AP leads fight on infections

Vijayawada(NTR district): Health & Family Welfare Commissioner J Nivas informed that Andhra Pradesh is the first State in India to initiate a pilot project on assessment and training of Infection Prevention and Control (IPC) practices. He said that 540 clinicians, OT technicians and nurses were trained till date from all the teaching and district hospitals under the Centers for United Nations disease control and prevention (US-CDC), NCDC and Share India.

In a press release on Wednesday, the Commissioner said that this was a huge effort from the AP government for the action against Antimicrobial Resistance (AMR). He also said that AMR was a global health threat and a priority for G-20. Andhra Pradesh became 4th State in India to come up with a State action plan against AMR in November 2022, he said. A global workshop was conducted with the support from a consortium formed by Federation of Asian biotech association (FABA), Infection control academy of India (ICFAI) where the participants of the course were microbiologists and clinicians/surgeons, who came from government medical colleges across the state. The main aim of this workshop is to sensitise the participants on appropriate sample collection, identification of isolates, he stated.

Nivas said that during the meeting they were suggested that they must strengthen the laboratories for better microbiological services.