BREWING MISERY

Sept. 3: The lush tea estates of this Upper Assam district make for a picture of perfect health. But this description is applicable only to the tea bushes. The health of those who tend to them has been plucked right off the management’s list of concerns.

Of the 169 tea gardens in Dibrugarh district, only 50 have resident doctors. Programmes introduced by the National Rural Health Mission to improve the condition of labourers in the gardens have consistently met with lukewarm response from the estate managements.

“We are very conscious of the situation in and around tea gardens and often request the estate managements to send their doctors and other health staff to learn about new programmes that the government is adopting. But the response has almost always been poor,” said the joint director of health services of the district, Promud Hazarika.

Citing an example, Hazarika said 20 doctors from various tea estates of the district had recently been invited to attend a two-day workshop on the implementation of the WHO-funded Revised National Tuberculosis Control Programme. Only 10 doctors turned up.

“This makes our job difficult. The management must understand the gravity of the situation and send doctors whenever we call them for workshops. The government has been providing free treatment for tuberculosis, which is rampant in tea estates. It will be very unfortunate if the gardens continue to remain oblivious to health hazards,” Hazarika said.

Between January and March this year, 545 patients underwent treatment for tuberculosis. Most of them were from the tea community.

District health authorities have urged deputy commissioner Ashutosh Agnihotri to take steps to ensure better co-operation from the managements of tea estates.

“We are taking some steps in this direction and discussions are going on with tea associations to work out a comprehensive strategy to address health issues in the estates,” the deputy commissioner said. He said apart from garden managements, representatives of various employee and tea student unions would be called for discussions.