National Health Mission Director Manoj Jhalani bags prestigious UN award

National Health Mission Director Manoj Jhalani has been conferred the prestigious UN Interagency Task Force Award for his outstanding contribution towards the prevention and control of non-communicable diseases.

Jhalani, an additional secretary in the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, was given the award in recognition of Indian government's efforts in the field of prevention and control of non-communicable diseases (NCDs), according to an official statement.

The award will be conferred on Jhalani during the third high-level meeting of the UN General Assembly on the prevention and control of NCDs in New York on September 27.

India's national programme to control NCDs has been scaled up by more than eight times in the past four years and covers all the 36 states/union territories now, the statement said.

Free diagnosis, treatment, follow-up, referral and back referral have been integrated into the programme with an information technology platform developed through a multi-stakeholder partnership. The intervention also forms the core of the government's ambitious healthcare scheme Ayushman Bharat, it said.

The United Nations Interagency Task Force (UNIATF) on the Prevention and Control of NCDs coordinates the activities of relevant UN organisations and other inter-governmental organisations to support governments to meet high-level commitments to respond to NCD epidemics worldwide. The commitments were made by Heads of State and Government in the 2011 Political Declaration on NCDs.

The task force was established by the UN Secretary-General in June 2013 and placed under the leadership of WHO.