"We Set Up Everything From The Scratch": Health Minister On India's Covid Response

Union Health Minister Mansukh Mandaviya expressed pride in India's service to the world amid the Covid crisis.

The government put up a strong defence of its handling of the Covid pandemic saying that despite hurdles, the country had tackled the crisis at home and also helped the world. Acknowledging the large number of fatalities, Union Health Minister Mansukh Mandaviya, however, said the deaths must not be blamed on any one person. "We have worked for all Indians to ensure that the pandemic is dealt with. We have done no politics in this," Mr Mandaviya told the Council of States. "When there's need to work together and implementation has to be done by the states, at that time we never said 'this state failed' or 'that state didn't do this'. I don't want to do politics, but many states have 10-15 lakh doses of vaccines with them. I have data," he said. He said India did not have a single laboratory to test Covid at the beginning of the pandemic. Neither did the country have the capacity to manufacture PPE kits. The necessary facilities were built up only subsequently, he said, justifying the months-long lockdown imposed on the country.