Digital Initiatives to Fight Coronavirus

• 27 Mar 2020

Why in News

Recently, the Government has developed a platform which will host webinars by All India Institutes of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) doctors for healthcare workers across the country.

• It has also developed an app that will trace the paths of COVID-19 positive patients, serving as a warning to possible contacts.

Key Points

• Chat Boxes on Facebook and WhatsApp have been set up by the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) for providing information about COVID-19.
• A portal to map the requirements of hospitals, and cross-referencing them with those who have offered to help with equipment is also being set up by the government.
• A webinar platform has been developed in tandem with the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare.
  
  • The webinars are for the frontline health workers (nurses, paramedics, ASHA- Accredited Social Health Activist workers, anganwadi workers), who are more prone to COVID-19.
  • The webinars would be streamed on Facebook, YouTube and WhatsApp.
  • The state governments would also be involved so as to make the content available in regional languages.
• The government has also worked on a contact path tracing app, tentatively called ‘Corona Kavach’.
  
  • The app would store location data and would enter the credentials of the person if he/she tests positive. This information would be sent to the cloud.
  • A signal would come to the app which would convert it from green to red.
  • The server would then find out people who were in close proximity with the infected person in the last 14 days.
  • Their apps would turn yellow and they would get an alert that they should quarantine themselves.

All India Institutes of Medical Sciences

• The AIIMS was created in 1956, as an autonomous institution of national importance through an Act of Parliament.
• Objectives
  
  • To develop a pattern of teaching in undergraduate and postgraduate medical education in all its branches so as to demonstrate high standard of medical education to all medical colleges and other allied institutions in India.
  • To bring together in one place educational facilities of the highest order for the training of the personnel in all important branches of the health activity.
  • To attain self sufficiency in postgraduate in medical education.
• Recently, the central government has decided to set up 22 new establishments of AIIMS. These AIIMS would be set up under the Pradhan Mantri Swasthya Suraksha Yojana.

Pradhan Mantri Swasthya Suraksha Yojana

• PMSSY is a Central Sector Scheme.
• The primary objective of PMSSY is to correct the regional imbalances in availability of affordable/reliable tertiary level healthcare in the country in general, and, to augment facilities for quality medical education in under-served or backward States, in particular.
• In addition to setting up of AIIMS, PMSSY also envisages up-gradation of several existing Government Medical Colleges/Institutions in different states in the country

Source: IE