In all, 200 schoolchildren belonging to tribal community were screened for their health and to ascertain any nutritional deficiency in them, on Wednesday.
The screening programme was held at Nelluru Pala Ashram school in Hunsur taluk and is part of the ‘’Exceptional School Health Camp”- being taken up by the Ministry of Tribal Affairs, Government of India, in collaboration with Karnataka State Tribal Research Institute.
In the weeks ahead, tribal children across all the Ashrama Schools in Mysuru, Chamarajanagar, Kodagu and other districts with pockets of tribal population will be covered under the programme.
The objective is to raise and promote tribal childrens’ health in school and the programme is being organised with the help of JSS Academy of Higher Education & Research, Mysuru, JSS Hospital, Mysuru and All India Institute of Speech & Hearing (AIISH) Mysuru.
The children were screened not only for general ailments but also for eye care, oral care, ENT, subjected to speech and audiology testing, psychological evaluation. The camp will benefit nearly 3500 tribal children in Mysuru district alone and thousands of tribal children all over the State. The programme will cover all 112 Ashrama Schools in the State of which 21 are in Mysuru district.
Prabha Urs of KSTRI said the programme will enable early diagnosis and detection of general ailment including deficiency in tribal children which could lead to stunted growth.
