Visakhapatnam: A tribal woman who was being carried to a hospital in a makeshift stretcher gave birth on a slushy road on a hillside in a forest in Andhra Pradesh on Thursday.
A government officer said that on coming to know that the woman was facing difficulty in reaching the primary health centre, a medical unit had been sent to meet her midway.
“By the time our staff reached, the woman delivered a baby girl with the help of women accompanying her. Our medical team provided necessary post-natal care. The woman and the newborn baby are fine,” Ms G. Lakshmisha, project officer with the Integrated Tribal Development Projct, said on Friday.
Similar incidents have been reported in the past, both in Andhra Pradesh and in Telangana state from the remote Agency areas.
Officials said because of the remoteness of the area, pregnant women had been asked to report to hospitals a week before they are due to give birth. It is only of late that tribals had been coming to hospitals for institutional delivery, officials said.
The government has sanctioned Rs 5.5 crore to providing road connectivity to the villages under the Centre's Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana (PMGSY), but no contractor had bid for the work because of the difficult terrain, sources said.
The government has made available a palanquin for the villagers but they have not been using it “since it was heavy”, sources said.
