The District Planning Committee has given approval in principle to the project District Collector P.I. Sheikh Pareeth has said that a final version of a district level project, to be included in the comprehensive health programme that will be implemented in the State during the 12th five year plan starting April this year, has been submitted to the government. The district will benefit from a project worth Rs. 759.58 crore during the period. The District Planning Committee with district panchayat president Eldhose Kunnappillil as chairman and the District Collector as secretary has given in principle approval to the project. A committee with the District Medical Officer R. Sudhakaran as convener and Additional District Medical Officer Haseena Muhammed had drawn up the project. National Rural Health Mission district manager K.V. Beena and district planning officer R. Girija participated in the endeavour. The UDF government had decided to give shape to the comprehensive health programme as part of its one-year action plan. The State-level programme will be implemented after consolidating district-level projects. Districts including Ernakulam had already submitted the project plan. For coordination The Collector said the idea behind the proposed programme was to bring about coordination in terms of utilization of funds in the health sector by various departments, local bodies, and government agencies thus extending high quality health care to the people. Ms. Muhammed said that the district level project had been formulated by giving due consideration to various suggestions by all local self-government bodies in the district. Much planning at the ward-levels had gone into the suggestions from local bodies. The aim was to implement about 1,625 health-related projects under various local bodies in the district. About Rs. 337 crore will be spend in five years for these projects. Besides, 675 infrastructure projects will be executed at an estimated Rs. 422.58 crore to raise the standard of health care at par with international standards. Thus, the total number of 2,300 projects at a cost of Rs. 759.58 crore has been identified for the five-year period. The NRHM allocates on an average Rs. 18 crore to the district. So far, Rs. 60 crore had been received under this count. Funds under the NRHM will be available till 2018.