‘Robust public healthcare can help tackle pandemic’

Health experts talk of early interventions, remove stigma

A robust public healthcare system with primary, secondary and critical levels connected through surveillance mechanisms could have helped the country deal with the current COVID pandemic better and certainly would be able to tackle any next pandemic, was the common refrain from scientists and public health experts to policy makers on Thursday. “Primary healthcare could have helped us detect early waves, help us do early interventions, remove the fears or stigmas associated with the virus. We need to strengthen it in both urban and rural areas even as the focus is on hospital beds and ventilators,” asserted president of Public Health Foundation of India Dr. K. Srinath Reddy. Public healthcare personnel are needed for early detection of cases, contract tracing and monitor those in home care. While the focus on economy is there, there is a danger of it to “keep slipping on the banana peel of lack of public healthcare”, he warned, participating in a webinar on ‘COVIDwise: Lessons learnt and unlearnt” by the Atal Incubation Centre - Centre for Cellular & Molecular Biology (CCMB).