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More Babies Die In Tikamgarh Than In Poorest Africa

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More Babies Die In Tikamgarh Than In Poorest Africa
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KASTURI, 20, gave birth to a daughter in June. Little did she know that motherhood would be a fleeting joy. Four days after the birth, the baby developed diarrhoea and went into a paroxysm. Her parents rushed the sick infant to the nearest doctor in a village two km away. But how fast can you go on a bicycle? The baby died on the way. The couple still have no clue why their daughter died.

But Kamala did know that her two-year-old daughter was suffering from chicken pox and yet couldn't save her. Her husband Tularam says they took her to the primary health centre where they were told the girl was possessed by devi 'choti mata'. So they went back and prayed to appease the devi for 10 days by which time the child's condition took a turn for the worse. The couple rushed her to the doctor, but it was too late.

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These are not isolated cases. Both Kamala and Kasturi hail from a remote village, Purainia, in the Tikamgarh district of Madhya Pradesh where infant mortality is an appalling 40 per cent. Jamnaprasad Pateria, the sarpanch of the village, blames it on the lack of basic health services. "We have only one doctor for five villages who sits in the public healthcare centre only till 11 in the morning and then goes back to his house about 14 km away."

The sarpanch isn't exaggerating. Last week, a girl from his village burnt herself to death. The body was taken to the dispensary in Baldevgarh, about 15 km from the village. The dispensary was deserted and the villagers waited for almost five hours before a doctor was fetched to do a post mortem—an essential to prevent a police case being registered against her parents. But he refused to conduct the post mortem without the permission of the block medical officer who was away on a conference.

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Purainia is fairly representative of the sorry state of healthcare in Tikamgarh. According to economists Amartya Sen and Jean Dreze, even sub-Saharan Africa fares better than Tikamgarh. And when a single antibiotic tablet costs Rs 7-10, it is dif-ficult to manage with 0.50 paise per head.

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