1, September 2014

Overweight teens more likely to be addicted to cigarettes

A new study has suggested that overweight or obese teenagers are likelier to become regular smokers as compared to average weight teens. The study based on based on data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health showed a correlation between high body mass index (BMI) and cigarette smoking in young adulthood.

Lead author H. Isabella Lanza, Ph.D., research associate with the UCLA Integrated Substance Abuse Programs in Los Angeles, said that young people smoked cigarettes for a variety of reasons. Lanza said that for overweight or obese adolescents, the increased desire to improve social standing or fit in with others may also increase the probability of engaging in regular cigarette smoking.

Christopher N. Ochner, Ph.D., assistant professor of pediatrics and psychiatry at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai in New York, asserted that other studies evaluating a correlation between BMI and substance abuse had produced mixed results, but the size of the survey sample and the statistical processes used in this study suggested that the correlation between smoking and higher BMI may be clinically significant. The study is published in American Journal of Health Behavior.

Source: www.thehealthsite.com

01.09.2014

Self-monitoring hypertension programme could help keep BP under control

A new study has revealed that the hypertension self-management program can help reduce blood pressure for high-risk patients. It was found that among patients with hypertension at high risk of cardiovascular disease, a program that consisted of patients measuring their blood pressure and adjusting their antihypertensive medication accordingly resulted in lower systolic blood pressure at 12 months compared to patients who received usual care. ( Read more about hypertension)

Data from national and international surveys suggested that despite improvements over the last decade, significant proportions of patients have poor control of their elevated blood pressure. Self-monitoring of blood pressure with self-titration (adjusting) of antihypertensives results in lower blood pressure in patients with hypertension, but there are no data about patients in high-risk groups, according to background information in the article.

The authors mentioned that the trial has shown for the first time, that a group of high-risk individuals, with hypertension and significant cardiovascular comorbidity, are able to self-monitor and self-titrate antihypertensive treatment following a pre­specified algorithm developed with their family physician and that in doing so, they achieved a clinically significant reduction in systolic and diastolic blood pressure without an increase in adverse events. This would be the population with the most to gain in terms of reducing future cardiovascular events from optimized blood pressure control.

Peter M. Nilsson, M.D., said that future trials studying the effects of self-titration on cardiovascular events are needed and, a ‘bring it home’ blood pressure-lowering strategy appears suitable for patients with hypertension and comorbidities. The study is published in the issue of JAMA.

Source: www.thehealthsite.com

01.09.2014

It does not matter how slowly you go, so long as you do not give up and do not stop

30, August 2014

Is the poultry industry misleading Indians about antibiotics use?

The Centre for Science and Environment (CSE) Thursday rubbished claims made by the poultry industry that antibiotic residues found in Indian chicken were lower than the EU standard and accused it of ‘misleading’ the people. The CSE reiterated its earlier stand that large-scale use of antibiotics in the poultry industry has led to antibiotic resistance in Indians who are falling prey to many otherwise curable ailments. ’The poultry industry is misleading the public by saying that residues found in Indian chicken are lower than the EU standards,’ the CSE said in a statement.

‘The EU does not allow antibiotic use as growth promoters in poultry,’ it added. The CSE said that in India, non-therapeutic antibiotic use, for promoting growth of chicken and to prevent disease even in the absence of it was large-scale. In such cases, all the chicken in a poultry farm were exposed to a low dose of antibiotics for their entire life span. ’We need to stop non-therapeutic use to prevent emergence and spread resistant bacteria,’ it said. The study found that 40 percent of the samples tested positive and residues of more than one antibiotic were found in 17 percent of the samples. India currently has no regulations to control antibiotic use in the poultry industry or to control sales of antibiotics to the industry.

Source: www.thehealthsite.com

30.08.2014

Revealed — how junk food ‘controls’ you!

Junk food not only makes you pile on the pounds, it may also suppress your appetite for a balanced diet. Australian researchers found that a diet of junk food in rats reduces their appetite for novel foods, a preference that normally drives them to seek a balanced diet. The findings help to explain how excessive consumption of junk food can change behaviour, weaken self-control and lead to overeating and obesity.

The team of researchers, led by Professor Margaret Morris, Head of Pharmacology from the School of Medical Sciences, University of New South Wales, Australia, taught young male rats to associate each of two different sound cues with a particular flavour of sugar water – cherry and grape.

