Performance linked incentives to the front line workers for RAT testing

Hamirpur, June 2 (UNI) The Himachal Pradesh government has decided to give a performance Linked Incentives to the Health Sub centre teams involved in testing.
This step has been taken in view of the reported decline in the number of cases and in the case positivity rates since the last two weeks.
An official spokesman said today that the most effective strategy to control the COVID 19 pandemic was to test, track and treat. In an effort to increase the testing, directions have been given to the CMOS of the districts to give a performance Linked Incentives to the Health Sub centre teams involved in testing.
He said that the primary healthcare teams of CHOs, ANMs and frontline workers including ASHAs have been involved in several COVID related activities during the present surge in COVID-19 cases.
This initiative will definitely be a source of motivation to the frontline teams of HWCs i.e. CHOs, MPWs and ASHAs. If a Health Sub Centre team conducts more than 250 Rapid Antigen Tests in its area, the team can earn a maximum incentive of Rs. 11500 per month.
This incentive shall be split between the Community Health Officer, ANM, MPW and the ASHA workers of the area as per notification issued by the State.
He further added that for earning the incentive for RAT testing the HWC-HSC or HWC-PHC will be designated as Collection Centre on COVIN 19 CC Portal and this portal will be the basis for verification of the incentive.
Besides this testing, few more parameters like number of tale-consultations, increase in OPD, Daily & monthly reporting and use of DVDMS portal shall form the basis of calculation of the incentive.
The Government spokesperson further informed that Performance linked Incentives are payable to the Health and Wellness Centers teams since March 2020.
Earlier there was criteria of 19 parameters which were based on the performance achieved in various national health programmes like NCD screening, TB elimination, Maternal and Child health programmes etc.
However, keeping in view of the preoccupation of the Sub centre teams in COVID related activities and more specifically the duties assigned to the sub-centre team in health department in the Panchayat Level Task Force recently constituted by the State Government, these sub-centres have been revised and shall be applicable from 1st June 2021 till 30th September 2021.