Report of the Health Survey and Development Committee. Vol. IV. Summary

6. The maintenance of the public health requires the fulfilment of certain fundamental conditions which include the provision of an environment conducive to healthful living adequate nutrition the availability of health protection to all members of the community irrespective of their ability to pay for it and the active co-operation of the people in the maintenance of their own health. [...] Environmental sanitation is at a low level in most parts of the country malnutrition and under-nutrition reduce the vitality and power of resistance of an appreciable section of the population and the existing health services are altogether inadequate to meet the needs of the people while lack of general education and.health education add materially to the difficulty of overcoming the indiffere [...] in the hospital at the Secondary Health Centre will in addition to their hospital duties supervise work in their respective fields in the hospitals in the primary units and the corresponding staff in the hospital at the district headquarters will similarly supervise the work of the different departments in the secondary and primary health centre hospitals. [...] Their functions include among other things the visiting of the home of the patient in order to ascertain the causes underlying the disability for which he or she has sought the aid of the hospital and service as a connecting link between the hospital and the public in the treatment of the individual patient and the general health programme of the area concerned. [...] We consider that the development of local effort and the promotion of a spirit of self-help in the community are as important to the success of the health prgramme ns the specific services which the health officials will be able to place at the disposal of the people.