Mumbai: This year around, the theme of the World Health Day, observed on April 7 every year, is Universal Health Coverage: Everyone, Everywhere. Incidentally, India is already working to achieve the aim through its National Health Policy 2017, which has its goal fully-aligned with the concept of the Universal Health Coverage while advocating integration of Ayush (traditional system of medicine such as ayurveda) in the public health system to tackle chronic diseases particularly the non-communicable diseases (NCDs) like diabetes.
As part of the government’s Ayush intervention in the public health, scientifically-validated herbal drugs such as BGR-34 are being offered to the diabetic patients as curative and preventive health strategy. In fact, BGR-34, an anti-diabetic herbal drug has been jointly developed after standardisation and pre-clinical studies by the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research’s (CSIR) two Lucknow-based labs –Central Institute of Medicinal and Aromatic Plants (CIMAP) and National Botanical Research Institute (NBRI).
According to the WHO, the diabetes affects nearly 42 crore people worldwide with China topping the list. In 2017, China had 11.43 crore people suffering with diabetes followed by India with 7.29 crore. Nearly 9.8 crore people in India may have type 2 diabetes by 2030, according to a study.
