However, I am not aware if these draft reports have been internalised by the department of health,” Rajeeva Ratna Shah, member-secretary, Planning Commission said on Friday.
Shah, who was earlier the secretary in the Department of Information Technology and shifted to the Planning Commission, has been pressing for uniform standards in telemedicine and health information infrastructure.
“A whole lot of telemedicine projects have been undertaken in the country by various agencies including the Department of Space and Private Companies. However, these were scattered and based on different software protocols. A standard would help different systems to talk to each other. An overarching network is of importance,” he said. Shah who refused to be drawn into any controversy over the subject felt that the communication gap between the two domains (health and IT) could have led to the delay. He was confident that these standards would come in place by the end of the 11th plan. Shah was attending the seventh annual Baramati Initiative on ICT and Development at Baramati.
“The 11th plan has major provisions for e-health and e-education and will look at societal applications. New platforms would be rolled out as part of this plan. The creation of the backbone for the National Knowledge Network, ICT for schools where around 28,000 schools would get connectivity over 14 transponders for education over a five year span are just some of the initiatives,” he said. Shah felt that the growth of telemedicine would depend on availability of bandwidth, time sharing protocols and business models.
“An overarching architecture is yet to evolve. However, all the ministries have mandates, that of the total spend, at least 2-3% would be on ICT applications,” he said.
Shah said that the approach paper for the 11th Plan had been released a couple of months ago and allotments for mission mode critical projects such as JNNURM would begin from April 1. However, it will take six months for the plan to be in place.
Quelle/Source: The Financial Express, 17.03.2007
