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Only 11 of the 46 government headquarters hospitals within the State have been supplied with MRI services during the last three years, the reply to an activist revealed
In January 2017, the Madras High Court (Madurai Bench) had, on a writ petition filed by an activist J. Anand Raj, directed the State government to set up MRI services throughout all government headquarters hospitals.
However, the activist lately obtained info by means of the Right To Information (RTI) Act from the Tamil Nadu Medical Services Corporation (TNMSC) Limited, which confirmed that the government was yet to implement the courtroom directive absolutely.
Only 11 out of the 46 government headquarters hospitals within the State have been supplied with MRI services during the last three years, for which the government had spent ₹56 crore.
The activist stated that the knowledge furnished by the TNMSC confirmed that sufferers, who had taken scans at the MRI and CT services, had paid ₹264 crore during the last 9 years. All the GHs had collected prices starting from ₹500 to ₹1,000 for CT scans and ₹2,500 to ₹3,500 every for MRIs. Only these sufferers, whose annual earnings was lower than ₹72,000, have been coated beneath the Chief Minister’s Health Insurance Scheme.
Mr. Anand Raj has since urged the government to present MRI services at least in Usilampatti (Madurai district), Kovilpatti (Thoothukudi), Karaikudi (Sivaganga), Tenkasi (Tenkasi), Srivilliputtur (Virudhunagar), Periakulam (Theni) and Padmanabhapuram (Kanniyakumari district) hospitals earlier than this fiscal yr.
The docs/radiologists in these hospitals stated that due to the absence of MRI services, the sufferers had to journey at least 50 km to 100 km each time, for a scan. With the COVID-19 pandemic, when the government has been repeatedly telling individuals not to enterprise out, important sufferers have had to journey lengthy distances due to poor infrastructure, Mr. Anand Raj stated.
According to him, although the CT scan facility was accessible at all the hospitals, it was not functioning 24×7 in lots of places, forcing the sufferers to journey to different cities or to search for personal scan centres. He suspected that the government was intentionally aiding personal scan centres by not offering the services in government headquarters hospitals as directed by the courtroom.
When Puucho News contacted a senior official at the Directorate of Medical and Rural Health Services, he acknowledged that there was a delay in set up of the tools. However, he defined that the government can’t merely install the tools and depart it there. “We have to recruit people for the facility, fix the pay scale, give training to them to handle the devices and so on. It will take time. Today, the priority for the government is to fight COVID-19. All the left-out GHs will get MRI facilities in the next 18 months,” he stated.
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