UN Honours Kerala Health Min KK Shailaja Among Other World Leaders For Fight Against COVID-19

While the opposition in Kerala may call her 'Nipah princess,' and 'COVID queen' and mock her work as just PR exercise, the world has taken note of state Health Minister KK Shailaja's efforts in containing the spread of COVID-19 pandemic.

And on Tuesday, when the United Nations marked Public Service Day on June 23, to honour those working on the frontlines during the COVID-19 pandemic, the former science teacher-turned politician was one of the world leaders who were honoured by the world body for their attempts to curb the spread of the deadly virus.

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The function, held on a virtual platform, saw the participation of UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres, President of the General Assembly Tijjani Muhammad-Bande; Minister of Interior and Safety, Republic of Korea Chin Young, Director General, World Health Organization Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus; President of Ethiopia Sahle-Work Zewde and senior officers of the UN.

In the webinar streamed on UN Web TV, Shailaja was introduced by the moderator, Odette Ramsingh, who is executive director of Sefako Makgatho Health Sciences University, as ¡®Corona slayer¡¯ a term made famous by The Guardian newspaper.

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She also hailed Shailaja for low mortality rates in the state due to early intervention. Shailaja who was the lone speaker from India shared her views and also spoke about how spoke about how the experience in containing Nipah outbreak in 2018 and floods helped the state prepare and fight COVID-19 at the beginning itself.

"Right from the time when Covid cases got reported in Wuhan, Kerala got into the track of the WHO and followed every standard operating protocols and international norms and hence, we have been able to keep the contact spread rate to below 12.5 per cent and the mortality rate to 0.6 per cent," she said.

Explaining the strategy adopted by Kerala, Shailaja said the focus was set on minimising the spread and mortality. She said the three strategies adopted were - ¡°Trace, Quarantine, Test, Isolate and Treat¡±, ¡°Break the Chain¡± and ¡°Reverse Quarantine.¡±

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The Health Minister concluded by stating that the government¡¯s four-pronged strategy proved to be effective.

¡°Even after 142 days of the pandemic, over 6.5 lakh people kept under surveillance and tracing and isolating thousands of imported cases. Kerala¡¯s local spread is still below 12.5 percent, R0 below 0.25 percent, case fatality rate below 0.6 percent and test positive rate (percentage of people tested turning positive for the virus) below two percent,¡± she added.