Swasthya helps to bridge the knowledge gaps in tribal health & nutrition

Jan 19, 2022

On August 17 2020, Shri Arjun Munda, the honourable Union Minister of Tribal Affairs inaugurated the e-portal on tribal health and nutrition named ‘Swasthya’. A first-of-its-kind, it provides every kind of information related to the health and nutrition of the tribal population of India on a single platform.

Although the public health standards have improved with time, there is still a vast difference between the health outcomes of India’s tribal population vis-à-vis its non-tribal population. The maternal mortality rates along with the under-five mortality and malnutrition are higher among tribal groups. In addition to it, there is a higher prevalence of malaria, tuberculosis, and other communicable diseases. In such a scenario, the launch of the e-portal Swasthya plays an important role. It’s the first step towards a much bigger goal of serving the tribal population of our nation. The health portal curates innovative healthcare methods, research briefs, case studies, and best practices collected from different parts of India to facilitate the exchange of evidence, expertise, and experiences. Currently, it has a dashboard that presents data curated from multiple sources for the 177-identified high-priority tribal districts.

The Ministry of Tribal Affairs (MoTA) has also recognised Piramal Swasthya as the Centre of Excellence for Knowledge Management (CoE for KM) for health and nutrition. The institute will work towards consolidating data for tribal health and nutrition, facilitating evidence-based policymaking, documenting successful models, best practices, and innovative solutions, disseminating and facilitating the exchange of knowledge, creating networks, and collaborating with stakeholders to improve tribal health and nutrition outcomes.

In a short span of time, Piramal Swasthya has been able to analyze the landscape of information available on tribal health and map organizations working in this area. Some milestones achieved by it includes:

• Launch of e-portal on tribal healthcare: The CoE, in collaboration with the Ministry of Tribal Affairs, has developed this Tribal Health and Nutrition Portal, ‘Swasthya’, a one-stop solution for information pertaining to tribal health and nutrition-related to the tribal population.
• Establishment of Sickle Cell Disease support corner: A one-stop portal with information on sickle cell disease (SCD) in tribal regions of India. Every visitor can access real-time data through a dashboard. The portal will also have an online self-registration facility and will act as a knowledge repository with information about the disease and various government initiatives.
• Initiation of ALEKH: It’s a quarterly newsletter by CoE for KM in health and nutrition.
• Tribal Health Compendium: Collaboratively presenting district/ cluster level health and nutrition data for the tribal population, using the NFHS-4 dataset.

This is a much-needed collaboration as it focuses on tribal health which has been overlooked for a long time. There’s no doubt that this initiative will build a sustainable, high-performing health eco-system that addresses the key health challenges faced by our tribal population in the coming days.