New Delhi , June 7. Delivering the keynote address, as chief guest, at a seminar on “Safe Food Today for a Healthy Tomorrow” organized by the PHD Chamber of Commerce & Industry on the occasion of the World Food Safety Day 2021, Dr Jitendra Singh said, the concept of management of diseases, particularly infectious diseases through immunity boosting modalities has been an inherent part of medical management in India, especially before the arrival of antibiotics and antimicrobials , which came to be known to medical practitioners only when the first antibiotic, namely Penicillin, became available in the late 1940s. In a country like India, he said,
Tuberculosis was rampant in the first half of the 20th century and before Streptomycin and other anti-tuberculosis drugs became available in early 1950s, the mainstay of treatment of tuberculosis was Sanatorium management, which included a clear, healthy open and airy environment, hygienic conditions, healthy diet, all of which were aimed at increasing the resistance of the body to fight the infection.
Only in the last few decades, Dr Jitendra Singh said, when the non-communicable and metabolic diseases took over, the focus on the treatment of infections, both through pharmacological and non-pharmacological regimens, got diluted, but it has been revived with the arrival of the unprecedented pandemic of COVID, which has swept the whole world. Even though COVID has created more awareness and curiosity to understand the principles of diet, he said, a peculiar feature in the oriental society is that food and food habits have never been a priority and upon this, several myths have also been prevalent from time to time.
Union Minister Dr. Jitendra Singh, who is also a former Professor of Diabetes and Medicine besides being the Life Patron of the coveted RSSDI (Research Society for Study of Diabetes in India), said today that Natural Immunity boosters are more effective than pharmacological ones.
Citing a number of studies published in leading medical journals of the world over the last two decades, he said, even though vitamin and immunity booster tablets are prescribed in allopathy but by and large the inference is that though it may be appropriate to prescribe vitamin supplements and anti-oxidant tablets or capsules to the patient, the natural source vitamins and the natural source antioxidants could be more reliable and effective.
