The report presents a mixed picture. Over the past 25 years, there have been notable improvements in child well-being in the group of countries examined in this report: steady decline in child mortality, overall reduction in adolescent suicide and increase in school completion rates. But the last five years have …
it has been noted that some patients with strokes or brain damage have severe difficulty with language and exact calculations, while their ability to estimate remains intact. Now, a team of French and us researchers has obtained first-hand evidence to prove that two very different modes of brain activity underlie …
colourful plastic toys may be fun, but could pose a health hazard, too. A scientific committee of the European Union ( eu ), which has assessed analyses from several countries, has shown that when these toys are sucked or chewed by infants, there is a risk that hazardous softeners added …
far from being a festival of lights, Diwali has gradually become a nightmare for the residents of Delhi. In a report on the ambient noise level survey, the Central Pollution Control Board has recommended the bursting of crackers at one place instead of at individual houses. It has said that …
Women's longevity may depend on the age at which they get pregnant, say Rudi Westendorp of the Netherlands and Thomas Kirkwood of the UK. Those who have their first pregnancy at a late age seem to live longer than those who bear children earlier, they add. The duo also says …
aids is on the increase among students living in Mumbai, especially in Navi Mumbai area. Experts and doctors say the incidence of aids has risen to alarming levels in recent times. At the Mahatma Gandhi Mission (mgm) Hospital, the city's only aids centre, 761 new cases of hiv were reported …
In his 30-year teaching career, Joginath Sahoo has seen more trees in his life than students. When he enters his classroom in Kesharpur village in Orissa's Nayagarh district, his students' shout in unison, " Gachha bina ...' (without trees). And he completes the sentence for them, "... jeevana nahi '(no …
The height of people appears to depend on the season of their birth. Jan Wohlfahrt and his team from the Danish Epidemiology Science Centre in Copenhagen, Denmark, studied 1,166,206 children born between 1973 and 1994. They found that children born in April were almost a quarter of centimetre taller
france has tightened norms on the use of chemicals in toys after studies confirmed the dangers of chemicals present in them. The government has said that buying, selling, production, import and export of a number of plastic toys containing phthalates are to be prohibited. Besides, it also imposed a ban …
GANDHAR KARMAKAR is nine years old. He has only one eye, and suffers from paralysis. Elder to him by three years is Motiram. He suffers from osteoporosis (general bone damage). Dunia Uraon, also just short of his teens, is another unfortunate adolescent. His mother suffered three miscarriages before giving birth …
leading chemical companies called for European Union ( eu ) legislation to regulate the use of pvc -softening chemicals to guarantee public safety and stop a proliferation of unilateral national restrictions. eu consumer affairs commissioner Emma Bonino unsuccessfully pushed last year for an eu -wide ban on toys containing phthalates …
millions of couples the world over often face this question: Is there an ideal period between the birth of the first and second child? It is known in medical circles that having babies too close together can be bad for an infant's health as the mother's body does not get …
MEMORY FOR CHILDREN: Clinical trials on the efficacy of Memory Plus capsule have shown that it is effective on children suffering from Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHA). The trials were conducted by the Central Drug Research Institute, Lucknow (CDRI). Raj Kumar, managing director of Velvette International Pharma Ltd, the manufacturers …
The scientists of the Central Drug Research Institute of India (CDRI), Lucknow, conducted clinical tests on Memory Plus, a drug which owes its origin to the traditional herb
Approximately 50 per cent of Indonesia's children aged under five suffer from malnutrition, of which 25 per cent are babies under two, said a United Nations Children Fund (UNICEF) official. The figure was cited by Stephen Woodhouse, head of the UNICEF for Indonesia and Malaysia in a recent interview to …
millions of children in the United States are exposed to unsafe levels of potentially toxic pesticide residues. According to a study by Consumers Union, publisher of the magazine Consumer Reports , as little as a single serving of some popular fruits and vegetables may contain enough chemicals to exceed safety …
According to United Nations World Food Program (UNWFP) official, David Morton, the continuing famine in North Korea is comparable to the Ethiopian famine in the mid-1980s. He said large-scale assistance would be needed for at least three years to turn the situation around. The food disaster has produced a generation …
Doctors know that children whose mothers smoke have a higher risk of smoking during their adolescence, but they are yet to find out why. However, a recent study says it probably involves the learning of flavours. A variety of flavours are transmitted from the mother's diet to the baby through …
THE students of M C Primary School in village Peera Garhi, north-west of Delhi, have many complaints. Their school is surrounded by smoke-spewing factories, a part of the 500-odd industrial units - 80 Per cent of which deal with polyvinyl chloride (PVC) - in the village. Children, between six and …
IT is pay back time now. During the Vietnam War, the US sprayed Agent Orange - a chemical mix of herbicides rich in dioxins, that are hormone disrupters - in Vietnam during the 10-year war. Vietnamese government officials say that Agent Orange has deformed around 50,000 children and has claimed …
