Rural Assam's health systems unequipped for COVID-19

Mahmodul Hassan

"No doctors come here. Not even for a day. For any kind of medical emergency, we have to travel 25 kilometres. There is no other way to get treatment here," Abdus Salam, a 45-year-old farmer in Hojai district, said. "Now the community transmission of COVD-19 is on the rise. The government of Assam is mainly responsible for it. Because the current Assam chief minister [Himanta Biswa Sarma], who was earlier the health minister, during the election he said that no need to wear masks. If he would have taken proper measures then, there would not have been a community transmission here. During his time [as a health minister], there was no infrastructure-based development of government hospitals. For a long time, he was the health minister. There's no infrastructure-based development of the sub-health centres and hospitals here," Basit Alom, 30-year-old social activist who has been working on social issues in the Hojai district, said.