Narendra Modi stresses on holistic, preventive healthcare

Chandigarh: Emphasising the need for holistic and preventive healthcare, Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday said that time has come to think about wellness rather than illness.

"The time has passed for (only) addressing (the issue of) illness, (rather) time has come to address wellness. We will have to move ahead with a comprehensive thought, in which we should address wellness and well-being and not only illness," he said.

Modi was addressing students at the 34th convocation of the Post Graduate Institute of Medical Education and Research (PGIMER) here.

The Prime Minister said that there was consciousness among the people about holistic and preventive healthcare.

The world is asking for something more from medical science, he said, noting, "It has begun to think about good health than depending on (the use of) medicines."

"There is a big change coming in the society as it wants freedom from medicines. A person does not want side effects (of medicines), he wants to prevent himself from illness," he said.

Modi said that practicising yoga was a step towards the preventive and holistic healthcare and wellness. The policies and strategies of the health sector are being made keeping in mind such issues, he said.

The Prime Minister also asked doctors to accept their responsibility towards the society which has a role in helping them to become specialists.

"I want to tell you that today you are accepting a big responsibility of your life. You are associated with such a field where you not only decide about your life but also take

a decision of accepting the responsibility of the society," Modi said at the convocation.

"Whenever you face any problem in taking any decision in your life then you think for a while about the poor who have played a role in your life that whether you are doing right or wrong. Then decision will follow automatically and if such kind of decision-making process remains, the country will never face problems," he said.

Modi told the students that the poor and downtrodden sections of the society have played role in achieving their aim to become doctors.

"Today, there will be many people among you who will be having their visas ready or some may have filed visa applications. But this is our country. Today, whatever we are today is because something must have been come from the poor and then given to us and then we have reached this stage.

"Whatever decision you take in your life, you must think about whether that decision was in the interest of poor. In making you a doctor, the ward boy also had a role, the tea seller, who served you tea late at night, also had a role," he said.

Modi, who is visiting Chandigarh city for the first time after becoming the Prime Minister, gave away gold medals to doctors who completed their post-graduate degrees at PGIMER.