45,000 posts filled in medical, health, more to be filled: MT Krishna Babu

AMARAVATI: Principal Secretary of the Medical, Health and Family Welfare Department of Andhra Pradesh MT Krishna Babu on Wednesday said that the government was providing better medical facilities to all the poor and middle-class people in the State. Recalling that the government had filled as many as 45,000 posts in the medical and health sector, the principal secretary said that a notification would be released soon for the recruitment of 5,000 more posts.

He said that the government was spending Rs. 16,255 Crore under 'Nadu-Nedu' works to provide the best infrastructure in hospitals and medical colleges, he said that the government was gearing up to set up 16 new medical colleges in addition to the 11 colleges. He said five medical colleges would be inaugurated in 2023 and the remaining in 2024.

Speaking on the YS Jaganmohan Reddy government's YSR Village Health Clinics, the Principal Secretary said that these were established to bring medical services closer to the people of rural areas.

"Each Health Clinic has five medical staff along with a Community Health Officer and ANM who provide medical services to the people in each village twice a month through a mobile medical unit," he said. He also said that two PHCs were also made available in each mandal with telemedicine facility. He said that these PHCs would mainly focus on pregnant and lactating women, providing 14 types of tests and 67 types of medicines including transportation services to the babies delivered at PHCs.

Krishna Babu further said that the government had strengthened the YSR Aarogyasri scheme and was effectively implementing it in as many as 2,400 hospitals in the State and 238 hospitals in other States. He asserted that they had completed the payment of Aarogyasri bills till July and said that 83,400 people received medical services under the YSR Aarogyasri scheme in the financial year 2021-22, for which the government has spent Rs 85 crores. He said that up to 25 percent of government hospitals in the State were implementing the Aarogyasri.

The principal secretary said that better results were being achieved in providing medical services to the poor with incentives being given to the doctors working in remote and tribal areas. He said that the government was providing additional payment of 50 percent to specialists and 30 percent to MBBS doctors who worked in remote areas.

Krishna Babu also said that they were planning to deploy PG students in rural areas for a year to meet the shortage of specialists. He said that the performance of doctors had improved after biometric attendance and assured that the existing vacancies in the medical field would be filled by the end of September.

Commissioner of Medical and Health Department J Niwas said that seven people in the Paderu area showed symptoms of anthrax, which appeared to be negative. However, Niwas said that samples were sent to Visakhapatnam for tissue culture and the results were likely to be revealed on Thursday. Andhra Pradesh Medical Council Commissioner Dr. Vinod Kumar and Director of Medical Education Dr. Raghavendra Rao participated in this program.