In the area of intellectual property, public health and access to medicines, the Narendra Modi government should consider its independence to be of the utmost importance.

A study published just before Christmas in the Clinical Infectious Diseases Journal on "totally-drug-resistant-tuberculosis" in India led to several news reports on multidrug-resistant TB (MDR-TB) but also extensively drug-resistant tuberculosis (XDR-TB) in different states. The government in response has decided to enforce an old public health law under which TB is a notifiable disease.