Hyderabad: There is a serious need to make healthcare accessible and affordable in the country. Realising this need, Telangana has focused its efforts to ensure that healthcare is made accessible to all. With strong pharmaceuticals, biotech, healthcare and IT industry, the State has become the drug and vaccine hub for the world, providing affordable medicines for diseases as complex as HIV.
Telangana has been in the forefront of developing generic drugs. Though the industry here is helping solve issues of global markets, it is also important that medicines and healthcare is made affordable and accessible to those in the State and in the country. Burden of cost of treatment is increasing in non-communicable diseases and cancers, which needs solutions, Etela Rajender, Minister of Health, Medical & Family Welfare, Government of Telangana, said, addressing a gathering at the CII-IMT Health & Pharma Conclave.He added, “Telangana government is doing its part. The State spends Rs 7,500 crore annually for healthcare. Pharma, biotech and IT industry can work with the government to make it a leading State in the country in healthcare delivery.”
The Minister also stressed that advances in science and technology should always benefit the common man. Nations that put efforts and investments in technology alone make substantial progress. India at large has to step up its efforts in science technology to achieve desired growth, though southern States such as Telangana, Tamil Nadu and Kerala have already made some progress, he said.
He recalled, in the recent Council of Ministers’ meeting held at New Delhi, it had been accepted that the technology was yet to make a difference at the grassroot level. This is something that the pharma and healthcare industries should focus on.