While addressing the 75th session of the World Health Assembly in Geneva, India expressed its great disappointment regarding the approach and methodology used by the World Health Organization (WHO) to publish excess mortality reports. Union Health Minister, Dr. Mansukh Mandaviya, insisted that WHO had used its own methodology, ignoring the concerns from the other countries. He also said that the organization did not take into account country-specific authentic data from the statutory authority of India.
Dr. Mandaviya said, “The Central Council of Health & Family Welfare, a constitutional body having representation of Health Ministers from all States within India, passed a unanimous resolution expressing their collective disappointment over the WHO’s all-cause excess mortality report.”
This row erupted a few weeks back, when WHO reported that nearly 50 lakh people died in India due to Corona virus. This data highly contradicts the figures released by the Government of India, which state that between January 2020 and December 2021, 4.8 lakh people died in the country.
Furthermore, in his address, Dr. Mandaviya asserted the need to build a stronger and flawless supply chain so as to improve accessibility of vaccines and medicines through out the world. He also noted that WHO itself must work on streamlining its approval processes and also strengthen its core in order to build a more resilient health industry on the global front.
“As highlighted by India’s Prime Minister, there is a need to build a resilient global supply chain to enable equitable access to vaccines and medicines, streamlining WHO’s approval process for vaccines and therapeutics and strengthen WHO to build a more resilient global health security architecture,” he said.
