Tamil Nadu: Dr. J A Jayalal Elected as IMA National President

Dr. J A Jayalal, the associate professor of surgery at Tirunelveli Medical College, has been elected as the new National President of the Indian Medical Association (IMA) on Friday. The doctor is a government medical practitioner from the Kanyakumari district of Tamil Nadu with a great reputation. Dr. Jayalal will be taking charge of the post from the current President of IMA, Dr. Ranjan Ranjan, on December 27th.

Dr. Jayalal has also served as State Hon. General Secretary for IMA in Tamil Nadu state, and further as the National Coordinator for the Academic Wings of IMA. He pursued his MBBS from Govt. Medical College Tirunelveli. He pursued his DLS from Germany and FRCS from the Royal College of Surgeons.

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Talking to the media, the doctor said, "IMA believes each system is unique, each system is important. IMA will be concentrating on maintaining the purity and sanctity of modern medication as well as the traditional strains. Allopathy and Ayurveda both have their own sanctity and should not be mixed while treating a patient." Modern and traditional types of medications should be used individually.

He has also said that IMA will be concentrating on the issue of the recent attacks on healthcare workers. He added that some of the states of the country have already adopted the Healthcare Professional Protection Act to ensure security to healthcare workers. IMA will take initiative to adopt a system nation-wide to stop violence against doctors.

He also shared that making laws against attacks on health workers is as important as giving them recognition, as many of them are working amidst COVID-19 without caring for their lives. He stated that "we have lost more than 600 doctors all over the country. This is high time that healthcare workers should get legitimate recognition and compensation from the worker, for their constant services under the great threat of infection."

He further added that the budget allocation for health is not at par with the population, hence the government must take note of that. IMA will urge the government to initiate an improvement in the infrastructure of health care in the country. "The infrastructure does not only include the hospital facilities and sufficient availability of workforce, but it also refers to sanitization, air pollution which must be addressed by the government. There should be a holistic approach," said the doctor.

Moreover, IMA will also try to see that the Ayushman Bharat Insurance scheme can be adopted in health facilities to provide health care benefits to the poor as it will need the active participation of the healthcare facilities for the development of the scheme. However, Dr. Jayalal stated that it is important to consider the possibility of applying the scheme to provide affordable and accessible health care benefits to the poor, but it must not be imposed and should be practically viable also.

The Indian Medical Association is a professional body of doctors which has lakhs of doctors from several states and union territories of India as members.