India proposes BRICS Consortium to tackle NCDs as flagship programme

Experts deliberated on emerging issues in the various fields of Biotechnology and Biomedicine at the fourth BRICS Working Group meeting on the subject area. BRICS is the acronym coined to associate five major emerging economies: Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa. More than 60 participants, including researchers, academicians, and government officials participated in the online meeting organized on May 25-26, 2021. The members of the working group on Biotechnology and Biomedicine suggested future directions of research collaboration among BRICs countries in the areas such as Antimicrobial Resistance, Artificial Intelligence and Digital Health Medicine, Non-Communicable Diseases (NCDs), Neurological Disorders, Agro-biotechnology, Food and Nutrition, Cancer, long Post-COVID Challenges and Complications including Molecular Pathogenesis of COVID-19 virus. India proposed BRICS Consortium to address Post COVID challenges, tackling NCDs as Flagship Programme whereas Russia proposed Sustainable Agro-biotechnology for Healthy Food & Nutrition, advanced Virtual Reality assisted technology for neurorehabilitation. China proposed Cancer research as a Flagship Programme.