Four states show significant drop in diarrhoeal prevalence and death : NGO

The ‘Stop Diarrhoea Initiative (SDI)’ a five-year project executed by Save the Children India in partnership with Reckitt and Benckiser (RB) which was initiated in nine locations demonstrated 62 per cent reduction in prevalence of diarrhoea. The three urban locations are North and South Delhi in Delhi and Ward 58 and 65 in Kolkata, West Bengal, while the six rural locations are Haridwar and Udham Singh Nagar (US Nagar) districts in Uttarakhand (UTK), Bahraich, Balrampur, Pilibhit and Shrawasti districts in Uttar Pradesh (UP). The programme averts 16,286 cases of diarrhoea in the intervention area and an estimated reduction in mortality due to the disease lowered by 15 per cent.

Appreciating the efforts of the NGO and the SDI programme, Dr Aarti Garg, Assistant Commissioner-Child Health, Ministry of Health & Family Welfare, GoI said, “India ranks high on the global list of deaths due to diarrhoea and pneumonia, where diarrhoea alone is responsible for nine per cent under-five deaths. Out of the 4.8-lakh deaths globally, around one lakh deaths occur in India. That makes it 287 deaths daily or two deaths every hour. It needs huge efforts to achieve our goals for 2030 and SDI is a multi-sectoral convergence to operationalise diarrhoea control programmes. Co-packaging ORS and Zinc in the treatment package has given a significant boost to reducing diarrhoeal deaths in their intervention areas.”

The project catered to 473 rural Gram Panchayats (GP) of UP, and has reached out to two million people and to 0.2 Million under-five children through diarrhoea treatment packages.

Informing that such programmes will bring in a transformative change in public health sector, Dr Raj Bhandari, Member, National Technical Board of Nutrition and Health at NITI Aayog, Technical Advisor to VSTF, GoM, Poshan IMAM, said, “We are ready to have a very informed view as to how our programmes need to be more doable. Besides growth surveillance and ICDS CAS real-time monitoring, inter-sectoral convergence is the third pillar of Poshan Abhiyan and what Save the Children has demonstrated through this convergence on a platform across sectors and at a micro level by including community-level participation and have them take the ownership is commendable.”

OP Singh, team leader, Save the Children’s SDI project, shared SDI achievements are aligned with National Health Mission’s Integrated Action Plan for Prevention and Control of Pneumonia and Diarrhoea (IAPPD). He said the NGO designed this intervention for the WHO/UNICEF seven-point plan and implemented and tested across four states and the project ambition was to eliminate diarrhoea as a leading cause of death amongst children by 2020 and displays the plan as the most effective strategy that comprehensively covers prevention and treatment approaches of childhood diarrhoea management.