ACF to bolster NCD intervention focus across rural India

The intervention programme by ACF is initiated across four locations and it will reach out to nearly a lakh people across 12,464 household

Ambuja Cement Foundation (ACF), the CSR arm of Ambuja Cements, will expand its Non-Communicable Disease (NCD) intervention programme across rural India to develop a robust healthcare system.

ACF, which is celebrating its silver jubilee year, recently organised a participatory dialogue ‘Multi Stakeholder Consultation on Non-Communicable Diseases’ in New Delhi, which saw participation from various stakeholders involved directly or indirectly in public health space.

Elaborating on the NCD programme, Pearl Tiwari, Director, ACF said, “Changing lifestyle combined with lack of awareness has led to the rising epidemic of NCDs in rural locations across the country. While rural women suffer from malnourishment, the youth have falling prey to substance abuse of tobacco and alcohol, further aggravating their risk of developing NCDs. The situation is critical and demands urgent intervention from various stakeholders to partner and develop a cohesive and sustainable healthcare awareness campaign. ACF has launched an NCD intervention programme to combat these diseases.”

“NCDs account for nearly 60 per cent of deaths in India at present. Mitigation of it needs constant and concentrated efforts at multiple levels, which can be made possible only through synergetic efforts by all stakeholders. ACF will continue its endeavour to build healthy communities to enable people to lead more fruitful and productive live,” she added.

The intervention programme by ACF is initiated across four locations and it will reach out to nearly a lakh people across 12,464 household. Before starting this programme, ACF has conducted a baseline study at Chandrapur (Maharashtra), Bhatapara (Chhattisgarh), Darlaghat (Himachal Pradesh) and Roorkee (Uttarakhand) and then designed strategies to implement a community – based project on NCD. The project covers diabetes, cardiac problems, cancer, respiratory disease, women‘s health and mental health problems. The objective of the project is to generate awareness in the community about NCDs, motivate high-risk population for early identification and treatment.