Union Health Minister Mansukh Mandaviya.
Union Health Minister Mansukh Mandaviya on December 3 said that India’s COVID-19 deaths per million of the population were one of the lowest in the world.
Speaking in the Lok Sabha during the ongoing Winter Session of Parliament, Mandaviya urged Opposition parties to stop doing politics over the deaths related to the shortage of oxygen during the deadly second wave of the pandemic.
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The minister said that the Union government had started working for COVID-19 prevention nearly a month before the first case was reported in Kerala.
“3.46 crore coronavirus cases have been reported in India and 4.6 lakh people died. This is 1.36 percent of total cases. 25,000 cases and 340 deaths per million population were reported in India. This is one of the lowest in the world,” Mandaviya said. The health minister spoke after the Lok Sabha witnessed an 11-hour long discussion on the country’s COVID-19 situation that continued past midnight amid Omicron variant concerns.
The minister also said that the government will decide when to start vaccination for children and a booster dose based on the advice from expert committees and scientists.
Mandaviya appealed to the Opposition leaders to take note of the Centre's honest efforts. "This is not a subject of politics," he said
Instead of blaming previous regimes that ignored health infrastructure, Mandaviya said in his 90-minute speech that the Narendra Modi-led government undertook work to strengthen the infrastructure.
“The government worked for results. In the last two years, decisions under the leadership of PM Modi show that this government works with will power and not power,” the minister said.
Mandaviya also cited a meeting held well before the first case of COVID-19 was reported in India to show how the Centre was well-prepared before the outbreak of the pandemic.
“The first COVID-19 case in India was reported on January 13, 2020, in Kerala. But the first meeting of the joint monitoring committee constituted by the Centre was held on January 8. It means we were alert, a committee had been formed before the case was reported and it had started working,” he added.
The minister said as many as 19 states responded to the Centre’s query on deaths related to the shortage of oxygen during the second wave and only Punjab replied saying four deaths were being investigated.
No deaths due to lack of oxygen were specifically reported by states and UTs during the second COVID-19 wave, the government informed the Rajya Sabha during the Monsoon Session.
