VMC Starts Eight Health Camps for Sanitation Workers, With Eye Tests and Scheme Help

The Varanasi Municipal Corporation began a series of health camps for its sanitation workers on Friday, with check-ups, eye tests and help in signing up for government welfare schemes. Eight camps will be held zone by zone across the city between 25 September and 8 October.

The camps are being held on the direction of Municipal Commissioner Himanshu Nagpal. The first were held in the Dashashwamedh and Varunapar zones.

At the camps, safai mitras, as the corporation calls its sanitation workers, are being examined and given medical advice. They are also being told about government schemes in health and family welfare, social welfare, welfare of persons with disabilities, labour welfare and women's empowerment. Where a worker is eligible, staff are helping with the paperwork needed to get the benefit.

Eye check-ups are part of every camp. Doctors from RK Shankara Eye Hospital, Varanasi, and Sadguru Netra Chikitsalaya, Chitrakoot, are examining sanitation workers' eyes and giving advice.

According to corporation officials, sanitation workers are a vital link in the city's cleanliness system. Keeping their health and safety in mind, the camps are meant to bring health services and welfare benefits close to where they work, the officials said.

The corporation has appealed to all sanitation workers to reach the camps on the scheduled dates in large numbers, get themselves checked and take advantage of the schemes they are eligible for.

Separately, on Friday, a health check-up camp for the corporation's sanitation workers from the Shivpur area was held at the urban community health centre in Shivpur, under the Seva Sankalp Abhiyan. The health department team examined the workers and explained the importance of regular health check-ups and the precautions they should take.

Doctors Manoj Dubey, Arun Yadav, Jai Shankar Mishra and Rakesh Singh, pharmacist Sukhram Maurya, staff nurse Dinesh Bind and other staff of the Shivpur CHC took part. The team encouraged the workers to stay alert about their health.

The Seva Sankalp Abhiyan, under which the Shivpur camp was held, is a state campaign in urban local bodies that began on 17 September with continuous cleanliness drives in cities. The Shivpur camp turned the campaign's attention to the workers who carry out those drives.

Two things set the corporation's camps apart from a one-off check-up. They are spread over two weeks and eight zones, so workers do not have to travel across the city to be examined. And they combine the medical check with scheme enrolment, which means a worker who is found eligible for a social welfare, disability or labour welfare scheme can start the paperwork at the same table.

The eye tests are the most specialised part of the camps. Eye hospitals from Varanasi and Chitrakoot have been brought in for that alone.

The remaining camps will move through the city's other zones until 8 October.