Bio-terrorism? Public health Bill 'ignores' pollution, malnutrition, people's insecurities

Counterview Desk 
Protesting against the proposed Public Health Bill, Gujarat-based physician-activist Dr Maya Valecha, who heads a civil rights group seeking nationalisation or socialisation of healthcare, Jan Andolan, has insisted on the need for “social management of healthcare services and pharmaceutical companies under public ownership.”
In a statement seeking support on her phone number 7016002688 on messaging services, Dr Valecha said, the Bill should not be allowed to be passed as it could enslave us, underlining, “The New Public Health Bill to be tabled in monsoon session is not for our health or welfare”, adding, it is people who should decided what they for the healthcare sector, not the World Health Organisation (WHO).

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The new Bill is all about virus and bio-terrorism. However, health issues in our country are related to malnutrition, pollution, economic and social insecurities. Nothing is being thought of, done for that, nor enough budget is being allocated to correct these issues.
But to implement the measures suggested by WHO, an entity funded primarily by pharmaceutical companies, a Bill is being drafted that can violate our bodily integrity, put an end to our freedom, and recourse to the judicial process is also being curbed.
What we gather from media is that this Bill will be the bill brought in 2017 plus lockdown will be defined in more detail.
The Bill of 2017 has many tyrannical provisions. If any infection is merely suspected, entry into your home or office, doing testing on anyone, medicating anyone, vaccinating anyone, closing down markets and schools, sealing buildings and destroying, disinfecting or killing your pets or animals can all be done.
It is not just when a disease has spread but when a disease or infection is simply suspected then also any or all of these actions could be taken. There is no mention that when WHO declares a pandemic, our country’s health experts would be consulted for final decision. Our experts in fact had said No to total lockdown of our country during the covid episode.
It is clear that lockdowns, masks, social distancing do not stop the virus spread. And still, they want to have it in a Law, to keep bringing such measures repeatedly.
Hence, we have sent a letter with thousands of signatures, where doctors, lawyers and social workers have signed and sent it to the Prime Minister, Health Minister, Chief Justice of India, the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Health and Family Welfare.
We have asked that…

1. Before any Law is passed there should be a wide-spread public debate among people and there should also be a citizen’s referendum.
2. Other than allopathy we have many indigenous treatments in our country, such as ayurved, homeopathy, siddha, unani and all these deserve equal importance. They should be made available in all government hospitals and be used in pandemics as well.
3. The existence of a pandemic in our country will not be declared by WHO. That would be decided by our local medical experts and our public opinion after studying symptoms and number of those infected, deaths here in the country.
4. Unreliable tests such as the rt-PCR that has not been even fully approved, will not be forced onto the people.
5. No medicine, injection or vaccine can be made compulsory for anyone, anywhere.
6. Lockdowns will never be used as it has absolutely no benefit and has created extensive damage to socio-economic wellbeing.
7. There will not be any Treaty with WHO as it is proved by now that it is funded by Private Pharmaceutical Companies and their allies and therefore works as per their direction.

These days the government is passing Bills without any discussion with the public or even in parliament. Hence, we need to spread this awareness in advance, build a public opinion and warn the government that neither we will allow such a Bill to be passed nor will we allow any Treaty or agreement with WHO. Instead, our country’s health care system and drug companies will be taken away from private ownership, brought under social ownership and will be under the direct management of people with participatory democracy.

During the corona time and before too, it has been observed that there have been widespread instances of open scamming and looting by private hospitals and pharmaceutical companies. To come out of this problem permanently, we need nationalisation/ socialisation of healthcare system and drug companies under the direct democratic control of people.
Free healthcare services of the highest quality is our basic right.
It is not possible with private ownership existing parallelly. Hence, we need to build a wide-spread opinion and movement.
After socialization, government will have to tax super-rich with inheritance tax and wealth tax to provide enough funding for healthcare services. However, the full management of hospitals and pharmaceutical companies will be by public committees that will be answerable to the public meetings on a monthly basis.
We need to bring our life in our own control. A lot of hard work needs to be done in the right direction, the only way to prevent the total enslavement of future generations.