Kerala - Kozhikode   

AIIMS status sought for Kozhikode Medical College

Staff Reporter

Delegation to meet Chief Minister in this regard

Kozhikode: A delegation led by Kozhikode Mayor M. Bhaskaran and district panchayat president K.P. Kunhahamedkutty will meet Chief Minister Oommen Chandy and apprise him of the need to upgrade Kozhikode Medical College Hospital (MCH) to the status of the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS).

They will submit him a copy of a resolution adopted at a special meeting of the representatives of local bodies, political parties and other organisations here on Tuesday afternoon.

The meeting was held in the backdrop of Union Finance Minister P. Chidambaram announcing in Parliament last week that one of the medical colleges in the State would be raised to the status of the premier medical institute in New Delhi.

An action committee, comprising the Mayor as chairman and the district panchayat president as convener, was constituted at the meeting to pursue the issue.

District-level committees headed by the district panchayat chiefs will be formed in Kasaragod, Kannur, Malappuram, Wayanad and Palakkad.

Mr. Bhaskaran said the proposal of the State Government to award the special status to the medical college in Thiruvananthapuram was not justified since the State capital already had a good number of medical institutes such as the Sree Chitra Tirunal Institute of Medical Sciences and Technology, Regional Cancer Centre and the Regional Institute of Ophthalmology.

The 250-acre MCH campus here has better clinical facilities than other than medical college in the State.

A 500-bed super-speciality complex is soon going to be a reality, he said.

The hospital catered to 30 to 35 per cent of the State's population.

The hospital attends to 1.5 lakh inpatients and five to six lakh outpatients annually, Mr. Bhaskaran said.

Taking part in the deliberations, Mr. Kunhahamedkutty said that a concerted effort from all including elected representatives was needed to bring the issue to the attention to the authorities concerned.

MCH Principal V. Geetha said that the people of North Kerala would immensely benefit if the project was be awarded to the medical college here. The medical college has excelled in its spheres of activity.

P.K. Sasidharan, president of the Alumni Association and a member of the faculty of General Medicine, said a centralised administration would increase the efficiency of the medical college. Kozhikode medical college treats 90 per cent of the patients in Kozhikode in spite of a number of private hospitals, he said.

Former Mayors Thottathil Raveendran, U.T. Rajan A. Sanakaran and O. Rajagopal demanded that the Government give priority to the Kozhikode MCH in this regard.

Calicut Chamber of Commerce president C.E. Chakkunny, Malabar Chamber of Commerce secretary, P.G. Anoop Narayanan and Kerala Vyapari Vyavasayi Ekopana Samithy Kozhikode district secretary K. Hassan Koya pledged their support to the cause.

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