The audience at the Dus Ka Dum Swasth Rahenge Hum health programme launch at SK Memorial Hall in Patna on Sunday. Picture by Jai Prakash

The state government has decided to focus on spreading public awareness about preventive health measures.

Chief minister Nitish Kumar on Sunday launched a programme, Dus Ka Dum Swasth Rahenge Hum, at SK Memorial Hall to make people living in villages aware of preventive health measures.

The programme would teach people 10 lessons related to preventive health measures and sanitation. They would be taught not to defecate in the open but to use washrooms, encouraged to practise yoga and other exercises and told to abstain from alcohol. The message that girls should not be married before 18 would be spread during the drive.

Nitish flagged off Jan Swasthya Chetna Yatra later on this occasion. A vehicle would visit different parts of the state to teach people the lessons of the programme.

Inaugurating the programme, Nitish said: “If people adopt a healthy lifestyle, they would not fall sick easily, helping reduce their expenditure on healthcare. The state government also has to spend a lot of money on healthcare services. We spent around Rs 250 crore in the past year only on purchase of drugs provided to patients free of cost in state hospitals. People spend around Rs 1,000 crore on their medication. So if people adopt the prevention measures listed in the programme, less medicines would be required, helping the state government use the money on other development programmes.”

Nitish also spoke of the state government’s Lohiya Swachhata Yojana under which it provides funds to above poverty line families for construction of washrooms. He added: “I would request girls to refuse to marry into houses where there are no washrooms. Only then this problem could be sorted out completely.”

Health minister Ashwini Kumar Choubey said the state government had decided to introduce lessons of preventive health measures and sanitation in school textbooks.

Deputy chief minister Sushil Kumar Modi said people could save themselves from several diseases if they take care of sanitation.

Earlier, David McLoughlin, deputy representative (programme), Unicef India, expressed concern on increasing total fertility rate and declining sex ratio in the state.