ABSTRACT
Primary health care (PHC) center is the first point of contact between community and the medical officer at village level. The PHCs have been envisaged to provide an integrated curative and preventive health care to the rural population with emphasis on preventive and promotive aspects of health care. The PHCs are established and maintained by the State Governments under the minimum needs programme or basic minimum services programme. At present, a PHC is manned by a medical officer supported by paramedical and other staff. It acts as a referral unit for 4 to 6 sub centres. It has 6 beds for patients. The activities of PHC involve curative, preventive, promotive and family welfare services. There are 2080 PHCs functioning as on March, 2018 in the Rajasthan.
ABSTRACT
Background: The Government of India has taken various initiatives for tobacco control by enacting comprehensive tobacco control legislation (Cigarette and Other Tobacco Products Act [COTPA], 2003). Objectives: The aim of this study was to assess the level of compliance of Sections 4, 5, 6-a, and 6-b, and 7, 8, and 9 of COTPA with respect to public places, educational institutes, point of sale (PoS), and warning on packaging (COTPA) in public places of Alwar District of Rajasthan. Methods: A cross-sectional observational study was conducted in 2014 in Alwar city and four blocks of the district. The study was done around 365 public places for observing the compliance of Section 4 of COTPA, 357 educational institutions for observing the compliance of Section 6-b of COTPA, and 357 tobacco retailers for observing the compliance of Sections 5 and 6-a of COTPA. Results: The criteria for the evaluation (the core indicators) and decision criteria for a district to qualify for the "Smoke free" status include six parameters. From the total of 365 places visited, 90% places displayed the "No-smoking" signage and out of total 328 places, 99% were as per the COTPA specification. Alwar city, Ramgarh, Thanagaji, and Alwar rural block followed the compliance of Section 4. The PoS visited Alwar district displayed 93% (332) signage and all the displayed signage followed the COTPA compliance. In Alwar city, Thanagaji, Ramgarh, and Alwar rural block, the compliance of Section 6-a was above 90%. The compliance of Section 6-b was above 90% in Alwar city, Ramgarh, Thanagaji, and Alwar rural block. Ninety-three percent (332) of the PoS did not display tobacco advertisement in Alwar district, which is a positive sign of COTPA compliance. Conclusion: This finding suggest a high level of compliance of Section 4, Section 5, Section 6-a, and Section 6-b of COTPA at Alwar district.