Govt to launch cleanliness awards for public health facilities

The government is set to announce a scheme under which public health facilities will be awarded based on their performance on various parameters, including sanitation, cleanliness and infection control.
Health Minister J P Nadda will launch the initiative to award public health facilities, 'Kayakalp', tomorrow and also release 'Swachhata' guidelines for these facilities.
Health Ministry officials said that this initiative was the Ministry's contribution to Prime Minister Narendra Modi's pet project 'Swachh Bharat Abhiyan'.
Elaborating on the objectives of the initiative, health officials said it is aimed at promoting cleanliness, hygiene and infection control practices at public healthcare facilities.
The initiative also aims to incentivise such facilities that show exemplary performance in adhering to standard protocols of cleanliness and infection control as well as inculcate a culture of ongoing assessment and peer review of performance related to hygiene, cleanliness and sanitation.

The number of awards proposed under the scheme are for the best two district hospitals in each state, best two Community Health Centres (CHC) or sub-district hospitals and one award for Primary Health Centre in every district.

In the first category, the first and second district hospitals will be given Rs 50 lakh and Rs 20 lakh, respectively, while for CHC category, the first facility will be given Rs 15 lakh and the second Rs 10 lakh. For PHC, Rs 2 lakh will be awarded.
"The awards would be distributed based on the performance of the facility on sanitation and hygiene, infection control, hospital upkeep, waste management and community participation.

"Assessment would be done sequentially through a three tier system - Internal assessment followed by Peer assessment and then external assessment," Health Ministry said.
A state-level award committee will be constituted under the health secretary or mission director while a three to five-member committee at the district level will be constituted under the district magistrate or the Chief Medical Officer (CMO).