Bajura, July 23

Nearly two months after a doctor was appointed for the purpose, emergency parturition service has yet to start at Kolti Primary Health Centre in Bajura.

With the aim of starting emergency parturition service, Bajura’s Budhinanda Municipality had managed Dr Ashok Khanal in the month of May. “As we didn’t have the necessary equipment, we could not start emergency parturition service even after hiring the doctor,” said Kolti Primary Health Centre Chief Dr Rajuraj Jaishi.

The budget allocated by the government for starting parturition service at the centre had frozen in fiscal 2019-20. Only Rs 1 million out of the Rs 3 million budget allocated for the purpose was spent in the last fiscal; the remaining amount simply froze.

Though the District Health Office said some equipment worth Rs 2 million was procured and managed in the last fiscal, the municipality, however, said the service could not be operated due to lack of necessary infrastructure.

The government had planned to bring into operation emergency parturition service at the primary health centre, targeting four north-eastern local levels of the district and two local levels of Mugu and Humla.

Local Gorakh Sarki said people like him in the northern parts were at the receiving end of the delay.

“If the proposed service had come into operation, we wouldn’t have to take critical cases of pregnant women to distant places for delivery,” Sarki said.

Last fiscal, the government had rescued six pregnant women in serious condition from the district in choppers.

A version of this article appears in e-paper on July 24, 2020, of The Himalayan Times.