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. …
A new surgical technique may be useful in treating high blood pres- sure (BP) when it does not respond to treatment, claims H Geiger of the J W Goethe University of Frankfurt, Germany. In the technique called ventrolateral medullary decompres- sion, a Teflon implant is used to reduce pressure on …
IMMUNOLOGISTS believe that because of the low levels of hormone called leptin, millions of malnourished people in the developing world become victims of infectious disease. Their study, if proved correct, may save lives of the starving millions. "There are 180 million malnourished children in the world. That's three times the …
CHIROPRACTIC is a system of treatment where the backbone is treated mainly by manipulations. The treatment does not prescribe drugs or chemicals. It has almost no appeal among pharmaceuticals. And its effectiveness and safety has been questioned more often than not by cynics, other medical professionals and even the public. …
ARMED forces medical services have started giving a lot of importance to geriatric medicine. Studies have revealed that a large number of patients admitted to military hospitals suffer from Alzheimer's disease and other neurocognitive disorders. By 2020, the number of patients suffering from Alzheimer's disease will double in India to …
DRUGS are big money. And it is not hallucinogens or drug peddlers that are being discussed here but drug peddling by the pharmaceutical industry. In absence of a rational policy the world over, these companies are having a field day. And all of them have the same motto: to hell …
Unsafe abortions are primary killers of women between the ages of 14 and 44 in Ghana. Poverty and ignorance among people allows quacks to have a flourishing business. According to the health minister, approximately 1,200 women die each year due to this illegal practice. Worldwide around 20 million unsafe abortions …
BRITISH government experts have revealed that thousands of people may have died because they were given albumin - a blood product instead of a simple saline drip. According to the experts, albumin treatment could have caused deaths to six out of every hundred patients treated. Albumin was first used to …
A CASE FOR CONCRETE: New concrete varieties have been developed by Russian experts which are resistant to moisture, frost, water and chemicals and do not dry up fast. Researchers from the Moscow-based Stroi-progress company have developed a novel binder with low-water yield. This is the key component of this wonder …
A RADICAL form of "face off surgery, being used at Queen Mary Hospital in Hong Kong, aims to rid patients of recurring nasopharyngeal cancer, a deadly cancerous tumour which forms in the centre of the head behind the nose and found mostly in southern China. To cut out the tumour, …
ONE good place to look for better and cheaper medicines has always been our planet's biological treasure house. It has furnished numerous inexpensive alternatives to many expensive medicines and chemicals. And scientists are rediscovering this amazing treasure house, coming up with new applications for plant and animal derivatives. Chicken feather, …
Counsellors in Heera Mandi, Pakistan's well-known red light district in Lahore, have proved very effective in spreading HIV/AIDS awareness among the largely illiterate sex workers. The results of a recent survey carried out for UNAIDS-Pakistan shows that an overwhelming 93 per cent of the commercial sex workers are aware of …
THE use of disposable syringes - which is a standard recommendation of the World Health Organisation - is being discontinued to make way for the old glass syringes in Calcutta's government hospitals. This move is in response to the fact that disposable syringes are not broken properly before throwing away …
INDIA will start clinical trials this year of the anti-HIV drug, AZT, on pregnant women, despite high costs and doubts about its efficacy. The trials will be conducted in Mumbai, Tamil Nadu and Kerala, say officials at the Union government's National AIDS Control Organisation (NACO), The government has identified these …
THE Union ministry of health and family welfare (MHFW) has finally acknowledged the utility of Ayurvedic metal-based formulations or rasa shastra in the treatment of a type of cancer, namely acute promyelocytic leukaemia (AML-3). The formulations have been developed by the Dehradun-based Vaidya Chandra Prakash Cancer Research Foundation. For Vaidya …
THE thought of eating live animals certainly fills most of us with disgust. And yet, we do it all the time. These are "animals" too small to be seen by the naked eye. They are microorganisms, mainly bacteria. And their ingestion does us a lot of good. In India, yoghurt …
CANCER chemotherapy is, even at the best of times, a pretty tricky business. Doctors are always walking the razor's edge, since the line between killing the tumour and killing the patient is extremely thin. That is because chemotherapeutic drugs targeted to kill the rogue cells first spread throughout the body, …
ONE CHILD in three is not registered at birth, leaving them without proof of identity or age that may deny them education, healthcare and even nationality, according to the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF). The UNICEF says that a birth certificate is required for vaccination in at least 20 countries …
IT MAY not be possible to eradicate poliomyelitis from the world by the year 2000 unless adequate resources are mobilised in time, warn World Health Organisation (WHO) officials. Bruce Aylward, in-charge of the WHO Global Polio Eradication Initiative, says that only a few polio-endemic countries are left in the world. …
ANTHRAX, a deadly disease, is caused by the bacterium Bacillus anthracis. In humans, infection usually affects the skin, causing development of a pustule, or the lungs, causing Woolsorters' disease, a kind of pneumonia. In animals, especially sheep and cattle, it takes the form of fatal acute septicaemia (poisoning of blood …
Chronic diseases such as cardiovascular diseases, cancer and diabetes are the major causes of death in China today. According to a report published by the national health economics institute, more than US $12 billion will be spent on the treatment of these diseases. By 2000, the annual expenditure will cross …
