Karnali provincial govt implements seven-year strategic action plan

Bheriganga (Surkhet), Dec 11: The Karnali provincial government has implemented the seven-year strategic action plan relating to health rehabilitation. The strategic plan has been prepared to conduct various works relating to disability reduction and rehabilitation.     

Under this plan, the situation of the loss of life and being disabled in emergency situations would end. For this, a system will be developed along with an emergency medical treatment wherein the injured will be taken to a health facility from the incident site. In ineffective coordination with the federal government and the local level, research-based measures will be adopted to prevent hereditary blood-borne diseases like sickle cell anaemia, thalassemia and haemophilia within the province.     

At an interaction on health rehabilitation organised here today in Birendranagar by the National Federation of the Disabled, Nepal, Karnali Province, Amrita Gyawali, an officer at the Health Services Division, the Ministry of Social Development, said the health rehabilitation service would be integrated into the health plan and budget.     

The action plan has included activities of establishing and operating a rehabilitation unit, gradually upgrading the local level health institution to disabled-friendly structures in coordination with the local level, providing rehabilitation services to the disabled and coordinating with the local level to gather information and statistics of the service users.     

Birendra Pokharel, former President of the Federation, said eight per cent of disabled people across the country are struggling with poverty while suggesting that the government should launch various job programmes for them. He also urged the inclusion of employment programmes for the disabled in the government's policies and programmes themselves.     

Similarly, the Minister for Social Development of the province Khadka Bahadur Pokharel pledged that the provincial government would take the initiative to make a separate policy for the disabled soon.     

The provincial government allocated over Rs 10 million under various headings for persons with disabilities in the current fiscal year, 2023/24, it has been informed. (RSS)