New Delhi: The COVID-19 pandemic has exposed the fault lines in the global health architecture and highlighted the need to make it more robust, inclusive, and responsive while maintaining the centrality of World Health Organisation (WHO), Union Health Minister Mansukh Mandaviya said on Saturday (May 13).
Virtually addressing the G7 Health Ministerial meeting on Global Health Architecture in Japan’s Nagasaki, he said,
When it comes to managing a health emergency, a country’s health system is heavily dependent on the global health system.
The Union health minister cautioned against fragmented and siloed efforts in addressing the challenges faced by the world and underlined the need for collaborative efforts to ensure global health security, including a focus on promoting health equity. While multiple global efforts are underway, there is a need to ensure the convergence of these ongoing initiatives, he noted.
The COVID-19 pandemic has brought to the forefront the fault lines in existing global health architecture and emphasised the need for a more robust, inclusive, and responsive global health architecture while maintaining the centrality of WHO.
According to a Union health ministry statement, the G7 Health Ministerial was held to discuss global health challenges and ways to ensure preparedness, prevention and response to future health emergencies.
Health Ministers of the G7 countries and “Outreach 4” countries — India, Indonesia, Vietnam and Thailand — who were invited to the meeting were present.
Dr. Mandaviya appreciated the health agenda under the G20 India Presidency and the G7 Japan Presidency, saying these have collectively prioritized health emergency preparedness, access to medical countermeasures and digital health to achieve Universal Health Coverage and innovation.
He emphasised the role of digital solutions and the use of technology in ensuring continuity of care amid multiple challenges posed by the pandemic.
Bridging the digital divide through the promotion of Digital Public Goods to support health service delivery is critical to ensure that fruits of technology are made available to all and to aid and augment health response capacities.
On India’s G20 Presidency, the health minister informed the meeting that priority has been given to building consensus for converging global efforts to address any health emergencies and ensure the availability of medical countermeasures to all countries during any health emergency with a specific focus on affordability and equitable availability.
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NDTV – Dettol have been working towards a clean and healthy India since 2014 via the Banega Swachh India initiative, which is helmed by Campaign Ambassador Amitabh Bachchan. The campaign aims to highlight the inter-dependency of humans and the environment, and of humans on one another with the focus on One Health, One Planet, One Future – Leaving No One Behind. It stresses on the need to take care of, and consider, everyone’s health in India – especially vulnerable communities – the LGBTQ population, indigenous people, India’s different tribes, ethnic and linguistic minorities, people with disabilities, migrants, geographically remote populations, gender and sexual minorities. In wake of the current COVID-19 pandemic, the need for WASH (Water, Sanitation and Hygiene) is reaffirmed as handwashing is one of the ways to prevent Coronavirus infection and other diseases. The campaign will continue to raise awareness on the same along with focussing on the importance of nutrition and healthcare for women and children, fight malnutrition, mental wellbeing, self care, science and health, adolescent health & gender awareness. Along with the health of people, the campaign has realised the need to also take care of the health of the eco-system. Our environment is fragile due to human activity, which is not only over-exploiting available resources, but also generating immense pollution as a result of using and extracting those resources. The imbalance has also led to immense biodiversity loss that has caused one of the biggest threats to human survival – climate change. It has now been described as a “code red for humanity.” The campaign will continue to cover issues like air pollution, waste management, plastic ban, manual scavenging and sanitation workers and menstrual hygiene. Banega Swasth India will also be taking forward the dream of Swasth Bharat, the campaign feels that only a Swachh or clean India where toilets are used and open defecation free (ODF) status achieved as part of the Swachh Bharat Abhiyan launched by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in 2014, can eradicate diseases like diahorrea and the country can become a Swasth or healthy India.
