National Centre for Disease Control (NCDC)

Why in news?

• The Union government has rushed a team of National Centre For Disease Control (NCDC) to Kerala to provide technical support to deal Nipha.

National Centre for Disease Control (NCDC):

• The National Centre for Disease Control (previously known as the National Institute of Communicable Diseases) is an institute under the Indian Directorate General of Health Services, Ministry of Health and Family Welfare.
• The institute was established to function as a national centre of excellence for control of communicable diseases.
• It aims to provide expertise to the States and Union Territories (UTs) on rapid health assessment and laboratory based diagnostic services.
• Surveillance of communicable diseases and outbreak investigation also formed an indispensable part of its activities.

Major Functions

• Undertakes investigations of disease outbreaks all over the country.
• Provides referral diagnostic services to individuals, community, medical colleges, research institutions and state health directorates.
  • These include diagnostic and clinical, teaching aids, storage and supply of vaccines and quality control of biological.
• Engaged in generation and dissemination of knowledge in various areas like Epidemiology, Surveillance, and Laboratories etc.
• Applied integrated research in various aspects of communicable as well as some aspects of non-communicable.

PRACTICE QUESTION:

Consider the following statements regarding ‘National Centre for Disease Control (NCDC)’:

1. It mainly focuses on preventing and controlling non-communicable diseases.

2. It provides referral diagnostic services to individuals, medical colleges, research institutions and state health directorates.

Which of the statements given above is/are correct?

(a) 1 only

(b) 2 only

(c) Both 1 and 2

(d) Neither 1 nor 2

Answer