‘Medicine From The Sky’: Telangana launches delivery of medicines and vaccines by drones
The project is an initiative of NITI Aayog, Apollo Hospitals, and the World Economic Forum, which will be expanded across the nation if successful.
Civil aviation minister Jyotiradtiya Scindia and Telangana IT Minister on Saturday launched “a first of its kind” Medicine From the Sky project aimed at transporting vaccines and other essential products to remote areas using drones.
Eight consortia are a part of the project, out of which three – Hepicopter, comprising Marut Drones and Public Health Foundation of India, Blue Dart Med Express, comprising Blue Dart and Skye Air, and Curis Fly, comprising TechEagle, launched their drones on Saturday.
The Medicine From the Sky project will be taken up on a pilot basis in 16 green zones in Telangana and later scaled up on the national level based on data, Scindia said.
The Medicine From the Sky project is an initiative of Telangana in partnership with the World Economic Forum, NITI Aayog, and HealthNet Global of the Apollo Hospitals.
“In India, a significant number of the primary health centres and sub centres are in rural, remote, and hard to reach areas, making Covid-19 vaccination operationally challenging. Beyond the immediate Covid-19-induced scenario, there are several primary health centres and sub-centres in hilly, forest or river areas of several States that are usually cut off from road connections for several months in a year due to heavy rains, landslides and very inclement weather like fog and snow. Hepicopter drones is built to address these challenges, Prem Kumar Vislawath, founder,” Marut Dronetech said.
Speaking on the occasion, Information Technology Minister K.T. Ramarao said that the project is an exciting intersection of technology and healthcare and the State has been at the forefront of using emerging technologies.
The WEF has commissioned an industry core group comprising the Governemnt of Telangana, PHFI, and NITI Aayog to look into aspects of mobilising capital for the drone ecosystem, with an emphasis on medical drone ecosystem. The other aspect would be to identify distressed last miles in the country where drone intervention is required.
