The Union Health Minister Mansukh Mandaviya praised the government’s response on Friday for “adopting a holistic response approach” that helped the nation manage Covid-19 successfully. A working paper titled “Healing the Economy: Estimating Economic Impact of Vaccination & Related Measures” by Stanford University and the Institute for Competitiveness was released, Union Minister highlighted the economic impact connected with people’s welfare during the Covid crisis as one of several important factors. Mandaviya highlighted numerous public welfare initiatives and their financial effects, stating that the government would need to spend a total of US$100.26 billion (4.90% of GDP) to support 10.28 million MSMEs.
Mandaviya continued whilst also mentioning PMGKAY, a programme that provided free food grains to 800 million people and had an estimated US$26.24 billion in economic benefit. The comment by Mandaviya was made while he was virtually delivering the keynote talk at the Standford “The India Dialogue” on the financial effects of vaccination
and related topics.
“Under PM Garib Kalyan Rozgar Abhiyan, 4 million beneficiaries were provided employment which resulted in an overall economic impact of US$ 4.81
billion,” he added.
The Minister noted that India was able to save more than 3.4 million lives by undertaking the nationwide Covid-19 vaccination campaign at an
unprecedented scale.
He further remarked, “India adopted a ‘Whole of Government’ and ‘Whole of Society’ approach, in a proactive, preemptive & graded manner; thus, adopting a holistic response strategy, for effective
management of Covid-19.”
Describing the pandemic’s financial effects, the analysis from Stanford University also said that the Covid-19 vaccination campaign had a positive economic impact by averting a loss of US$ 18.3 billion. In addition, after deducting the cost of the immunization effort, the nation had a net benefit of
US$ 15.42 billion.