'India ready to share health best practices with Global South': Narendra Modi at World Health Assembly

While addressing the 78th Session of the World Health Assembly in Geneva, Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday highlighted India's contributions to global initiatives. 

 

Modi emphasised that the World Health Assembly's theme this year, 'One World for Health', aligns with India's vision for global health. 

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India's health reforms including Ayushman Bharat were highlighted by Modi via videoconferencing. Ayushman Bharat covers 580 million people and provides free treatment. The programme recently expanded to cover all Indians above the age of 70 years.

 

Modi also noted how India's extensive network of thousands of health and wellness centres facilitates early screening and detection of diseases such as cancer, diabetes, and hypertension. 

 

Adapting to the tech-advanced world, the role of technology in health and India's digital initiatives like the digital platform that tracks the vaccination of pregnant women and children and the unique digital health identity system was mentioned. 

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"It is helping us integrate benefits, insurance, records and information. With telemedicine, nobody is too far from a doctor. Our free telemedicine service has enabled over 340 million consultations," said Modi. 

 

"The health of the world depends on how well we care for the most vulnerable," he added. "The Global South is particularly impacted by health challenges. India’s approach offers replicable, scalable and sustainable models. We would be happy to share our learnings and best practices with the world, especially the Global South," said Modi.

 

He also invited all countries to participate in the 11th International Day of Yoga in June. This year the theme is 'Yoga for One Earth, One Health’. 

 

Modi also congratulated the WHO and all member states on the successful negotiations of the Intergovernmental Negotiating Body (INB) treaty.

 

WHO member states on Tuesday adopted a global pandemic agreement with the aim of being better prepared for dealing with future pandemics. However, with the US withdrawing from WHO, there is uncertainty regarding its effectiveness. The US was WHO’s largest funder. 

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