GUWAHATI, Sept 28 - Union Health and Family Welfare Minister JP Nadda today laid the foundation of a state-of-the-art Regional Drugs Testing Laboratory at Sixmile in the city and also inaugurated the AMRIT (Affordable Medicines and Reliable Implants for Treatment) Pharmacy at the Guwahati Medical College Hospital (GMCH) campus.
Nadda also announced that construction work of the proposed All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) at Changsari in Kamrup district would start soon.
The Regional Drug Testing Lab would make the process of testing of drugs more efficient and less time-consuming, and is expected to go a long way in checking the menace of spurious drugs in the region.
The AMRIT Pharmacy � the first such facility in the Northeast � will ensure that patients can avail medicines at hugely discounted prices at the GMCH. Medicines apart, medical implants will also be available at the pharmacy at discounted rates.
Nadda in his address asserted that the Centre was committed to bringing about a sea-change in the health care sector in the State and the Northeast for which several innovative initiatives were being undertaken.
He said that all the six medical colleges and 27 district hospitals would be having AMRIT pharmacies in a phased manner.
Attributing the delay in the setting up of the AIIMS in Assam to the former State Government�s failure to allot a suitable plot of land in time, Nadda said that matters had been sorted out finally and that the project would begin at Changsari soon.
�Setting up of AIIMS, upgrading of GMCH and Assam Medical College and Hospital, Dibrugarh to super-speciality hospitals, and sanctioning of funds to set up four new medical colleges testify our commitment to boost the region�s health care sector. The people will get the best of facilities,� he said.
State Health Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma said the new drugs testing lab has fulfilled a long-pending need of the State and it will ensure quality control of medicines and check supply of spurious medicine that has emerged as a major problem in Assam.
