The Covid pandemic for all the havoc it caused and tragedies which ensued forced our tiny state to upgrade its health infrastructure. The sarkar which was procrastinating over the South Goa district hospital for close to 9 years was forced to speedily commission it, thanks to the pandemic. Also 9 PSA oxygen plants were set up over the past 14 months reducing hospitals' dependency on purchasing oxygen cylinders. Due to the pandemic, critical care facilities were upgraded and a lot of life saving equipment like ventilators, multimonitors, syringe pumps and ECMO machines were procured quickly. Also RT- PCR labs were set up in several tier 2 towns like Mapusa, Ponda and Chicalim besides Margao, enhancing early detection of Covid besides various other diseases like leptospirosis, dengue, TB, cervical cancer etc. A genome sequencing lab was put up in Mapusa in record time thus nullifying dependence on other States. This pandemic brought about a paradigm shift in the relations and co-ordination between the Directorate of Health services and Goa Medical College. Also the general populace realized that health is the only true wealth we have, everything else is secondary.
