Anganwadi workers are fighting against COVID-19 as frontline warriors

Hyderabad: Anganwadi workers and ASHA (Accredited Social Health Activists) are continuously building the foundation for the Indian society. They are entrusted with the responsibilities of promoting healthy practices, providing on-ground support, and spreading awareness about various health programmes of the Telangana government.

"In critical times, ASHAs are acting as one of the frontline workers of COVID19 and monitoring the health of citizens by undertaking door-to-door collection of data if any person has changes in temperatures and viral fevers. Rapid fever survey Data from around 300 houses of each containment zone were collected in this lockdown. Currently we are doing at Borabanda and we did pastly in Venkatagiri, Rajiv Nagar, Yayanthi Nagar, Yousufguda," said Bindhu, AMOH,GHMC.

Apart of the door to door activities we are also trying to reach out to the public in markets to spread awareness on coronavirus spread and importance of measures like social distancing,face masks and hygiene, she added.

Around 9 lakh ASHAs are right in the first line of defense against the coronavirus pandemic across India. But, unfortunately they do not draw the same attention of the healthcare professionals.But few NGOs like Joy of sharing, Helping Hands and startups are working in support of GHMC to spread awareness.

Few companies are also conducting awareness campaigns under the Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) activities.

"we believe that this training and creation of modules must go beyond Covid-19 to help them when they go out in the field as caregivers. Proper interactive training material which is further converted into regional languages can help them become adept at varied aspects. Portea Medical can come in to help them with its ample experience and expertise in training this resource pool. For instance, a healthcare worker trained under this system should have the option to connect with an experienced nurse and seek guidance related to a patient's condition whenever they face doubts related to the necessary steps. There is a need to adopt a multiple channel strategy wherein a learner can access information through various real-time resources and implement it in their on-ground activities for the greater good and we are trying to do the same," said Meena Ganesh, MD and CEO, Portea Medical.

"We are right in the first line of defense against the coronavirus pandemic. But, unfortunately we do not draw the same attention as healthcare professionals. Still, it is our responsibility to find if any person in hiding at homes.We are working round the clock from 10 am to 5 pm and we are going door to door to test the temperatures and finding out if any person is falling ill frequently, this all actives are under Rapid fever Survey," said an Anganwadi worker.