Kerala - Kozhikode   

Bicycle rally for a cause

Staff Reporter

Doctors, engineers and other professionals from Pune undertake a bicycle rally to enlighten people on anaemia

ENTHUSIASTIC PARTICIPANTS: The team members of "Safe motherhood bicycle rally" during their journey in the city. Photo: S.Ramesh Kurup

Kozhikode: Setting aside their stethoscope and scalpels, a group of medical practitioners, accompanied by enthusiastic health activists drawn from all fields of activity from Pune, are now on a mission on their bicycles to realize a dream of "Anaemia Chale Jao Nischay in 2007" (Eliminate anaemia by 2007). The cyclists left the city on Monday morning for Kochi after a brief halt.

Their "Safe motherhood bicycle rally" from Goa to Kochi is the ninth in the series of the campaign organised as curtain-raiser for the 49th All India Congress of Obstetrics and Gynaecology to be held in Kochi from January 5 to 9.

"The message we want to disseminate is simple. Eyes are for seeing, ears for listening and haemoglobin is for intelligence," said Dr. Shirish Patwardhan, team leader and chairperson of the Safe Motherhood Community, Federation of Obstetrics and Gynaecological Societies of India (FOGSI).

The cycle rally was flagged off from Panaji on December 26. The team comprising 30 members including engineers, retired air force personnel, businessmen and chartered accountants passed through Margoa, Karwar, Bhatkal, Udupi, Mangalore, Kasaragod, Kannur and reached Kozhikode on Sunday.

They are expected to reach Kochi on Wednesday

"The campaign has evoked a good public response. Earlier, we had organised similar rallies from Bhuvaneswar to Kolkota, Wagah border to Agra and Pune to Bangalore," said Wing Commander (retired), Yeshwant Marathe, one of the participants.

"It is wonderful cycling through the roads of God's Own Country," said Satish Ronghe, an engineer, over phone when the team reached Kuttipuram in Malappuram district on Monday. Every woman, Dr. Patwardhan said, must know her basic health parameters including height, weight, haemoglobin and blood group.

"People are aware of their health to an extent in Kerala. Its health sector is a role model for other States to follow. But the awareness still needs to be improved. Eighty per cent of women countrywide are not aware even of their height and weight," said Dr. Patwardhan, who has been in the forefront of participating in the cycle rallies since 1998.

Studies reveal that iron deficiency is the most widespread nutritional problem in every State of the country. Incidence of iron deficiency anaemia is 26 per cent for men and 42 per cent for women.

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