Dr. BIMAL CHAJJER
Though India is a developing country, yet India has emerged as the best healthcare system across the globe, taking a giant leap ahead of the peer countries. Having an affordable medical cost and the best of emergency care procedures which are at par with International Standards, Indian medical infrastructure has captured the global attention.
Pertaining to the fact that various lifestyle ailments like heart diseases, hypertension, diabetes, obesity, or psychosomatic disorders, accumulate upto 75% of the total healthcare cost in the developed countries. India with its traditional health care systems like Yoga, Naturopathy, Ayurveda, Homeopathy and Unani, have been managing these ailments through lifestyle treatment modalities coupled with low-cost medications.
Science and Art of Living (SAAOL) for the last 30 years has been working on the same platform, by making use of lifestyle changes and has treated over 5 Lakh heart patients and that too with bare minimum cost.
Cardiovascular diseases (CVDs) are the leading cause of death globally. An estimated 17.9 million people died from CVDs in 2019, representing 32% of all global deaths. Of these deaths, 85% were due to heart attack and stroke. Over three-quarters of CVD deaths take place in low- and middle-income countries like India. Out of the 17 million premature deaths (under the age of 70) due to non-communicable diseases in 2019, 38% were caused by CVDs. Most cardiovascular diseases can be prevented by addressing behavioural risk factors such as tobacco use, unhealthy diet and obesity, physical inactivity, and harmful use of alcohol.
It is important to detect cardiovascular conditions as early as possible so that conditions can be managed with counselling, education, and medicines without stepping into risk. Education on the heart, healthy body and how it has been polluted by bad lifestyle is the first thing to get aware of. Once this awareness happens, then it is easy to take a behavioural change using the Edu Vaccine module we have created with very easy to adopt and practice lifestyle alterations based on the Indian mindset.
Under the Punyya Life Foundation SAAOL is targeting to reach 50 Crores of people in India within the next 5 years with their Free Edu Vaccine, which combines free medical check-up camps where a 10-minute education video is shown to educate people about how to keep the heart healthy. This year Punnya is expected to reach over 5 Lakh people with their Free Edu vaccine camps.
It is estimated that the medication cost in India accounts only one-tenth in comparison to that in the USA, and thus the majority of the countries import medicines from India. Known for Yoga, a culture that focuses on physical as well as mental fitness, Indians mostly eat vegetarian food only, and various reports and researches are evident that the incidences of heart ailments are significantly low among vegetarians. Further the Indian doctors have the niche to develop a clinical acumen to handle thousands of patients with minimal equipment, thereby increasing their demand throughout the globe.
(The Author is Founder – SAAOL & Punyya Life Foundation)