Azad writes to PM, suggests slew of measures to fight COVID

Former Union Health Minister and senior Congress leader Ghulam Nabi Azad has written to Prime Minister Narendra Modi suggesting measures to fight the pandemic and increase the vaccine production.

In his letter, a copy of which has also been sent to Union Health Minister

   

Harsh Vardhan, Azad has also put forth suggestions for further augmenting health infrastructure in view of the Covid-19 pandemic.

Azad in the letter suggests that Bharat Biotech, the manufacturer of Covaxin, should “share the technology with all the World Health Organisation (WHO) prequalified pharmaceutical companies in India so that vaccine production can be augmented”.

“While it is understood that the Covishield vaccine is being produced by SII under patent licensing arrangement with AstraZeneca and Dr Reddy’s Lab has lately been licensed to manufacture the Sputnik vaccine, we can surely augment the production of domestically developed Covaxin. I believe the Department of Biotechnology and ICMR have supported the development of the vaccine now being produced by Bharat Biotech,” the letter reads.

Azad also makes a few recommendations for increasing the capacity of vaccinators in the country besides ensuring more supplies for vaccination to counter the pandemic.

Azad mentions that there are 21 major vaccine manufacturing pharmaceutical companies in India with state-of-the-art manufacturing facilities compliant to bio-safety norms. He says that seven of them including the Serum Institute of India (SII) and Bharat Biotech reportedly are WHO pre-qualified manufacturers and suppliers.

The former Jammu and Kashmir chief minister has also asked the Government of India to ramp up oxygen production. “Many PSA oxygen plants have been installed in the country, many are in the pipeline and several more have now been sanctioned. These must be installed utilizing the various agencies at the disposal of the government expeditiously and certainly within the specified period. Nations across the world and development agencies have stepped forward in this time of need with oxygen and oxygen equipment. These must be distributed proportionately and with a sense of urgency to reach the end use points,” Azad writes.

Azad has also asked the government to rope in micro and small scale enterprises, entrepreneurs, NGOs and CSOs to manufacture pre-fabricated beds.

“Pre-fabricated beds can be manufactured quickly by our medium scale enterprises to enable the setting up of field hospitals and vaccination sites. Utilising our available technologies and capacities, we should be able to significantly upgrade our field infrastructure with a fortnight to a month,” Azad adds.

Azad has also asked the government to consider re-hiring recently retired nursing and pharmaceutical staff for six months to one year on payment of the last drawn pay minus pension for the vaccination drive. “They could be given some additional honorarium to undertake this in a mission mode in the aspirational districts or other targeted areas. This may help us in surging our skilled human resource in a short period of time to significantly increase the number of vaccination sites and population-based coverage” he writes.

In the letter, Azad has also highlighted the need to provide a boost to the skilled human resource. “As the then Union Health Minister of Health & Family Welfare, one of my focus areas during 2009-2014 was to increase the availability of health human resources. I am glad the efforts made to substantially increase medical and nursing colleges to provide much needed doctors and nurses were continued under the present Government. The initiative to establish medical and nursing colleges (ANM/GNM) in a large number of districts are now paying rich dividends,” the letter mentions.

“The advisory to engage final year medical students, residents appearing for PG examinations, and nursing students/graduates is welcome. While this measure will add to the nation-wide effort to vaccinate the maximum number in the shortest time, we may still be short of the required numbers of nursing and paramedical staff for reaching the large unvaccinated population in all corners of the country. Due to such shortage, we are unable to increase the numbers of our vaccination sites to desired levels, particularly in rural and remote areas” Azad writes.

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