The Hindu : Andhra Pradesh / Hyderabad News : Free ambulance facility throughout the State

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Saturday, Sep 23, 2006
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Andhra Pradesh

Andhra Pradesh - Hyderabad

Free ambulance facility throughout the State

Special Correspondent

Government signs Memorandum of Understanding with EMRI

FOR THE PEOPLE: C.B.S. Venkataramana, Secretary (Health) exchanges an MoU with Venkat Changavalli, CEO of EMRI, in the presence of K. Rosaiah, Minister for Finance and Health, in Hyderabad on Friday. B. Rama Raju, co-founder and CEO of Satyam Compute r Services Ltd., is also seen. — Photo: P. V.Sivakumar

HYDERABAD: The State Government here on Friday signed an MoU with the Emergency Management & Research Institute (EMRI) to provide ambulance services "to one and all free of cost" for any health emergency-- be it a heart attack, delivery, road accident or even a snake-bite.

The MoU was signed by C.B.S. Venkataramana, Commissioner, Family Welfare, and Venkat Changavalli, CEO, EMRI, at the Secretariat in the presence of Health Minister K. Rosaiah and B. Ramaraju, MD, Satyam Computers.

More centres

With this, the State steps into a new era of ambulance services. Any person anywhere in the State will be able to get ambulance by merely contacting the EMRI on toll-free phone 108. Once contacted, the EMRI will send in a well-equipped ambulance from its nearest centre. The EMRI is running 50 centres in the State now with a fleet of 75 vehicles of its own and has drawn up a plan to develop an integrated network with State as unit by opening more centres.

"The present network is such that an ambulance will reach the needy within minutes," Mr Rosaiah said. The MoU provides for handing over of 310 ambulances, now with various Government hospitals, to the network and release of Rs. 14,000 for each ambulance a month towards maintenance.

All the 122 Government ambulances, given to NGOs for better operation in nine ITDA areas and in Kadapa, Kurnool, Mahabubnagar and Nizamabad districts, will also be brought under EMRI purview, along with 57 others now running on national highways.

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