patna health minister mangal pandey on saturday laid the foundation stone for construction of an animal house at igims for the purpose of medical research animal house is mandatory as per the national medical commission guidelines for all medical colleges at igims it will have rats rabbits monkeys wild pigs and those other varieties required by the medical researchers for trial of drugs and their effect on animals genetic makeup describing it as a great initiative pandey said the state government has regularly been working to strengthen the health system in medical colleges to primary health centres and now has moved to promote medical research at igims trial on animals could lead to new findings on drugs and their effects he said the minister also inaugurated two psa oxygen plants there each of 1000 lpm capacity installed under pm cares fund he said these plants would make igims wholly selfdependent for its total oxygen requirement pandey also inaugurated the renovated forensic medicine department and the developed mortuary with deep freezer facility for preservation of ten bodies at a time igims medical superintendent dr manish mandal said the existing mortuary had space for preserving four bodies only and it appeared insufficient in case of larger number of casualties and delay in receiving the bodies by their kin for any reasons the covid waves had witnessed several casualties in a day thus creating problems for the igims administration to preserve the bodies in proper conditions the health minister also inaugurated a line probe assay machine in the microbiology department he said this machine would prove very useful in testing of drug resistant tb samples by revealing the most suitable drug with assured recovery within lesser periods dr mandal said the animal ethical committee has already approved it at igims and veterinary doctors and staff have been recruited for proper upkeep of the animals the genome sequencing lab of the institute would also coordinate in the research work by carrying out investigations on the genome of test animals the minister also inaugurated a storehousecumworkshop for the engineering section of the institute for repair and maintenance of machines furniture and electrical appliances igims director dr nr biswas deputy director dr vp sinha principal dr ranjit guha and others were also present on the occasion