Visakhapatnam: The number of patients seeking treatment in government hospitals has increased across the state in two years, health minister Kamineni Srinivas said on Monday. He said this was because of the improved services. He was speaking after inaugurating the modern diet kitchen and thalassaemia clinic at the King George Hospital here. “Maybe, I’m the first health minister in the state to visit KGH at least 20 times in the last two years, which shows our dedication towards quality healthcare services to the poor,” he said.
Dr Srinivas said there were proposals to increase the number of beds at all state-run hospital. The government was very keen on improving the standard of treatment provided at the government hospitals and Chief Minister Chandrababu Naidu had allocated about '800 crore more in the annual Budget for the health sector. He said that the state government included care for thalassaemia under the Dr NTR Vaidya Seva, making the patients eligible to have cashless treatment at both government and private hospital.
Dr Srinivas later inaugurated the electronic urban primary healthcare centres in the city. He said that about 222 Electronic Urban Primary Healthcare Centres would be developed across the state, including 24 within the limits of Visakhapatnam city. “We would allocate '10 crore for maintenance of these centres every month to offer specialist services at these centres itself,” Mr Srinvas said. Vizag MP K. Haribabu, MLAs Vishnu Kumar Raju and V. Ganesh Kumar, AMC principal Dr T. Radha, KGH former superintendent Dr M. Madhusudhana Babu, KGH superintendent Dr G. Arjuna and others were present.
