RRE likely to attract two lakh Chennaiites

CHENNAI: On its last stop in the state the HIV-awareness mobile, best known as the Red Ribbon Express, is expected to draw close to 2 lakh people from the city. And all these people are expected to walk through the eight-coach train, parked at Chennai Central Railway station, before it departs on Monday evening, according to Assembly Speaker D Jayakumar. The Red Ribbon Express was waved into the city by Health Minister Dr VS Vijay, Chennai Mayor Saidai S Duraisamy, TANSACS project director AC Mohandoss and Jayakumar himself.“So far the RRE has stopped at eight districts and as many as 4.55 lakh people have visited it,” added Jayakumar. Going by the fact that 76,000 people visited the train when it last came to the city in 2010, it is only natural to expect 2 lakh people this time. On Sunday plenty of school children arrived and were the first to get on to the awareness-targeted train and check out the displays inside.The fourth coach of the train, which has been set up by the National Rural Health Mission to spread the word about how to curb infectious diseases like tuberculosis, swine flu and malaria, was useful and timely — with a number of diseases afflicting the state at the moment. This is the train’s third visit to Chennai.Mayor Saidai S Duraisamy said that in order to have a healthy CD-4 cell count, a well balanced diet would suffice. Food ingredients like turmeric were known to help increase the cell count as well as boost immunity, he added.