Recent figures reveal a huge gap in child healthcare in India, at a time when experts warn of the vulnerabilities of young people to COVID-19 in a looming third wave. Experts expressed misgivings about a severe deficit in child healthcare at primary health centres and community health centres. Per data shared by a parliamentary standing […]
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Northeast India: The country’s cancer capital?
A government report suggests northeast India is emerging as leading India’s number of new cancer cases. “Profile of Cancer and Related Health Indicators in the North East Region of India”, a joint report by the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) and the National Centre for Disease Informatics and Research (NCDIR), found the region accounts […]
Senior citizens: Our moral duty to them
It is no secret that India is home to an ageing population. This World Senior Citizens Day, it is worth taking a breath to appraise the health of our seniors and to consider how the pandemic has affected them. As of 2019, older persons – those aged sixty or over – number at 139 million […]
Transplant waiting list only gets longer
For many, life continues to be hard as they wait on the organ donation transplant waiting list. Not being able to access a life-saving organ transplant is not the case the entirety of the time. The family of a brain-dead man in Maharashtra gave doctors the go-ahead to donate his organs, offering hope to patients […]
A combination between AstraZeneca and the first component of Sputnik V vaccine (Sputnik Light) demonstrates high immunogenicity profile in the clinical study in Azerbaijan
Moscow, August 20, 2021 – The Russian Direct Investment Fund (RDIF, Russia’s sovereign wealth fund), AstraZeneca and R-Pharm announce preliminary results on immunogenicity of combined use of the AstraZeneca vaccine (developed jointly with the University of Oxford) and the first component of the Sputnik V vaccine (Sputnik Light vaccine based on human adenovirus serotype 26) […]
Global health today: Tedros, COVID in Indonesia, and a million more COVID cases by 2022?
This is the first in a series of newsletters, offering the expert insight of Lalita Panicker – consulting editor, views, Hindustan Times, New Delhi – into some of the most pressing health issues of the day. Another term for Tedros? To use a well-worn cliché, the Director-General (DG) of the World Health Organization (WHO) is […]
Air quality standards to be rethought next year
India is to review its air quality standards next year, addressing an environmental and public health issue of significant concern. New national ambient air quality standards (NAAQS) are likely, reports indicate. Discussions are said to be considering ultra-fine particulate matter (PM0.1), smaller than fine particulate matter or PM 2.5 which denotes particular matter of 2.5 […]
Vaccine drive crosses 55 crore, unused doses remain
According to a provisional report, India’s vaccine drive surpassed the milestone of administering 55 crore and set a record in the last 24 hours. However, many vaccine doses provided to states and union territories remain unused. The past 24 hours saw 88.13 lakh doses administered, taking the cumulative number of shots in arms to 554,730,609 […]
100 million more? Stark warning on fresh COVID-19 cases
Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, director-general of the World Health Organization (WHO), issued a frank and alarming warning about the potential for fresh COVID-19 cases to exceed 100 million by early 2022 – taking the total caseload to 300 million and counting. His warning came just a week after the global case count surpassed 200 million, […]
Five kidneys after third kidney transplant
The Madras Medical Mission College in the Tamil Nadu state capital Chennai performed a kidney transplant for a 41-year-old man – the third time he has undergone such a procedure. Reports indicate that the man, who is said by surgeons to be recovering well, experienced kidney failure aged twelve and subsequently underwent his first kidney […]