Union Minister Dr Jitendra Singh, who is also a Professor of Medicine and a renowned Daibetologist, has said that India is fast emerging as protective healthcare leader, particularly after the world started citing India model of Covid management and the Vaccine success story under the leadership of Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi.

India has moved from sectoral and segmented approach of health service delivery to a comprehensive need-based healthcare service, said Dr Jitendra Singh while handing over the national level Hospital Academy Excellence Awards at a ceremony in New Delhi to some of the country's distinguished doctors specialising in hospital administration.

India is now seen as a role model in Crisis Management and Preventive Healthcare after the successful handling of the pandemic, he said.

The Minister said, “The age of working in silos is over and conscious efforts have to be made to integrate different organs of the Government including Ministries and Departments with various associations, institutes of higher and specialized learning and the Industry, particularly in the Healthcare sector”.

It is here that the role of Hospital Administrators will be critical as coordinators between different specialities and different streams of medical management, he said.

Dr Jitendra Singh said that New India will become Atmanirbhar in healthcare only by integrating various sciences and domains of medicine, going beyond Allopathy and synergising oriental alternatives like AYUSH, Yoga etc as well.

During the COVID even the West started looking up to India in search of immunity building techniques drawn from Ayurveda, Homoeopathy, Unani, Yoga, Naturopathy and other oriental alternatives and that is what calls for administrative skills to bring all together, he said.

Dr Jitendra Singh said, “India is today recognised as the vaccination hub of the world having produced DNA Covid Vaccine, world’s first intra-nasal Covid Vaccine, India’s first indigenously developed vaccine, ‘CERVAVAC’ for the prevention of cervical cancer and many other vaccines for different diseases,” he said.

The S&T Minister said, India is working on the world’s first vaccines against four Zoonotic diseases.

Besides Covid, we have four more vaccines in trial stage, which is being excitedly watched by the world, one is related to Anthrax, another on Brucellosis, one on Swine Fever and one on Leptospirosis, he said.

“Under PM Modi, India has also emerged as the world’s most cost-effective healthcare destination, with the latest technology tools deployed, across healthcare delivery. More than 10 lakh medical visas were issued to foreigners between 2019 and 2022 and the country is fast emerging as the Medical Tourism Hub of the world, despite the pandemic,” he said.

Dwelling on the Vision@2047, Dr Jitendra Singh said, it is expected that India becomes one of the top markets in medical devices grabbing 14-15% of the trade. India has almost 600 globally and nationally accredited hospitals that provide world-class treatment in cost-effective manner.

Dr Jitendra Singh pointed out that at present there are over 4,000 Healthtech Startups in India. Telemedicine is expected to reach $5.5 billion by 2025. eSanjeevani, a Ministry of Health & Family Welfare conceived technical intervention, has enabled virtual doctor consultations and connected thousands of people living in remote parts of the country with doctors in major cities while sitting in the comfort of their own homes, the Minister added.

Dr Jitendra Singh said, India is among the top five countries in the world manufacturing life-saving high risk medical devices but the cost of our devices is about one-third of those manufactured by the other four countries. He underlined that this reflects the Atmanirbhar vision of PM Modi to become self-reliant in medical devices as well as medical management.

Asserting for promotion of PPP (Public-Private Partnership) model for healthcare services, Dr Jitendra Singh said, this is the need of the hour especially to put an end to the urban-rural dichotomy in healthcare services for which many unimaginable initiatives have been taken by this government.

He said, PM Modi’s 9 years tenure has given India its vision for 2047 and laid the roadmap for the next 25 years of Amrit Kal which would witness the ascent of India as a front-ranking nation in the world in terms of best healthcare system,” he said.

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