Telangana gets 466 new ambulances, 228 Ammavodi transport vehicles

Hyderabad: Telangana chief minister K Chandrashekar Rao flags off 466 new ambulances and 228 Ammavodi transport vehicles on Tuesday at People’s Plaza in Necklace Road, Hyderabad. Among them, 204 vehicles are ‘108’ ambulances, 228 are ‘102’ Ammavodi vehicles and 34 vehicles are honour service vehicles.

Speaking on the occasion, health minister T Harish Rao said, “Happy to introduce 466 state-of-the-art emergency vehicles on a single day. When Telangana was formed, there were 316 ambulances, now the number has increased to 455. Earlier there was one 108 vehicle for every 100,000 individuals. Now one vehicle is available for every 75,000 people.”

Commenting on the impact of Ammavodi and 108 services, Harish Rao said, “Ammavodi vehicles provide services to 4,000 pregnant women every day, and 108 vehicles cater to 2,000 people. There were no Ammavodi vehicles in 2014, but today there are 300 such vehicles.”

“Similarly, there were no free hearse vehicles when the state was formed. Today, the state has 50 such vehicles, which are used to transport an average of 35 deceased people every day. The government has taken several measures to strengthen healthcare services in the state. A 100-bed hospital is being established in every constituency,” the minister added.

In 2014, there were no Advanced Life Support (ALS) ambulances in any district of Telangana. Today, every district has one such ambulance. There were also no ambulances for newborns in 2014, but today every district has one of those as well, he said.

Regarding ambulance services, the minister said, “The average ambulance response time has been reduced from 30 minutes to 15 minutes. The government is also working to keep ambulances in a state of readiness.”

The health minister further said, “The government is setting up a medical college in every hospital, which will increase the number of beds in government hospitals to 50,000. This includes the four Telangana Institute of Medical Sciences (TIMS) hospitals in Hyderabad and the Health City in Warangal.”

As part of extending support to ASHA activists, the minister announced, “The government will now pay the cell phone bills of ASHA activists and provide smartphones to newly appointed ASHA workers in Hyderabad.”

The health minister concluded by sharing a positive measure for employees, stating, “We are increasing the wages of 108 employees in four slabs.”