AstraZeneca, a science-led biopharmaceutical company, and Plan India, an NGO striving to improve the lives of millions of children and young people, have signed an MoU to expand its ‘Young Health Programme’ (YHP) in the state of Karnataka.
 
YHP aims to reduce the uptake of unhealthy behaviours in young people to improve their health outcomes as adults and help address the growing burden of NCDs on health systems.

YHP established 15 ‘Health Information Centres’ in Delhi, two in Chennai and will be launching three in the communities around Mahadevpura, Dasarahalli and Yelahanka in Bengaluru. In this first year in Karnataka, YHP aims to reach 50,000 adolescents and build a strong foundation to scale up the project in the years to come.

AstraZeneca is complementing YHP with ‘New Normal Same Cancer’ and ‘Ganga Godavari Initiative’ that focuses on creating a mass scale cancer-related awareness with the help of ambassadors and partners such as the Indian Cancer Society and Banaras Hindu University. Under these initiatives, multiple cancer screening camps are conducted in remote areas of the country where not many facilities are available.