NEW DELHI, July 6:
India has prioritised strengthening health systems as a non-negotiable strategy towards achieving Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), Union Health and Family Welfare Minister J P Nadda today said.
Addressing the ‘BRICS Health Ministers’ Meeting at Tianjin, China, he underlined that strengthening of health systems was critical to achieving SDGs.
Highlighting the achievements of India in the health sector, Mr Nadda stated that India has expanded the number of vaccines under Universal Immunisation Programme (UIP) and launched Mission Indradhanush aimed at expanding coverage by reaching the unreached. India has taken various measures to augment both number, quality and skill mix and geographical distribution to address shortage of critical health human resource such as increasing medical seats, upgradation of District Hospitals to Medical colleges in underserved areas, establishing new AIIMS, he elaborated.
Reiterating the commitment of the Union Government, the Health Minister said, ”India stands unwavering in its commitment towards synergising collaboration with BRICS countries especially through the ‘BRICS Framework for Collaboration on Strategic Projects in Health’.”
Referring to the importance of building strong and resilient health systems, the Minister said, ”The case for strengthening health systems stems from the basic realisation that even the most well-crafted or well-designed health interventions cannot succeed without a strengthened health system that encompasses improvements in healthcare service provision, utilisation, quality and efficiency of healthcare services delivered including adoption of healthy behaviours and practices.”
The health sector adds direct economic value by expanding the number of jobs, investing in infrastructure projects and purchasing supplies needed for health-care delivery, Mr Nadda told the delegates, an official statement here said.
Mr Nadda informed the participants that the National Health Policy, 2017 adopted by India was well aligned with the SDG-3 targets.
”The new policy enunciates health in all policies, comprehensive primary healthcare, organisation of public healthcare delivery, improving vaccines and drug security and progressive movement towards universal health coverage,” he stated.
He added that the National Health Mission (NHM), one of the largest health programmes in the world, represents the prime vehicle to achieve the SDG-3, and in its next phase would align its goals with the National Health Policy 2017 and the SDG-3.
The Health Minister informed that free dialysis services were provided free of cost to the poor under the recently launched Pradhan Mantri National Dialysis Programme which was on Public Private Partnership mode. The proposed National Health Protection Scheme (NHPS) envisaged inclusion of preventive care, robust IT platform, strong grievance redressal mechanism in addition to expanding both population and benefit coverage and providing an additional coverage to senior citizens. (PTI)
To address the growing burden of Non-Communicable Diseases (NCDs) on account of premature mortality and morbidity, India has launched a universal population-based free screening, control and management programme for five common NCDs that is envisaged to translate into one of the largest population based screening and management programmes in the world in next few years. (UNI)
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