Ranchi, Jharkhand 27 August 2014: Save the Children today held at Key Stakeholder Consultation on Diarrhoea Prevention and Control at Hotel BNR Chankya.
“With an ambition to help reduce the burden of diarrhoea, one of the leading causes of deaths in children, Save the Children is going to implement a Diarrhoea Prevention and Control Programme in nine locations across six states of India. We will do this through a ‘multi-stakeholder partnership’, enabling us to create evidence based and replicable model of diarrhoea prevention and control in India,” said Mahadev Hansda, State Programme Manager, Save the Children, Jharkhand.
He also informed that the organisation will implement this programme in Saraiyahhat block of Dumka district. Besides, the programme will be implemented in West Bengal, Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Delhi and Uttarakhand.
“Building on the successes and achievements of our ongoing WASH initiative in Bihar, Delhi, West Bengal and Jharkhand, we aim to scale it up by integrating comprehensive prevention, health promotion, care and treatment services that would enable children and their families to lead and sustain healthier lives with reduced under five deaths from diarrhoea,” added Mahadev.
Presently, the Under Five Mortality of Children in Jharkhand stands at 51 per 1000 live births (AHS 2012-13).
Experts informed that inadequate access to safe water, poor household and environmental sanitation, poor hygiene practices are the underline cause of diarrhoea. In India, 17.6% of the population do not have access to clean and safe drinking water and around 600 million people continue to defecate in open. In Jharkhand only 22% of the people have access to basic sanitation facility. Besides, only 12.9% of the populations have access to tap water facility, increasing chances of diarrhoea.
As per the latest Annual health survey (AHS 2012-13) 7.7 percent of the children in Jharkhand were suffering from Diarrhoea. Surprisingly more urban children (8.4 percent) were suffering from the disease than rural ones (7.5 percent). Of the suffering population around 84.2 percent children received WHO HAF/ORS/ORT and Zinc. The highest prevalence of the disease was found in (Dhanbad 14.5 percent), Dumka (13.8 percent), Pakaur (16.2 percent) and Lohardagga (10.8 percent).
The nutritional status of children in Jharkhand requires immediate prioritization with 54.6% child population less than three years underweight and 47.2% of the child population stunted in the state. Early breastfeeding for children under three years within one hour is 43.3% while the exclusive breastfeeding in the age group of 0-5 months is 50.2% in the state.
Meanwhile, speaking at today’s event Job Zachariah, Chief UNICEF Jharkhand said that it is time to act. “Our surveys shows that in rural areas 92% of the population defecate in open (Census 2011). Due to this open defecation around 70-80% of the water have microbiological content. We need to rope in Self Help Groups and Women Groups for dissemination of diarrhoea prevention and control messages,” he added.
Dr. Sunita Katyayan, member State Commission for protection of child rights informed that we need to promote the correct usage of ORS. “The family members should be well informed on the quantity of water to be used in preparing ORS. Any dilution of concentration will affect the effectiveness of ORS,” she added.
