Resolve that every clubfoot patient gets treatment: Prez

Expressing concern over poor access to treatment of clubfoot, President Ram Nath Kovind today said it should be a national resolve that by 2022 every child with the orthopaedic birth defect gets treatment as soon as it is diagnosed.
Inaugurating the Global Clubfoot Conference organised by CURE India in partnership with the Union health ministry, he said it is estimated that over 50,000 children are born annually in India with clubfoot which is curable.
"Till recently most children who suffered from clubfoot needed to be treated surgically. This was expensive for parents and traumatic for both the children and their families. Access to surgery was also difficult in rural areas. As such, many received no treatment. They were left to a lifetime of disability and stigma," he said.

The president said the relatively recent method Ponseti has been developed to treat and correct clubfoot without surgery which is "the gold standard" in its treatment.
He said the question is of access as the Ponseti method and the treatment of clubfoot require that all children who suffer from it are able to get a full course of treatment along with several years of follow-up.
"If we want to succeed, we have to treat this like a mission as was the case with polio or earlier smallpox," he said, adding one cannot ignore that at the current rate only 8,000 fresh cases are brought into the ambit of treatment every year.

"This is a small number if one considers the 50,000 children who are born annually in India with clubfoot. In 2022, India completes 75 years of its independence. It should be a national resolve that by then every child born with clubfoot gets access to treatment services as soon as the condition is diagnosed," he said.