Union government is working on a plan to strengthen diagnostic infrastructure with the setting up of laboratories in each of the 160 medical colleges in the country. While 120 labs are already functional, 40 more are approved and these are in the process of getting established and soon commissioned , said Dr VM Katoch, Secretary, Department of Health Research and director general Indian Council of Medical Research.

The 160 labs will now ensure early detection of infectious diseases and enable pathologists to identify the virus/bacteria allowing physicians to administer the right drug, thus preventing multi drug resistance(MDR) in the patient population, he added.

“India now needs to create its own research data on containing drug resistance. Healthcare providers will now need to network with the National Centre for Disease Control to research on the epidemiology of communicable diseases. There are ample government grants spanning from CSIR, Department of Biotechnology and ICMR among others which should help kick off interdisciplinary research projects to come up with evidence-based practices to contain gram negative infections. There are over 15 institutions engaged in research of fatal infections which could be prevented and better managed. We now need to consolidate the action, said Dr Katoch in his key note address on India’s response to multi drug resistance at the 4th Annual Conference of The Clinical Infectious Disease Society in Bengaluru.

The country has been able to contain epidemics but the management of infectious diseases has been chaotic. “However, in the last few months, we have a seen a growing awareness among the physicians to see that they are able to tackle the infectious diseases early because the ground realities are different. The medical experts are looking for affordable, acceptable and optimal easy-to-handle systems to control infections and prevent MDR”, he noted.

Pandemic of H1N1 in 2009 has been brought under control which proves Indian physician capability in alleviating viral infection. A network of labs supported the recovery from this flu strain proving that faster detection had led to early therapy administration. Therefore these 160 labs across medical colleges in the nook and corner of the country would further fortify expertise. While the country is reporting near eradication of leprosy, the concern is now on the increasing incidence of tuberculosis reporting a 12-15 per cent rise in MDR annually. This is where physicians need to be a part of scene to ensure patients sustain the drug regime, he said.

The prevalence of naturally resistant bacteria in the environment was a global phenomenon. The critical components to keep infections at bay is to ensure adequate sanitation. Therefore, the Union government is on the right track insisting to tackle the appalling sanitation and call to implement good hygienic practices. This will see the existing departments of hospital infection across healthcare space to work to control fatalities from MDR, said Dr. Katoch.