UP devises system to evaluate health performance of districts

The Uttar Pradesh government has devised a system to evaluate performance of the districts on the basis of 34 health indicators, an official statement said.

The system that was started in July this year focuses on indicators of family planning, maternal & child health, data quality of Health Management Information System and budget utilisation of National Health Mission (NHM) funding.

In July, Bareilly, Baghpat, Kannauj, Moradabad, Lalitpur and Shamli were ranked as the best performing districts on health indicators while Kanpur Dehat, Ghazipur, Ballia, Meerut, Jyotiba Phule Nagar, Faizabad and Bijnor were ranked as poor performing districts, as per the statement.

"The district ranking aims at fostering the process of setting agendas for stimulating awareness to drive health outcomes, motivate district CMOs (Chief Medical Officers) and DMs (District Magistrate) to prioritise over means to improved health outcomes, and to help establish broad responsibilities and accountability of population health outcomes," it said.

State NHM Director Alok Kumar said: "The purpose of the ranking is to motivate the district officials, not take punitive actions, (but) to facilitate a healthy competition to perform better."

"With a population of 200 million, UP is the most populated state of the country. This is one of the reasons why development indicators like health, education, economy and socio-cultural factors have become more significant for the state," said the release.

--IANS

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