Manmohan: Coal-gate address! Delhi: the ever quiet man Manmohan Singh got eloquent for a change. This is not a Lal Qila [Red Fort] speech, not one from the podium of Jantar Mantar, but one that needs close reading. So bracket your prejudices and plough through the text, which is surprisingly free of jargon and double talk. However, that is no justification for NOT reading between the lines, especially as there is some history here, which you may wish to investigate on your own. We forget that despite all drawbacks, Manmohan refuses to become a stalwart, a towering figure and in this he is... 

  Young and poor: open to cheating! Patna: Over 16,000 hysterectomies (surgical removal of the uterus), most of them “unnecessary”, have been reported at private hospitals across Bihar during the last one year allegedly to “avail insurance benefit” under the Rashtriya Swasthya Bima Yojna. The RSBY was launched by the Centre in April 2008. Preliminary investigation by Samastipur, Madhubani and Chhapra district authorities, which reported the maximum number of complaints, showed 10,000 hysterectomies took place in these three districts alone. While Samastipur administration found 1,300... 

Prof. Ashok Kumar Ghosh by Prof. Ashok Kumar Ghosh A significant factor in the waste management practices of low income countries like India is the presence of extensive informal sector activities, either in the form of recycling enterprise of itinerant waste buyers and dealers, or through self employed and municipal sweepers collecting solid waste against an agreed payment from household. The “informal sector in solid waste management” refers to individuals, families, and private sector (micro-) enterprises working in waste management services and valorisation, whose activities are neither... 

  Getting stronger: Me & Enemy! By flooding our environment with antibiotics, people may alter a little-appreciated but profound aspect of bacterial evolution: the very pace at which it occurs. Bacteria may evolve more rapidly and more radically than just a few decades ago. This proposition is still a hypothesis, but it’s an intriguing one. While drug resistance is a well-known consequence of antibiotic use, a global acceleration of bacterial mutability could make drug resistance more common and shape pathogens in unpredictable ways. “Human activities might be altering the fundamental... 

    Village women: easy to cheat! Patna: After Chattisgarh, Bihar became the second state to be hit by the ‘uterus removal scam’. The Bihar assembly speaker ordered a house committee probe into the alleged removal of uteruses of over 16,000 below poverty line women in the state to swindle them of their health insurance money provided under a central government scheme. The opposition has demanded a CBI inquiry. Speaker Uday Narain Choudhary handed over the probe to the assembly’s committee after the opposition Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) and the Lok Janashakti Party (LJP) for the... 

  Access to drugs: varies widely! Every year 3.2% of Indians fall below the poverty line because of high medical bills. This was revealed by the World Health Organisation (WHO). It states that almost 70% of Indians spend their entire income on health care and purchasing medicines. Medicines, which comprise 15% to 75% of the total health care costs, are a key concern due to the vast difference in pricing between brands of the same medicine and the low awareness among consumers. Consider this – two bands of similar sized ready-to-cook noodle pack costs Rs 10. Different brands of 200 ml... 

Prof. Ashok Kumar Ghosh Eco-Scope Bihar “The Tipping Point – Alarming signals for life on Earth” By Prof. Ashok Kumar Ghosh Earth is an exquisitely beautiful planet, washed in water and surrounded by a thin atmosphere with swirling white clouds. This planet is a system of moving gas, liquid, and solids with numerous interconnected and interdependent components. Earth operates as a constantly changing dynamic system since its origin. Changes are going on in its physical as well as biological characteristics. It has gone through change in temperature – sometimes we talk of global warming... 

Govt hospital in UP has 23 doctors: but sweepers stitch wounds, wardboys give injections!   Dr Scary, MD[Master of damage!]Lucknow: State health minister Ahmed Hasan has ordered probe into reports of fourth class staff performing work of a surgeon and doctors in the district hospital of Bulandshar. The probe was ordered after a news channel reported that the sweepers of the hospital stitch wounds and ward boys administer injections. Ideally, this stitching wounds is the job of a qualified surgeon and injection should be administered by a trained nurse. But locals reportedly said that such... 

Encephalitis strikes Bihar again: 29 deaths within fortnight!   The AES cycle and the source Patna: according to latest reports, within a matter of two weeks, twenty-nine children have died of Acute Encephalitis Syndrome (AES) and Japanese Encephalitis in Bihar while 41 remained ill. Reports mention that AES claimed seven lives, Japanese Encephalitis has accounted for two deaths in Anugrah Narayan Medical College and Hospital in Gayawhile six patients were undergoing treatment with symptoms of AES in the hospital. In Muzaffarpur’s Kejriwal hospital, 20 children died due to AES, while... 

Making a living as guinea pig in India: clinical trials by drug companies!   Ahmedabad: according to a recent report, more than 70% the women of Ward 56 of Amraiwadi area of the city make ends meet either by donating blood for money or by volunteering to be guinea pigs for pharmaceutical companies.  Among the medicines for which clinical trials are conducted on women volunteers from the area are drugs for treatment of comatose patients. If they recover from the artificially induced coma, they can hope to earn as much as Rs1 lakh. If something goes wrong and a volunteer does not come...