NATHEALTH 7th Annual Summit 2021: Healthcare leaders calls for new measures in post-pandemic era

New Delhi: NATHEALTH held its 7th Annual Summit on the theme of ‘Indian Health System Expansion in Post-COVID Era recently. The objectives of the summit included highlighting the acute need for greater engagement, increased investments, building skilled workforce and new talent pool, planning essential infrastructure, harnessing technology and improving access.

Delivering the valedictory address, Dr Harsh Vardhan, Union Minister, Health and Family Welfare, Science and Technology, Earth Sciences, and Chairman, WHO Executive Board, along with many other senior industry leaders and government representatives called for greater collaboration and engagement amongst stakeholders to make Indian healthcare ecosystem self-reliant. The Summit witnessed several highlights, which included agreements amongst varied partners to meet the needs of a new India via digital technology, innovation and scale up models:

• MoU with Duke University on building vaccine confidence, fostering innovation across health systems through collaboration and partnerships

• Collaboration with SAMRIDH Blended Health Finance and IPE Global to scale up innovation

• TIE Mumbai partnership on accessing, sourcing, curating and identifying high-potential and high growth start-ups

• Release of NATHEALTH Patient Confidence Study by iQVIA around patient sentiment and need to enhance access to healthcare post-pandemic

• India Africa Health Summit Report – steps initiated around South-South collaboration (India for the rest of the world)

• Special session on financing the silver economy on senior care

Union Health Minister, Dr. Harsh Vardhan, shared, “It is a pleasure to be a part of the NATHEALTH 7th Annual Summit. In this year’s union budget, health has been identified as one of the six main pillars to drive growth. A holistic approach towards health and wellbeing has been adopted with an enormous financial allocation of 2,23,846 crore. Budget allocation for the health sector in 2021 has been gradually raised to 1.8% of GDP, as compared to 1.2% of GDP in 2014. The objective of increasing Government expenditure in the health sector is to drastically decrease the proportion of households facing catastrophic health expenditure.”

The Summit witnessed an amalgamation of representatives from the Government of India, leaders from hospitals, medical technology and diagnostics sectors, insurance, medical education, pharmaceuticals, global multi-stakeholder organizations, start-ups and investors. The Summit focussed on 5 critical and most relevant themes of current times led by top Indian healthcare leaders.

In the inaugural session led by Ms Preetha Reddy, President NATHEALTH & Executive Vice Chairperson, Apollo Hospitals, she shed light on the need to streamline investments in the health sector to plug existing infrastructural gaps. Eminent speakers of the second session led by Dr. Harsh Mahajan, Mahajan Imaging, focused on the financing of healthcare and how the PPP model will help accelerate in achieving Universal Health Coverage.

The third session placed emphasis on how India can leverage innovation and technology to improve access and quality of care and it was led by Dr Shravan Subramanyam, GE Healthcare; the Fourth session led by Dr. Ashutosh Raghuvanshi, Fortis Healthcare, focused on the need of developing healthcare infrastructure over the next 5 years for India and Bharat, and the fifth, again by Ms. Preetha Reddy brought together leading healthcare experts to discuss how PPP can be the game changer to bridge the demand-supply gap in skilling.

Speaking about the summit, Ms. Preetha Reddy, President NATHEALTH and Executive Vice Chairperson, Apollo Hospitals said, “It was a privilege for us to host this high-impact two-day virtual 7^th Annual Summit of NATHEALTH. Unlocking Investments and effective collaboration between the public and private healthcare sector are of utmost importance to strengthen our existing healthcare ecosystem. In the last few years, we have seen India making some giant steps towards positive change and the pandemic is a great example of our exemplary capabilities in dealing with healthcare emergencies and also finding solutions that would work for India and help us serve people around the world. India has been a land of opportunities for everyone and the path for India to become a 21st-century modern healthcare service delivery provider has been set.”

Sharing his thoughts about the summit, Dr Harsh Mahajan, Vice President, NATHEALTH and Founder and Chief Radiologist Mahajan Imaging said, “Despite numerous challenges, India has been able to expand its bandwidth and display exemplary leadership to respond to medical emergencies. Despite economic shocks faced by the healthcare sector, private and public partners worked together to make India a global leader in testing, tracing, treatment, and vaccines. Collaborative efforts helped us to set up the required infrastructure to develop effective solutions. As we reimagine the capacities of our healthcare ecosystem today, The Nathealth summit is the right platform to engage and develop new models to strengthen healthcare services across the globe.”