Health among Slum Children- A Sociological Study of Chennai City

The World Health Organization (WHO) defined health in its broader sense in its 1948 constitution as “a state of complete physical, mental, and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity.†Child health is the purview of pediatrics, which became a medical specialty in the mid-nineteenth century. Before that time the care and treatment of childhood diseases were included within such areas as general medicine, obstetrics and midwifery. A slum is a densely populated urban area and characterized by low standard of living. The rapid urbanization and increase in population resulted in the depletion and degradation of natural resources. Industrial expansion lead to the increase in the job potential in large cities, which attracted the rural population to migrate to cities and further converted the cities into a major slum and concrete jungles. Numbers of slums are increased in metropolitan cities due to acute shortage space for housing. At the same time, access to services like healthcare, fresh food, and basic sanitation may start to become restricted, creating filth and squalor. The present study titled Health among Slum Children- A Sociological Study of Chennai city has focused on the health conditions of Slum Children with three research objectives as (i). To find out the socio-economic background of the slum children in Chennai city, (ii). To bring out the nature and causes of health problems among slum children and (iii) To identify the types of health problems among slum children. The present study is descriptive in nature and tries to find out the nature and causes of health problems of slum children. The universe of the research is the total number of households of Ayothikuppam slum (1250 HH) and Saidapet slum (2220 HH). The total numbers of households are 3470. In order to have reliable data collection, the researcher has interviewed 50 slum children from the age group of 8-14 on the basis of convenient sampling method under Non-Random Sampling. The researcher has used interview schedule to collect data from the respondents. The findings of the study divulges that most of the slum children experienced diseases or health problems once in a month which are cold, cough and fever. During the illness time, 26% of the slum children were going to government hospital. 60% of the slum children are not having the habit of washing their hands before taking meals due to them play with friends and neighborhoods. 40% of the slum children are frequently affected by the fever like Malaria, Typhoid and 20% of the slum children were affected by cold and cough; sometimes it was in severe stage. The study has provided the following recommendations; i). Government has to provide formal education to the slum children and to guide them to go to school, ii) Government should take necessary step to clean the slum areas and near the Kuvam River, iii) NGO’s has to conduct more number of medical camps, awareness programmes about health and education to the slum children as well as their parents and iv) The government has to construct the public latrine for the slum areas.