PGIMER, the cleanest government hospital

Last year, the Health Minister, JP Nadda had launched an initiative to motivate the government hospitals to keep their facilities clean and encourage bio-waste disposal.

The initiative was to award the facilities, which are the cleanest and also take up environment-friendly, bio-waste disposal activities. This year it was the first edition of the same and Postgraduate Institute of Medical Education and Research, Chandigarh bagged the first position for the hospital cleanliness and infection control. With the award it received a cash prize of Rs. 5 crore to help in encouraging them to continue the good work.

The second position in the same category of award was given to All India Institute of Medical Sciences, New Delhi. It was given prize money of Rs. 3 crore for the same. The third prize had award money of Rs. 1 crore, which was given to North Eastern Indira Gandhi Regional Institute of Health and Medical Sciences, Shillong. It is good to see how various hospitals in different parts of the country are making an effort to offer clean and infection free services to their patients. It wasn’t the same years before, as people didn’t prefer to go to the government hospitals because of the untidy conditions but with such motivational efforts made by the government, the hospitals are also taking a step forward in this direction.

The first edition of the Health Ministry’s landmark Kayakalp Awards was an effort to encourage the practices of cleanliness amongst hospitals. The awards were given on the central and district levels to the government hospitals in 26 states of the country. From the next edition of the award ceremony, which is being planned to take place in the coming year, the ministry is planning to even involve the primary health centers and community health centers.

The district hospitals, which have been awarded for cleanliness, are given prize money of Rs. 50 lakh each. This award was won by Civil Hospital, Panchkula in Haryana, Madan Mohan Malviya Hospital in Delhi, and JBMM Civil Hospital, Amritsar on the Punjab level. In Himachal Pradesh, this award was given to the Zonal Hospital of Dharamshala, whereas in Jammu and Kashmir it was awarded to SNM Hospital, Leh. Chain Rai Women’s Hospital, Haridwar was the winner in Uttarakhand.

The runner-ups on the state-level were given prize money of Rs. 20 lakh. This was awarded to Civil Hospital, Rohtak on Haryana level and Netaji SC Bose Zonal Hospital, Mandi on the level of Himachal.