By IANS
Kushinagar (Uttar Pradesh) : President A.P.J. Abdul Kalam Wednesday emphasised the urgency of making modern medicines available to the people of the country.
Kalam who was on a day’s visit to Uttar Pradesh to attend a function marking the 2,550th anniversary of Lord Buddha attaining nirvana in Kushinagar, inaugurated the Wat Thai poly medical clinic run by Buddhist monks from Thailand.
Emphasising the importance of health care, he said the two major issues were augmenting primary healthcare system and the use of advanced technology to improve healthcare in the country.
“These two efforts will make modern medicine available and accessible to all the citizens of the country,” Kalam said.
With the growing threat of HIV/AIDS in the country, the president said, “there was need for creative leaders to eradicate leprosy, tuberculosis, polio, cardio-vascular diseases, HIV/AIDS apart from physical resources.”
Addressing Buddhist monks from Thailand, he said there was a need to work towards “building an inclusive society in a world free of violence, terror, war and fear” to recapture in the modern context “the holistic traditions of knowledge creation, acquisition and dissemination as practiced in ancient Nalanda.”