SAS NAGAR, Nov 25: With the state government deciding to provide additional doctors and paramedical staff, decks have been cleared for the setting-up of three more dispensaries for factory workers in Punjab from December onwards. The sites have already been identified at the newly developed industrial focal points in Mohali, Lalru and Chinalo.The opening of three dispensaries will benefit about 30,000 workers who could not avail medical facilities under the ESI scheme.Employees State Insurance Corporation (ESIC) regional director B.C. Bhardwaj said that the notification process for the implementation of ESI scheme in Lalru and Chinalo has already been started. The scheme will be notified in the first week of December this year, he added.While Mohali dispensary will be run with 12.5 per cent financial assistance, all expenditure in Lalru and Chinalo dispensaries is to be incurred by ESIC for the next three years.Bhardwaj told Newsline that the ESIC constructed its own building for shifting of Dera Bassi dispensary which has been running in a rented accommodation over the years. Punjab Health Department is being approached for immediate taking over of building which has been lying unused for the last couple of months.Apart from the new dispensary in Phase IX, Mohali has one 50-bedded ESI hospital and one dispensary in Phase-VII and Phase-II industrial focal points. Bhardwaj said, "Each new ESI dispensary will be manned by a medical officer, three para-medical staff, Class IV employees and one junior clerk".He added that a local office for disbursement of cash benefits to Insured Persons (IPs) will shortly be opened in Dera Bassi. Presently, Dera Bassi dispensary is visited by the staff from Chandigarh once a week for this purpose.
