10 lakh Kits distributed to mothers and newborns
Hyderabad: KCR Kits scheme, the landmark initiative of Telangana to improve mother and child healthcare services and encourage pregnant women to opt for government hospitals, has reached a milestone of distributing 10 lakh KCR Kits to mothers and their newborns.
Launched in June 2017, the initiative that comes with financial benefits, has so far distributed 10,82,684 KCR Kits among women who chose government hospitals to deliver babies.
The scheme, which offers a financial benefit of Rs 12,000 for a baby boy and Rs 13,000 for a baby girl to pregnant women, has so far, between 2017 and 2022, helped 14,17,816 pregnant women deliver babies at government hospitals.
Since its inception, government hospitals have continued to outperform private hospitals by taking up 55 per cent of overall pregnancies in the State. Between 2017 and 2022, the total number of deliveries that have taken place in Telangana were 25,63,659 of which 14,17,816 (55 per cent) were in government hospitals.
One of the unique aspects of the KCR Kits initiative is that the financial benefits are transferred directly to the bank accounts of pregnant women. To ensure the infant and mother receive proper treatment, the amount is distributed in four stages.
An amount of Rs 3,000 is added to the bank account of pregnant women on completion of second antenatal (ANC) check-up, Rs 4,000 or Rs 5,000 after delivery of a boy or a girl, Rs 2,000 is added after first immunisation within three months after delivery and the final amount of Rs 3,000 is added after second immunisation, within nine months after delivery of the infant.
As a result of in-built focus on immunisation under the initiative, the percentage of infants who are vaccinated in Telangana is also pretty high. Nearly 90 per cent of the infants are vaccinated within the first three months after delivery while 80 per cent of the newborns get vaccinated within the first nine months of delivery.
KCR Kits has not only resulted in rise in deliveries in government hospitals, but also on the overall development of the intensive care facilities for newborns and improvement of vital healthcare indices including Maternal Mortality Rate (MMR) and Infant Mortality Rates (IMR), which are at an all-time low in Telangana.
