The MoA was signed and exchanged between Lav Agarwal, JS (International Health) and Dr Ghebreyesus in the presence of Nadda
Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Director General of World Health Organisation (WHO) met JP Nadda, Union Health and Family Welfare Minister to discuss perspectives on national, regional and global public health programme. Dr Ghebreyesus complimented the Government of India on the initiatives taken to expand universal health coverage through the two pillars of Ayushman Bharat.The 1,50,000 Health and Wellness Centres will definitely take primary health care closer to the people and the path breaking National Health Protection Scheme (NHPS) will provide the secondary and tertiary care to 500 million people of the country providing the continuum of care to the citizens, Dr Ghebreyesus remarked.
To further strengthen collaborative work between India and WHO in achieving improved health outcomes, Ministry of Health and Family Welfare (MoH&FW) and WHO signed a Memorandum of Agreement (MoA) recently. Nadda presided over the signing ceremony. The MoA was signed and exchanged between Lav Agarwal, JS (International Health) and Dr Ghebreyesus in the presence of Nadda. Dr Poonam Khetrapal Singh, Regional Director, WHO, SEARO; Dr Soumya Swaminathan, DDG (Programmes), WHO; Preeti Sudan, Union Health Secretary were also present.
Dr Ghebreyesus also appreciated the community engagement and feedback through digital outreach witnessed by him during field visit to the Mother and Child Facilitation Centre at NIHFW recently and stated that such best practices should be documented and shared with other countries in the region and beyond. The Union Minister thanked the DG, WHO for their continued technical support to the national programmes. He highlighted that the Government is progressively increasing the budgetary support to the health sector and working in spirit of cooperative federalism with the states.