Times of India: Jalandhar: Thursday, July 05, 2018.
Even though
the issue of drugs abuse has been at the centre of political debate for years
now, addiction or overdose do not figure in the list of ‘cause of death’ in the
standard format used by the health department for data collection. The format,
which is used to gather information from all the districts on an annual basis,
has list of 38 major causes, including malaria and leprosy, but not narcotics.
Inquiries
from the health department revealed that senior officials have never sought any
break up of young deaths or the reasons of the deaths of young people. The lack
of focused effort has only increased the opacity in reporting the drugs-related
deaths when families of such addicts have also been reluctant to report it.
‘Heart attack’ is the common camouflage in drug deaths.
Congress
president Rahul Gandhi had created a big political debate in 2012 when he said
that 70% of Punjab youths were drug addicts. Then in power, Shiromani Akali Dal
and BJP had challenged his figure and asked him to explain the basis of his
claims.
The SAD-BJP
alliance continued to insisting till 2017 assembly election that it was an
attempt to defame Punjab. However, neither the then SAD-BJP government nor the
Congress after coming to power made any attempt for data collection and
compilation from the ground about the drugs related deaths.
“I have never
seen mention of drugs in the cause of death mentioned in the data of our
department in all these years even as there have been several cases of ‘heart
attack’ mentioned as the reason of demise of several young people,” said a
health department official.
“Neither
people report nor does the government appear to be keen on collecting data on
drug deaths from ground level. They are in fact missing the mechanism,” said
RTI and social activist Parvinder Singh Kitna. He had first brought out through
RTI queries the prevailing practice of ‘heart attack’ being mentioned in such
cases.
When asked if
there was any break up available of young deaths along with the reasons or if
any such break up was ordered by the health department, Jalandhar civil surgeon
Dr Jaspreet Kaur Sekhon could not give a clear answer. Asked if she was aware
of any such data compilation, she could simply refer the TOI query to the date
and birth registration department in her office.
When
contacted, health minister Brahm Mohihndra admitted that there was no data
available on drug deaths in Punjab. He held that people were also not
forthcoming in reporting it. However when, pointed out that health department
was not even providing a column in its own data compilation format, he said
that he would discuss it with the officials and would look into its details.
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