Make healthcare services and medicine affordable: Narendra Modi

Ahmedabad, Nov 7 : Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi today urged the Pharma Industry to make health care and medicines services affordable to the common man and lower income group of society.

Addressing his first video conference, after being tested a (H1N1) Flu positive early last week, at the launch of Pharmac India-2009 here, Mr Modi emphasised that the Industry leaders should put more thrust on research in order to make the medicines and healthcare services affordable to all strata of the society.

The 3-day long Pharmac India 2009 has been jointly organised by Indian Drugs Manufacturers’ Association - Gujarat State Board (IDMA-GSB) and Orbitz Exhibitions Pvt Ltd. It was formally inaugurated by Gujarat Health and Welfare Minister Jaynarayan Vyas.

Mr Modi said, ''A single company cannot shell out a big amount for research activities. So players should come together and set up a corpus for the purpose. This will help in making the healthcare services and medicines affordable.'' He also pointed out that along with pharma industry, there is a scope for development of pharma machinery manufacturing and packaging industry. Potential for these two sectors is still not fully tapped and industrialist should come forward to explore the opportunities, he added.

Mr Vyas, who was the Chief Guest of the function, urged the industry to become the largest one in terms of value too.

''The Indian pharma industry is the fourth largest one in the world in terms of size but when it come to value, it stands at 13th position. To improve on this front too, the industry needs to adapt new age technology and change accordingly,'' he added.

--UNI

(c) 2009 Published with permission from United News of India.
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