Essential Health Services and Child Nutrition Programme (2014-15)

The Pratichi research team undertook a study to re-examine the healthcare system in West Bengal from a broad and integrated perspective, focusing on primary health care, child and maternal nutrition, food availability, with an additional stress on clean water and sanitation. As part of this study, specific data collection was done at primary health centres, sub-centres, health facilities at the block level, the Anganwadi Centres and the fair price shops under the public distribution system (PDS) in order to understand the roles of these institutions in the context of the issues being studied. The team went for field visits to certain rural and urban areas of the state – Jalpaiguri (Rural), South Dinajpur (Rural and Urban), Murshidabad (Rural), Barddhaman (Rural and Urban) and South 24 Parganas (Rural and Urban) – for collecting the requisite data.