Union Minister for Health and Family Welfare, Ghulam Nabi Azad has said that vaccines and drugs manufactured in India have had a far reaching impact not only on improving global access to life saving interventions but also on dramatically reducing the costs by making high quality drugs and vaccines highly affordable. Two out of every three children in the world receive an Indian vaccine in the case of measles and DTP, he said.

He co-convened the Child Survival Call to Action Forum along with Hillary Clinton, US Secretary of State, in the US and addressed the meeting along with Hillary Clinton and Health Minister of Ethiopia, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus. The forum aims to raise global awareness of child survival challenges, celebrate the 70 per cent reduction in child mortality over the past half-century and establish a global roadmap to end preventable child deaths in a generation.

Azad said that meningococcal vaccine produced in India has saved many lives in Africa at an un-believable cost of a mere 50 cents. In many poor and middle and income countries, anti HIV drugs supplied by India have transformed the quality of lives of millions of people living with HIV/AIDS, he stated. While, women and children facing the scourge of TB from across the globe have benefited greatly by anti TB drugs made in India.