Urban poor still the forgotten lot

Shirley Wijesinghe

Chief City Administrator Omar Kamil said 50 percent of voters are urban poor and they are the people who go to the polling station very early to cast their votes. But the people who belong to the middle class are reluctant to exercise their franchise.

However the urban poor are forgotten once the elections are over. The projects of the “Nagamu Purawara” under the direction of President Mahinda Rajapaksa will be a clear solution for the urban poor, he said.

He was addressing the stakeholders meeting of Urban HEART(Health Equity Assessment and Response Tool) organized by the Public Health Department of the Colombo Municipal Council with collaboration of World Health Organization.

Kamil said the involvement of the CMC to ensure equal health to all living within the city limit of Colombo is highly commendable.

Addressing the meeting WHO Resident Representative Firdosi Rustam Mehta said they have observed a rising trend of increasing non- communicable diseases in the country. Metha said that every six out of ten people would live in urban cities and it demands more urban health , socio and economic facilities.

Sri Lanka experienced a severe outbreak of dengue mostly spread in the urban areas had spread to the rural areas too and even to the North from the beginning of this year.