World's First Hospital Train, launched in 1991

 

The Lifeline Express, also known as Jeevan Rekha Express, is the world's first hospital train, launched on  Jul y 16, 1991, by the Impact India Foundation in partnership with Indian Railways. It provides free medical care to the poor in remote areas of India. The train is equipped with modern medical facilities and has travelled across 19 states, reaching 201 rural locations in 138 districts. 

Here's a more detailed look:

Launch:

The Lifeline Express was launched on July 16, 1991, from Mumbai's Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Terminus (CSMT). 

Purpose:

The train's primary goal is to provide free medical treatment to the impoverished in rural India. 

Medical Facilities:

It features seven coaches equipped with modern medical equipment, including two operation theatres, a sterilizing room, a patient ward, and a medical supplies room. 

Services:

The Lifeline Express offers a range of medical services, including eye treatment, dental care, plastic surgery, epilepsy treatment, and counselling. 

Impact:

It has served a vast number of patients, with over 12.32 lakh patients treated, including 1.46 lakh surgical cases. 

Partnership:

The project is a collaboration between the Impact India Foundation and Indian Railways, with support from the Ministry of Health. 

Unique Feature:

The train's ability to travel to remote areas and provide on-site medical care makes it a unique initiative in healthcare delivery. 

Roald Amundsen''s Birth Anniversary

 

Roald Amundsen, born on 16 July, 1872, in Borge, near Oslo, Norway, was a Norwegian explorer who was the first to reach the South Pole, the first to make a ship voyage through the Northwest Passage, and one of the first to cross the Arctic by air. He was one of the greatest figures in the field of polar exploration.

Amundsen studied medicine for a while and then took to sea. In 1897 he sailed as first mate on the Belgica in a Belgian expedition that was the first to winter in the Antarctic. In 1903, with a crew of six on his 47-ton sloop Gjøa, Amundsen began his mission to sail through the Northwest Passage and around the northern Canadian coast. He reached Cape Colborne (in present-day Nunavut) in August 1905, completing his transit of the passage proper, before ice halted his westerly progress for the winter at Herschel Island in the Yukon the following month. Amundsen and his crew resumed the journey in August 1906 and were greeted with a heroes’ welcome when the expedition concluded in Nome, Alaska, later that month. This achievement whetted his appetite for the spectacular in polar exploration.

Amundsen’s next plan, to drift across the North Pole in Fridtjof Nansen’s old ship, the Fram, was affected by the news that the American explorer Robert E. Peary had reached the North Pole in April 1909, but he continued his preparations. When Amundsen left Norway in June 1910 no one but his brother knew that he was heading for the South Pole instead of the North. He sailed the Fram directly from the Madeira Islands to the Bay of Whales, Antarctica, along the Ross Sea. The base he set up there was 60 miles (100 km) closer to the pole than the Antarctic base of the English explorer Robert Falcon Scott, who was heading a rival expedition with the same goal. An experienced polar traveler, Amundsen prepared carefully for the coming journey, making a preliminary trip to deposit food supplies along the first part of his route to the pole and back. To transport his supplies, he used sled dogs, while Scott depended on Siberian ponies.

Amundsen set out with 4 companions, 52 dogs, and 4 sledges on October 19, 1911, and, after encountering good weather, arrived at the South Pole on December 14. The explorers recorded scientific data at the pole before beginning the return journey on December 17, and they safely reached their base at the Bay of Whales on January 25, 1912. Scott, in the meantime, had reached the South Pole on January 17, but on a difficult return journey he and all his men perished.

With funds resulting from his Antarctic adventure, Amundsen established a successful shipping business. He acquired a new ship, the Maud, and tried in 1918 to complete his old plan of drifting across the North Pole, but he was forced to abandon this scheme in favour of trying to reach the North Pole by airplane. In a flight (1925) with the American explorer Lincoln Ellsworth he arrived to within 150 miles (250 km) of the pole. In 1926, with Ellsworth and the Italian aeronautical engineer Umberto Nobile, he passed over the North Pole in a dirigible, crossing from Spitsbergen (now Svalbard), north of Norway, to Alaska. Disputes over the credit for the flight embittered his final years. In 1928 Amundsen lost his life in flying to rescue Nobile from a dirigible crash near Spitsbergen. Amundsen’s books included The South Pole (1912) and, with Ellsworth, First Crossing of the Polar Sea (1927).