COVID-19: Pandemic Management Becomes Part Of MBBS Course

Medical students will now learn about pandemic management along with its social, legal and other aspects in the MBBS course.

According to PTI, India’s apex medical education regulator is introducing a new module to better prepare doctors for challenges posed by pandemics like COVID-19. It is expected that the pandemic management module extending from foundation course to the final year undergraduate programme will help in ensuring the creation of an Indian medical graduate “who will serve humanity as doctor, leader and healer in bleak times such as occurrence of a pandemic”, the board of governors (BoG) in supersession of the Medical Council of India (MCI) said.

While the move has been triggered by the coronavirus pandemic and aims to prepare doctors for challenges posed by emerging diseases, the document containing details of the module to be adopted by colleges has been put together by a team of experts and the academic cell of the MCI.

“This pandemic management module is designed to ensure that MBBS students acquires competencies in handling not only the illness but also the social, legal and other issues arising from such disease outbreaks. The emergence of COVID-19 and its rapid spread across the globe has further underlined the need to develop these skills in our graduates,” Dr V K Paul, the chairman of the BoG said in the foreword.