Good Food is First Food. It is not junk food. It is the food that connects nature and nutrition with livelihoods. This food is good for our health; it comes from the rich biodiversity of our regions; it provides employment to people. Most importantly, cooking and eating give us pleasure. …
INVESTMENT in public services has not kept pace with the health needs of India's growing population. This has resulted in the quality of medical services being poor. The dismal performance of government hospitals has encouraged the growth of private medical institutions, but these are profit-motivated and far too many of …
National Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission Janpath Bhawan, 5th floor, :' Wing New Delhi 110 001 Phone: 33117690 H D Shourie Common Cause A-31, West End New Delhi 110 021 Phone: 671666 Association for Consumer Action on Safety and Health Lawyers Chambers, Room No 21 R S Sapre Marg Bombay 400 …
THE PRISTINE woods of the Biligirirangan Hills in Mysore district, a reserved forest, are marred by denudation that has left only a few eucalyptus and silver oak patches on the lower slopes. The destruction by contractors has wrought havoc on the Soliga tribals, who have lived in Biligirirangam for centuries. …
THE SUPREME Court is set to cover new ground in medical litigation when it considers an appeal by doctors contesting their inclusion within the purview of the Consumer Protection Act (COPRA), 1986. Doctors of the Cosmopolitan Hospital in Thiruvananthapuram were charged with medical negligence in September 1989, when G P …
THE EXORBITANT price of the life-saving, anti-coagulant drug, Acetrome, is enough to give heart patients a cardiac arrest. Between January 1991 and January 1993, the price of a strip of 10 4-mg Acetrome tablets jumped 1,000 per cent from Rs 5.80 to Rs 59.50, effectively putting it out of reach …
A REVOLUTION is taking place in medical immunology with the discovery of a method to produce monoclonal antibodies, which offer a powerful and less toxic treatment for diverse diseases, from cancer to rheumatoid arthritis, than most available drugs (British Medical Journal, Vol 340, Nos 6864-6). In the mid-1970s, a group …
COMMUNITY participation can work wonders when it comes to tackling diseases too recalcitrant to be curbed effectively by medical science alone. A fine example of this can be found in the Shertallai region in central Kerala, where the Pondicherry-based Vector Control Research Centre (VCRC) successfully involved the people in an …
SCIENTISTS at Cambridge University's Department of Pathology have found an effective way of treating patients with long-standing rheumatoid arthritis, using "humanised monoclonal antibodies". Produced from animal cells, monoclonal antibodies are designed to order and can kill unwanted cells. Mainly used to treat cancer, these antibodies are now being used to …
THE FIRST all-India household survey of medical care shows some interesting results. The survey, which was conducted in 1990 in 21 states and Union territories and covered 18,000 households, found that in the perception of these households, males tended to fall ill more than females. As the study puts it, …
INDIA has shown commendable achievements in health and nutrition in the past 40 years and C Gopalan, former"director-general of the Indian Council of Medical Research, considers the "most outstanding achievement" to be the virtual banishment of large-scale famine. In a study recently released by the World Health Organisation (WHO), entitled …
MANY southeast Asian countries, including India, have been able to control several nutritional diseases such as kwashiorkor, beriberi and pellagra. Kwashiorkor, a form of malnutrition caused by protein deficiency, is especially prevalent among children. Pellagra, a disease caused by a deficiency of vitamins found in milk, liver and yeast, is …
NEW FORMS of nutritional diseases can appear with environmental change, warns C Gopalan, former ICMR director-general. Increased use of chemical fertilisers with intensive cropping results is steadily depleting the soil of micronutrients such as sulphur, iron, manganese, zinc and cop- per. A majority of soils and crops in Andhra- Pradesh, …
A LOW-COST AIDS test is now being manufactured in India. The test, known as the HIV Dipstick, was developed by the Programme for Appropriate Technology in Health, a US-based, non-profit agency, and does not require very complicated equipment, refrigeration or technicians to operate it. The human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) that …
Finally, France's former Socialist prime minister Laurent Fabius, secretary of state for health Edmund Herve and social affairs minister Georgina Dufoix are to be tried in a parliamentary court in the AIDS scandal currently rocking the nation. In 1985, when Fabius was prime minister, 1,000 haemophiliacs were given a blood …
AIDS is a a disease that has no cure and this is forcing health workers to seek effective ways to prevent its spread. The experiences of the decade since the discovery of AIDS indicate strategies to change social attitudes and behaviour have limited the spread of the disease. Many grassroots …
SCIENCE may have conquered smallpox, but as far as AIDS is concerned, education may be a better weapon. According to WHO estimates, there are 10 million people infected with the AIDS-causing human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) worldwide. Two-thirds of the infected persons live in developing countries, of which three million are …
IF LIVING proof is needed of how institutions created by human beings for their welfare really work, one has only to go to Bhopal, where thousands succumbed in a deadly MIC gas leak on the night of December 2-3 in 1984. Eight years later, apathy, arrogance and greed still prevail …
Katchi abadis (illegal squatter colonies) are a common feature in Pakistan's rapidly expanding cities. Karachi alone has 362 such colonies, housing more than 3 million people -- about 40 per cent of the city's population. These settlements have sprung up since the 1970s as a result of immigration from rural …
TUBERCULOSIS, the number one killer in India -- two million cases of active TB are diagnosed each year -- and the AIDS epidemic are showing a disturbing tendency of coalescing and infecting the same individual (WorldAIDS, No 23). The risk groups of both diseases overlap in many countries in the …
