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The Delhi government is constructing two mohalla clinics inside portable shipping containers in the city's Shakurbasti area, which the authorities plan to replicate in dense cluster colonies where creating health infrastructure in a dedicated building is a challenge owing to space constraints.

The Delhi government opted for this model in order to tide over the issues of land posed by DDA and civic bodies, Health Minister Satyendar Jain said.

"Land is a subject that comes under the Centre. Politics has been happening with the construction of mohalla clinics. DDA had promised in the Delhi High Court that it would give land for mohalla clinics but it did not given us anything for even a single mohalla clinic.

"The municipal corporations has also been troubling us. What we did was that we took a shipping container and prepared a readymade mohalla clinic," he told reporters.

Mohalla clinics is one of the flagship initiatives of the Kejriwal government to boost the primary healthcare system in Delhi.

A typical mohalla clinic has a doctor and a midwife-cum-nurse. It provides an array of diagnostic services and essential medicines free of cost.

Jain had earlier visited the sites of two mohalla clinics being constructed in giant containers in Shakurbasti and took stock of the situation. The clinics in these containers would also be fully air-conditioned.

"Visited the construction site of 2 new Mohalla Clinics at Shakurbasti. These Clinics have been set up in portable containers. Such Clinics are easy to set up & transport in Cluster areas like Jhuggi-Bastis & narrow streets where healthcare infrastructure is less accessible," he tweeted after his visit.

Talking about the new version of mohalla clinic, Jain said these are being made by a company as part of its CSR activity. Mohalla clinics were also made inside porta cabins at some places.

"These are 100 per cent transferable, and can be installed wherever there is space. At present, we have one sample. I think the cost of these will be similar to the ones in porta cabins," he said.

He said these will be a better option since they can made in bulk in a factory, can be installed within no time and are made of sturdy material.

"There were issues of thefts arising at mohalla clinics but these shipping containers are made of sturdy material and will be able to withstand the danger of thefts," he said.

Jain said these will be put up at the Delhi government land. "The porta cabins were assembled on the site but these would be made in factories and then put up at the designated places. These would occupy lesser space.

"A mohalla clinic would be made in an area of 600 square feet but these will occupy 320 square feet. The idea behind their design is derived from an aeroplane, which is well-designed and has everything in a compact space. There are around 500 mohalla clinics currently functional in Delhi," he said.

The AAP government had in February 2019 flagged off 16 bike ambulances, known as First Responder Vehicles (FRVs), in a district in east Delhi on pilot basis.

The facilities available in FRV include a portable oxygen cylinder, a first aid kit and dressing materials, air-splints, foldable transfer sheets, ambu bags, glucometer, pulse oxymeter, a portable manual suction machine, a GPS device and a communication device.

These FRVs are manned by trained ambulance manpower.

Buoyed by the "overwhelmingly positive response" to the bike ambulance project in east Delhi, Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal in September 2019 had said plans were afoot to expand the service across the national capital.

"A large number of people in Delhi live in unauthorised colonies or other such areas where streets are very narrow. I was very concerned about how to provide better emergency healthcare to the people living in these colonies. With this in mind, the Bike Ambulance service was launched. The Delhi government is planning to extend the service to the entire city," he had said.

Jain recently had opened a new mohalla clinic at Tis Hazari court.

In January 2020, two months before the COVID-19 pandemic hit Delhi, Chief Minister Kejriwal had inaugurated 152 mohalla clinics en bloc.

Earlier, Jain had said mohalla clinics help in keeping quacks away, as people have a facility to go to for simple ailments. The plan is to have such facilities as close to households as possible.

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