Health Status of Scheduled Castes in Andhra Pradesh: A Study of Visakhapatnam and West Godavari Districts

Abstract

The term ‘Dalit’ is mainly confined to scheduled castes (SCs). The term ‘SC’ was first used by the British in the Government of India Act, 1935. SCs were totally marginalised from the mainstream of society and were deprived in every aspect of their livelihood. In this paper, we have described the health conditions of sample households, health schemes by the government, health services provided by the government and sample households’ awareness regarding government schemes and services, etc. About 97 per cent of the sample households had suffered from ill health in the recent past. In the Visakhapatnam District, 50.22 per cent and in the West Godavari District 49.78 per cent were diseased persons out of a total of 669 diseased persons. The disease prevalence rate is high in females in both Visakhapatnam (73.68) and West Godavari (56.07) Districts in the age group of 0–14 years. With regard to the total diseased persons, a majority of them were spending 501–1000 (39.91%), 36.62 per cent were spending below 500 and 23.47 per cent were spending above 1000. In the Visakhapatnam District, 33 per cent and in the West Godavari District 34 per cent of the sample households benefited from the Rajiv Arogyasri Scheme (RAS). In the West Godavari District, more sample households underwent the family planning operation and they were aware about AIDS and causes for the disease when compared with Visakhapatnam District sample households.