Union Health Minister hails Centre-State coordination in fight against COVID-19
Mar 21, 2022
New Delhi [India], March 22 : Union Minister for Health and Family Welfare Mansukh Mandaviya on Monday said that India's political leadership took decisive actions at crucial times in a strategic manner by learning and amalgamating best global practices to manage the COVID pandemic.
"India presented an exemplary model of COVID-19 management with Centre and States working in unison in a federal democracy. Jan Andolan and Jan Bhagidari are key pillars of India's COVID-19 management strategy," said Mandaviya while delivering a keynote address at an event to discuss India's COVID-19 management journey.
Mandaviya claimed that several studies predicting and assuming the impact of COVID-19 in India have been proved wrong by effective management of the pandemic by the political leadership of India.
"Several studies had made ill-informed predictions and assumptions on the impact of the pandemic in India but India's political leadership took decisive actions at crucial times in a strategic manner by learning from and amalgamating best global practices with our own approach to manage the pandemic," said Union Health Minister.
India's COVID-19 management is a story of "leadership, innovation, dedication, partnership, sharing and leveraging technology", Mandaviya said in his keynote address at the 'Aksha Lessons from India', an event organised by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation here.
Appreciating the contribution of healthcare workers in the fight against the COVID-19 pandemic, Mandaviya applauded their motivation and dedication.
"Controlling the COVID-19 pandemic was a joint effort by multitude stakeholders like NGOs, CSOs, industry, development partners. Administration of more than 181 Cr has contributed to our success in management of the third surge," he said.
Lauding India's COVID-19 vaccination programme, Minister said, "the fact that despite the huge diversity of geographies and population, India demonstrated how a huge vaccination drive can be mounted at scale."
As Keeping up with Indian Ethos and tradition India supplied medical essentials including vaccine and medicines during the pandemic.
"The country supplied COVID-19 vaccines with the world even before our own vaccine requirement was fully met. We did not exhibit any arrogant behaviour but shared what India produced," he said.
"We have provided medicines such as HCQ to many countries. We did not compromise on quality or bargain with the price," he added.
Aksha - Lessons from India was an event organized by Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation (BMGF) in New Delhi on Monday.
Dr. Rodrigo Ofrin, Country Director, WHO outlined the sheer number of people, vaccination centres, cold chains and other associated networks employed in the mammoth vaccination exercise across India. He praised the country's vaccine manufacturing capability, stating that "India is already a vaccine super power in the world as over 70% vaccines for various antigens in the world are manufactured in India".
Country Heads and Representatives from Development Partners such as World Health Organization (WHO), United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF), United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), United States Agency for International Development (USAID), Asian Development Bank (ADB) and Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation (BMGF) were present at the meet.
