheme, with support from SC and ST Development and National Rural Health Mission (NRHM), targets 17 micro project areas comprising 541 villages under 84 gram panchayats in 20 blocks of these districts. Later, the scheme would be extended to PVTGs living outside the defined micro projects.
Since poor nutritional status, endemic malaria, lack of vocational education and under-employment, poor access to healthcare services, low level of literacy and food insecurity are major factors contributing to the high level of malnutrition, the Government will devise a special strategy that links major schemes run by the three departments as well as projects to reach the PVTGs.
For a beginning, the Government has proposed an extra meal for the children of the PVTGs during the later part of the day and not take home ration. The directly observed feeding would be in form of ready-to-eat dry ration or even cooked food. Feeding would be provided to anganwadi centres, schools, residential schools and self help groups. The ST and SC Department has been asked to conduct a survey of each hamlet for this purpose.
The W and CD Department has also proposed that anganwadi centres may be explored to double up as creche for the children below three years of age. This could be taken up on a pilot basis and help intensive monitoring of the children and their nutrition indicators.
Public health disorder in form of malaria and diarrhoea load being a major concern, a strategy would be chalked out for conducting malaria rapid diagnostic tests in the micro project areas. Just like the malaria control strategy, one to tackle diarrhoea would also be launched along with extensive awareness drive and usefulness of ORS and other supplements as preventive measures.
Since the Government plans to cover a population of 20,000 children under the scheme, it will also develop a software for individual monitoring of their health and nutrition. Every child upto the age of five would be tracked through WHO new growth standards.
For women folks of PVTGs, the Government plans to extend the pregnancy benefits. Under Mamata scheme, pregnant women can avail benefit for first two live births.