Prime Minister Narendra Modi, lauded the country’s fight against COVID-19 and said that the nation has achieved a major milestone of administering 100 crore vaccine doses. Addressing a gathering in Varanasi, PM said that the campaign of ‘Sabko vaccine, muft vaccine’ is going ahead successfully. PM Modi inaugurated development projects worth Rs 5,200 crore for his Lok Sabha constituency.
“Villages either didn’t have hospitals or no doctors in hospitals. Block hospitals didn’t have testing facilities, if test reports came in, there was doubt on its results. Dist level hospitals led to surgery for serious diseases but the hospitals didn’t have surgery facility,” PM said in Varanasi.
PM further said that in the next 10-12 years, the nation is going to receive a number of doctors that will be more than the number of doctors that graduated out of medical colleges in the 70 years after independence.
PM inaugurates nine medical colleges
Earlier during the day, PM launched nine medical colleges in Uttar Pradesh’s Siddarthanagar. Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath, Health Minister Mansukh Mandaviya were also present on the occasion. Speaking at the launch, PM said that Uttar Pradesh’s ‘double-engine’ government has increased medical seats by more than 1900 seats in the last four years alone.
“Has it ever happened before that 9 colleges were inaugurated? Its reason is political priorities. Previous governments were only filling their family lockers and earning for themselves. But our priority is to save money belonging to the poor strata and provide them facilities,” PM Modi said in Siddarthanagar.
The nine medical colleges are situated in the districts of Siddharthnagar, Etah, Hardoi, Pratapgarh, Fatehpur, Deoria, Ghazipur, Mirzapur and Jaunpur.
PM said that with the opening of nine medical colleges, over 2500 new beds have been added to the region and over 5000 employment opportunities will be generated. “Earlier, the government had left the people of ‘Purvanchal’ to suffer from diseases but now it will become a medical hub of Northern India,” PM said.
“Opening 9 medical colleges in a day are no small thing. These medical colleges will benefit both, the present and future generations. Under PM Modi, medical education governance has improved… GoI has opened 157 medical colleges in the country,” said Union Health Minister Mansukh Mandaviya.
Earlier, the PMO said that the objective of PMASBY is to fill critical gaps in public health infrastructure, especially in critical care facilities and primary care in both urban and rural areas.
It will provide support for 17,788 rural Health and Wellness Centres in 10 High Focus States. Further, 11,024 urban Health and Wellness Centres will be established in all the States.
Critical care services will be available in all the districts of the country with more than 5 lakh population, through Exclusive Critical Care Hospital Blocks, while the remaining districts will be covered through referral services.
Under PMASBY, a National Institution for One Health, 4 New National Institutes for Virology, a Regional Research Platform for WHO South-East Asia Region, 9 Biosafety Level III laboratories, 5 New Regional National Centre for Disease Control will be set up.
