The Madras High Court on Monday marked that both Tamil Nadu State and Puducherry, Union Territory are presumed to be shouting out for the necessary supply of drugs and vaccines, keeping in view the own-motion petition regarding the regulation of COVID-19 response.
A division of Bench of Chief Justice Sanjib Banerjee and Justice Senthilkumar Ramamoorthy marked that, as per the experts’ suggestions, a third wave of the deadly COVID-19 may be approaching anytime soon and also it is much important to get prepared yourselves accordingly and not necessarily the resources being put to use as a substitute than being not prepared and also regret later for not having gathered additional and required resources then.
The Bench additionally mentioned that the Hon’ble Supreme Court has constituted a National Task Force to:
- Evaluate and make guidance for dissemination of medical oxygen for the whole country.
- Analyze and advise measures necessary for ensuring the availability of essential drugs and medicines.
- Aim and embrace remedial measures to meet future emergencies arising during the pandemic.
- Advice measures to increase the availability of personnel and facilitate the sharing of best practices and make recommendations in regard to other issues to find an effective response to the pandemic.
Oxygen Supply
Concerning the oxygen supply, the Court accounted that the State and the Centre should find ways of effective supply to the south-western region of the State since supply from Sriperumbudur or elsewhere in the north or central Tamil Nadu may be logistically difficult to reach the south-western part of the State.
Vaccines and Drugs
The Hon’ble Court observed that in Tamil Nadu, the vaccination for persons below the age of 45 has not been feasible because of the lack of the number of doses and that Remdesivir was to be in short supply in both the State and the Union Territory.
The moto of the entire exercise is to get prepared for the worst possible scenario and expect that the worst won’t hit them.
In conclusion, the Additional Solicitor-General implicated to take up the case of both the State and the Union Territory with the Centre, at least till such time that the National Task Force set up by the Supreme Court order gets down to the nitty-gritty of allocation and the like.
The further hearing of the matter has been posted on May 12.
