Catch them young! Taking cue from Finland, the Union Health Ministry is looking towards schoolchildren to prevent and manage the scourge of communicable and non-communicable diseases such as malaria and diabetes and cancer which are fast gripping the nation.
The Ministry is working on a proposal to introduce health education as a subject from the next academic year for Class IVth onwards till Class Xth in schools.
“In this regard consultations are now underway with the Ministry of Human Resource Development (HRD) as well as the National Institute of Health and Family Welfare, which is currently preparing the course framework.
“Control and management of lifestyle diseases such as diabetes, cancer and heart ailments will be a major part of the syllabus. The course will be introduced from the next academic year,” said Jagdish Prasad, the Director General of Health Services, Health Ministry on Monday.
He was speaking at a function coinciding with the announcement of a two-day national summit for diabetes management in the country to be held next month in Delhi.
Prasad said Rs 20 lakh have already been released to the NIHFW to prepare the course structure and would be a compulsory subject wherein kids will sit for exams.
The need to introduce the subject titled as “Health Education and Promotion” in the schools had been felt consistently as many health problems can be rooted out if timely preventive measures are taken.
Finland has already introduced health at the education level and is now reaping fruits by bringing down the disease rate. “We all know students can be best information disseminators in education as well as persuading their parents also to adopt healthy lifestyle like quitting smoking and junk foods,” Prasad said noting that unhealthy food habits and lifestyle were the main cause for increase in disease burden.
Diabetes being one of the major silent killer diseases in the country will be discussed at length by experts from across the globe at the national summit to be kicked off from June 7. “It will focus on a wide range of topics like — diabetes management, policy gaps, best practices, capacity building of nodal officers, education needs, media and technology tools for awareness and education,” said Melt Van Der Spuy, Managing Director, Eli lilly & Company India Pvt ltd.
India has over 61 million diabetic patients as against 50.8 million last year, an increase of over 12 per cent. Estimates put that by 2030, India’s diabetes burden will cross 100 million, as against 87 million estimated earlier.