Covid showed competence of Maharashtra’s healthcare system: Dr Dileep Mhaisekar
The Covid pandemic has not only challenged the healthcare system but also showed its competence, Dr Dileep Mhaisekar, director of medical education and research in Maharashtra, said Saturday.
Dr Mhaisekar, speaking at the valedictory ceremony of the two-day Symhealth Conference at Symbiosis International University in Pune, also said that Maharashtra’ model of introducing clinical practice for first-year medical students, in a first in the whole country, had proved to be a success and that five other states were adopting it.
“Our model of tackling Covid-19 was a success. The healthcare system, be it the doctors or the paramedics, was stretched but we managed to tackle the pandemic,” he said. The pandemic was the first of its kind and had occurred 100 years after the Spanish Flu, he said.
According to Dr Mhaisekar, the pandemic allowed the system to look at the future and be prepared. He said the state government was now undertaking an awareness campaign about obesity, cancer and some other diseases.
Dr S B Mujumdar, chancellor of the university, said if anything, Covid had shown the importance of healthcare to the world.
Talking about the genesis of healthcare education at Symbiosis, he said earlier the conference would be mostly on medico-legal issues and that eminent lawyers like Ram Jethmalani would address it.
“Covid-19 showed us the importance of healthcare and how we need to take care of our health,” he said.
