Child theft threat: Baby, mom tags at Chennai hospital

CHENNAI: As part of the attempt to check infant thefts, babies in the Government Hospital for Women and Children, Egmore, will soon sport devices around their ankles that will set off a siren if they are moved out – a contraption similar to the ones used in supermarkets and malls to catch shop-lifters.

Two years after the state health department introduced electronic tagging of babies in

Government Rajaji Hospital

in Madurai following a directive by a Madras high court bench, officials have now expanded the project to Chennai.

Babies will have reusable radio frequency identification tags (RFID) tags on their ankles, while their mothers and attenders will wear them around the neck. “We have installed a RFID reader a little away from the entrance of main block,” said

Dr T K Shanti Gunasingh

, who heads the hospital. The reader will set off a siren if the baby is carried 50m away from the spot. “This will be the only route open to mothers and attenders who carry babies in and out of the building. The others will be blocked,” said Dr Gunasingh.

The hospital has the highest number of daily deliveries with 40-60 in a single government institute.

Officials said, to make the tracking system fool proof, the hospital staff have been instructed to take a picture of each baby with it’s mother and attendant, which is then fed into a software. A CCTV camera will be installed close to the RFID reader, which will be monitored round the clock in a control room set up exclusively for the purpose. “This is to ensure the mothers’ and attendants’ tags, which can be easily removed unlike the devices on the infants, aren’t worn by anyone else. If there is a face that is not on our records crosses the scanner with tag, it will set off a siren,” said a senior health official, who is overseeing the implementation of the project in Madurai and Chennai.

The system will be fully functional at Egmore hospital after installation of an additional RFID reader in the family welfare block. “We can get the system up and going only once that block is brought under surveillance too,” said Dr Gunasingh, as mothers who undergo postpartum sterilisation are admitted there with their infants. Officials said the entire system, designed by Anna University, will be in place within three months. Last year the government had sanctioned Rs 2.5crore for the project. According to

State Crime Records Bureau

(SCRB) statistics, at least five children go missing everyday in the state, with 2,586 children going missing in Chennai alone between 2011 and 2015.