NEW DELHI: India will roll out this month the U-WIN platform, which will keep a permanent digital record of vaccination and medicines of more than three crore pregnant women and mothers and almost 2.7 crore children born annually, the government said Friday.
The online vaccine management platform will capture every vaccination event of all pregnant women and children under the Universal Immunisation Programme (UIP).
TNIE was the first to break the story in April 2022 that the National Health Authority (NHA) plans to launch a clone of the CoWIN platform for its vaccination programme.
The CoWIN app, which was made available to other countries across the globe, was used for managing COVID-19 vaccination.
Making the announcement, Union Health Secretary Apurva Chandra said the U-WIN (Universal Immunisation Win) will be launched later this month.
The online platform will issue digital vaccination certificates for all 12 vaccinations administered under India's UIP.
He also highlighted that there are already many portals operating across different segments like telemedicine, TeleManas, eRaktKosh, etc and the effort is to combine them in a single portal.
Speaking at the National Conference on Universal Access to Healthcare: Digital Solutions, organised by the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) in collaboration with the Sankala Foundation and supported by the NITI Aayog and the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, Chandra said one of the goals of the national digital mission is to increase the reach of healthcare services and reduce the disparity between rural and urban areas.
Dr V K Paul, Member (Health) NITI Ayog, highlighted that transformative changes are taking place across the health sector in India and noted that “a strong primary healthcare system is a high priority for reducing the healthcare burden in later ages."
NHRC Secretary General, Bharat Lal said, "Healthcare is a basic human right, and without good health, the full potential of a human being cannot be realised.”
He highlighted that the scope of NHRC has increased from economic to the domain of socio-cultural sectors and since the health sector impacts everyone, it is currently engaged in this sector as well.
Stating that “digital technologies hold tremendous promise for leapfrogging towards the achievement of the goal of universal healthcare,” he emphasised the importance of engaging with all the stakeholders towards improving the quality of life through such solutions.
He also stated that NHRC is involved in various healthcare initiatives involving mental health, leprosy, etc.
