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Experts raise doubts over state’s ‘My Family my Responsibility’ campaign
Pune district collector Rajesh Deshmukh said the administration has completed the first round of campaign in Pune successfully.
In a bid to make the fight against Covid-19 stronger, Maharashtra government in September started door-to-door health check-ups under the campaign ‘My family, my responsibility’. However, the campaign has come under criticism of activists and public representatives who have called it “misleading” and “flawed” in its implementation.
In the first phase of the initiative, the state government had set a target of reaching 2.25 crore families across Maharashtra twice a month, with the help of NGOs, elected representatives and college students.
Volunteers have been appointed by the health department for undertaking a door-to-door survey and test temperature and oxygen levels of people.
Almost a month into the campaign, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) Shivajinagar MLA Siddharth Shirole has called the campaign as misleading and said that it does not render a clear picture of the pandemic in the city, a claim the district administration has denied.
“The concept of the campaign is good, but it is somehow flawed as not every family member is screened by staff and volunteers of this campaign. The information obtained from a family member is verbal and there is no system to confirm the information received. The family might provide vague information on blood pressure, fever, and diabetes. The Covid outbreak in the city cannot be predicted due to such faulty campaign,” said Shirole.
Besides the current initiative, the Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) has also undertaken a door-to-door survey in the city and has completed multiple rounds.
He stated that about 1,068 employees and 2,116 volunteers were appointed for this work to do the door-to-door survey of the campaign. They have approached about 9,42,000 houses and checked about 29,83,000 citizens. Of this, 1,226 coronavirus-infected patients were found in a fortnight while about a thousand or 1,500 new patients are being found in Pune every day.
“The door-to-door inspection campaign seems too good to be true, it is misleading,” added Shirole.
Contradicting the administration, health activist Vaishali Patkar, president of the Aundh Vikas Mandal who is working as a Covid warrior since the lockdown started, said, “The ground reality of this campaign is different, in most of the housing societies people are not allowing the campaign employees to come inside to conduct the survey. Whereas citizens in some areas intentionally give false information due to various reasons.”
“There is need to create awareness about this campaign if the state government wants to make it a success model. Only collecting the information is not enough, according to its survey report further steps towards improvement needs to be taken,” she said.
Chandrakant Zende, a resident of Kasba peth, said, “Last week a group of people had come to our house to take the information for this campaign. We gave the necessary details to them, but some of the residents in our area gave false details to them. Such kind of campaigns are not going to work and I think state government should focus on the improvement of medical treatment given to the Covid patients.”
“The Covid pandemic has not yet ended and we all need to get together to stop the infection spread in our areas,” he said.
Pune district collector Rajesh Deshmukh, however, said the administration has completed the first round of campaign in Pune successfully.
“Through this campaign, we are able to collect information of citizens and so it helps prevent the spread of the virus. The local people are also accompanied by the survey employees so there is cannot be misinformation shared by the citizens,” said Deshmukh.
About the initiative
Stated on September 15, ‘My family, my responsibility’ campaign aims to reach out to twelve crore people in Maharashtra as part of the government’s statewide outreach programme to check the health status of each individual in government’s efforts to contain Covid.
In the first phase of the initiative, the state government had set a target of reaching 2.25 crore families across Maharashtra twice a month, with the help of NGOs, elected representatives and college students.
Volunteers have been appointed by the health department for undertaking a door-to-door survey and test temperature and oxygen levels of people
