BHUBANESWAR: Union Minister for Health and Family Welfare Mansukh Mandaviya on Saturday said ‘seva’ (service) is the cornerstone of India’s model of healthcare, which was never treated as a commercial model. Addressing the fourth convocation of AIIMS-Bhubaneswar, Mandaviya said the country that believes in ‘service to mankind is service to God’ supplied medicines and vaccines to over 140 countries, including free supplies to around 40 countries, and became the pharmacy of the world during the Covid pandemic.
“India supplied drugs and returned the favour without compromising the quality and enhancing the price. But several countries, which supplied PPE kits and some medical essentials during the beginning of the pandemic, increased the price and even some of them sent us spurious drugs. It was commerce for them and service for India,” he said.
Mandaviya recalled the contribution of doctors and nurses during the Covid-19 pandemic and said when the medical practitioners in some countries known for their robust healthcare preferred to skip hospital duty in fear of infection, the physicians in India sacrificed their family life and put their health at risk to treat Covid patients.
The minister urged the AIIMS students to wholeheartedly take the opportunity of service and responsibility that medical science brings. He said the sense of responsibility should align with the service to humanity.
The new initiatives of ‘Heal in India’ and ‘Heal by India’ will give an impetus to medical value by positioning the country as a global hub for medical and wellness tourism and also fulfil the demand for skilled and qualified medical and para-medical human resource across the globe, he said.
Speaking on the occasion, Union Minister for Education and Skill Development Dharmendra Pradhan said the government is committed to having medical books in local languages to enhance the understanding of students.
He proposed the union health minister to introduce a ‘dual degree’ as part of a joint venture between AIIMS and IIT-Bhubaneswar on the lines of AIIMS and IIT-Kashmir so the final year students of both institutes can have the opportunity to do research on diverse subjects. It can be a win-win situation for both the institutes and benefit the society, he hoped.
The union ministers inaugurated the state-of-the-art NTPC burn centre and laid the foundation stone of a critical care hospital to be built at a cost of around Rs 200 crore. They awarded 40 gold medals to meritorious students. MoS Dr Bharati Pravin Pawar, MP Aparajita Sarangi, AIIMS president Prof Subrat Acharya and executive director Prof Ashutosh Biswas also spoke.