Punjab News- State gets gold award in improving healthcare service delivery

Chandigarh, September 6, 2013: The Punjab has been chosen as one of the best state for improving healthcare service delivery in the state and awarded with 'Dataquest-CMR e-Readiness-2013 Gold Award for “e-Governance impact on improving healthcare service delivery– highest reduction in maternal and infant mortality rate.

Disclosing this here today official spokesman said that the Special Secretary and Director Governance Reforms, V.N. Zade received the award in a function organised at New Delhi recently. He said that R Chandrasekhar, Former Union Secretary, Department of IT and Telecommunications and designated President of NASSCOM conferred the award.

The Spokesman said that the award has been given to Punjab state for registering remarkable performance in improvement of healthcare service delivery and its impact on reduction in female/infant mortality rate. He added that the National Planning Commission on IMR (Infant Mortality Rate) and MMR (Maternal Mortality Rate) has released the data for the 29 states, comparing the figures for 2006-07 and 2011-12. "On the basis of this data the states with the highest drop in IMR and MMR have won the award for ‘Best Healthcare Service Delivery’-female infant mortality". Adding further he said that the Punjab state has reduced IMR and MMR by 34% from 50 per 1000 live births in 2006-07 to 33 per 1000 live births during the year 2011-12.

Zade informed that this award was the result of constant efforts made by Health Department Punjab in the area of Maternal and Infant Mortalities in the state. He said that during the award ceremony, various E-Governance initiatives of Governance Reforms Department including e-District, State Service Delivery gateway were also appreciate.  He said that under the e-district project the pilot project had been introduced in Kapurthala and Shaheed Bhagat Singh Nagar besides improving the citizen service delivery of Health Department Services including Birth/Death Registrations. He said that Digitally Signed Birth/Death certificates were being provided to the citizens in Punjab and the applicants can get the multiple copies of Birth/Death certificates from Suwidha centers within a short span of time.

Meanwhile, Principal Secretary, Governance Reforms C. Roul congratulated Governance Reforms and Health Department for this achievement.