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An ICMR study under its i-DRONE initiative found that drone-assisted transport of tuberculosis sputum samples cut the median diagnosis turnaround time from 15 days to 5 days.
Mean out-of-pocket expenditure for patients fell from about Rs 9,451 to Rs 91, a reduction of more than 99 per cent.
The study was conducted in Yadadri-Bhuvanagiri district of Telangana in collaboration with AIIMS Bibinagar and the National TB Elimination Programme.
ICMR's budget allocation has risen from Rs 2,732.13 crore in Budget Estimates 2024-25 to Rs 4,000 crore in Budget Estimates 2026-27, about 21 per cent above the revised estimates for 2025-26.
The Government has announced the Biopharma SHAKTI scheme with an outlay of Rs 10,000 crore over five years to build a domestic ecosystem for biologics and biosimilars.
Tuberculosis is diagnosed by testing sputum, and the test has to be done at a district TB unit or laboratory rather than at the primary health centre where the sample is collected. In remote terrain that journey is the bottleneck. Every day the sample spends in transit is a day the patient remains untreated and potentially infectious, and if the patient has to make the trip themselves, the cost of travel and lost wages is what the study measured as out-of-pocket expenditure — about Rs 9,451 on average. Flying the sample instead of moving the patient attacks both problems at once: the median turnaround fell from 15 days to 5, and the patient's own cost fell to Rs 91. The public health significance is larger than the convenience: shortening the interval between symptom and treatment start is one of the few interventions that reduces onward transmission as well as improving the individual outcome, because an untreated infectious case keeps transmitting for the whole of that delay.
Simple Analogy: The test was never the slow part; the road was. The drone replaces the road.
Test and scale drone-based delivery of medical supplies and samples in hard-to-reach areas
Key: Launched by ICMR in 2021 as the Drone Response and Outreach for North East, beginning in Manipur and Nagaland and later extended to Himachal Pradesh, Telangana and Karnataka across different terrain and clinical use cases
Match funding to the scale, maturity, risk and translational stage of a research proposal
Key: ANVESHAN grants up to Rs 2 crore, NISCHAYAK ANVESHAN grants of Rs 2 to 8 crore, the First-in-the-World Challenge with stage-linked support up to Rs 8 crore, and Centres for Advanced Research up to Rs 15 crore, with follow-on grants to carry forward leads from initial awards
Raise the research standing of India's leading medical institutions and improve medical education
Key: The first targets the top ten NIRF-ranked medical institutions; the second, run jointly with the National Medical Commission, opens to the top 100 NIRF-ranked institutions for research on competency-based education, digital learning and assessment reforms
Accelerate innovation in medical technology and reduce reliance on high-cost imports
Key: The Mission for Advancement in High-Impact Areas - Medical Technology, launched by the Anusandhan National Research Foundation in collaboration with ICMR and the Gates Foundation
Build a globally competitive domestic ecosystem for biologics and biosimilars
Key: Outlay of Rs 10,000 crore over five years, supporting research and development, clinical trial infrastructure and academia-industry collaboration, with a stated long-term goal extending to AI-designed biologics, advanced therapies and precision medicine
Fill specific gaps in clinical research and care delivery
Key: A Clinical Care Excellence Initiative running multi-centre trials on non-communicable diseases, a Centre for Advanced Research call for priority medical devices, strengthening of intramural research in three Central Government medical colleges in Delhi, and a multistate implementation research study on scalable palliative care
India's apex body for the formulation, coordination and promotion of biomedical research; runs i-DRONE and the grant architecture described above
Collaborating institution for the Telangana drone study on TB sputum transport
The national programme through which TB diagnosis and treatment services are delivered, and a partner in the i-DRONE study
Launched the MAHA-MedTech mission in collaboration with ICMR and the Gates Foundation to accelerate medical technology innovation
Health-sample logistics joins agriculture spraying and land survey as a mainstream civilian use case for drones in India, each depending on beyond-visual-line-of-sight permissions
The fall from Rs 9,451 to Rs 91 per patient is a micro-level illustration of the same national trend recorded in the National Health Accounts
MAHA-MedTech, the priority device list of about 100 unmet clinical needs and Biopharma SHAKTI all target reduced dependence on high-cost imported technology
The tiered ANVESHAN structure and follow-on grants mirror the wider shift towards stage-linked, translational research funding under the ANRF framework
GS Paper 3 > Science and Technology > Health, Biotechnology and Emerging Technologies
General Awareness > Science and Technology Current Affairs
General Awareness > Science and Technology
Consider the following activities: 1. Spraying pesticides on a crop field 2. Inspecting the craters of active volcanoes 3. Collecting breath samples from spouting whales for DNA analysis At the present level of technology, which of the above activities can be successfully carried out by using drones?
Answer: 1, 2 and 3
ICMR initiatives, drone applications and health research funding recur in Prelims science and technology questions
ICMR's Drone Response and Outreach for North East, launched in 2021 and since extended to other states and use cases
The interval between sample collection and the diagnostic result reaching the patient — reduced here from a median of 15 days to 5
ICMR's small research grants of up to Rs 2 crore, with NISCHAYAK ANVESHAN covering Rs 2 to 8 crore
The Rs 10,000 crore, five-year scheme to build a domestic ecosystem for biologics and biosimilars
Mission for Advancement in High-Impact Areas - Medical Technology, launched by ANRF with ICMR and the Gates Foundation