Healthy rats, raised on a healthy diet, stopped responding to cues linked to a flavour in which they have recently overindulged. This inborn mechanism, widespread in animals, protects against overeating and promotes a healthy, balanced diet.

But after two weeks on a diet that included daily access to cafeteria foods, including pie, dumplings, cookies, and cake – with 150 per cent more calories – the rats’ weight increased by 10 per cent and their behaviour changed dramatically. They became indifferent in their food choices and no longer avoided the sound advertising the overfamiliar taste. This indicated that they had lost their natural preference for novelty. The change even lasted for some time after the rats returned to a healthy diet.

The researchers believe that a junk diet causes lasting changes in the reward circuit parts of the rats’ brain, for example, the orbitofrontal cortex, an area of the brain responsible for decision-making. They said these results may have implications for people’s ability to limit their intake of certain kinds of foods, because the brain’s reward circuitry is similar in all mammals. ‘The interesting thing about this finding is that if the same thing happens in humans, eating junk food may change our responses to signals associated with food rewards,’ said Morris. ‘It’s like you’ve just had ice cream for lunch, yet you still go and eat more when you hear the ice cream van come by,’ Morris added.

Source: www.thehealthsite.com

30.08.2014

Being honest may not get you a lot of friends but it’ll always get you the right ones

28, August 2014

Low-dose aspirin reduces blood clot risk

Low-dose aspirin can help prevent new blood clots among people who are at risk and have already suffered a blood clot, says a promising study. 

According to Australian researchers, low-dose aspirin lowers the occurrence of new venous blood clots and represents a reasonable treatment option for patients who are not candidates for long-term anticoagulant drugs such as warfarin. 

"Aspirin represents a useful treatment option for patients who are not candidates for anticoagulant drugs because of the expense or the increased risk of bleeding associated with anticoagulants," claimed study's lead author John Simes, a professor at University of Sydney. 

During the study, compared to placebo patients, those who took 100 mg daily of aspirin had a one-third reduction in the risk of thromboembolism (obstruction of a blood vessel by a clot) and deep vein thrombosis (DVT), which is the formation of a blood clot in a deep vein, predominantly in the legs. 

It also reduced pulmonary embolism which is a blood clot affecting the arteries that supply blood to the lungs. 

Most people who have had a blood clot in a leg vein (deep-vein thrombosis) or an embolism (where the clot blocks the blood flow) have anticoagulant drug treatment (such as warfarin) for at least six months. 

However, long-term anticoagulant drugs are expensive and may cause bleeding in some patients. 

For people who are not able to cope with this, the viable alternative of taking regular aspirin will be a great benefit. 

"Aspirin will be ideal in many countries where prolonged anticoagulant treatment is too expensive. A major benefit of this treatment is its cost-effectiveness," Simes added.

Source: www.timesofindia.com

28.08.2014

Tickle' your ears for a super heart

How often do you want to kill that itchy feeling in your ears? Well if we believe researchers, tickling your ears can actually improve the health of your heart!

When they applied electrical pulses to the tragus - the small raised flap at the front of the ear immediately in front of the ear canal - they found that the stimulation changed the influence of the nervous system on the heart by reducing the nervous signals that can drive failing hearts too hard.

The technique works by stimulating a major nerve called the vagus that has an important role in regulating vital organs such as the heart.

The researchers applied electrodes to the ears of 34 healthy people and switched on the standard TENS (Transcutaneous electrical nerve stimulation) machines for 15-minute sessions.

They monitored the variability of subjects' heartbeats and the activity of the part of the nervous system that drives the heart.

"The first positive effect we observed was increased variability in subjects' heartbeats. We found that when you stimulate this nerve, you get about a 20 percent increase in heart rate variability," said lead researcher Jennifer Clancy from University of Leeds' school of biomedical sciences.

"You feel a bit of a tickling sensation in your ear when the TENS machine is on but it is painless. It does have the potential to improve the health of the heart and might even become part of the treatment for heart failure," claimed Jim Deuchars, a professor of systems neuroscience at University of Leeds.

The second positive effect was in suppressing the sympathetic nervous system, which drives heart activity using adrenaline.

"We measured the nerve activity directly and found that it reduced by about 50 percent when we stimulated the ear. This is important because if you have heart disease or heart failure, you tend to have increased sympathetic activity," Clancy explained.

A lot of treatments for heart failure try to stop that sympathetic activity - beta-blockers, for instance, block the action of the hormones that implement these signals.

"Using the TENS, we saw a reduction of the nervous activity itself," researchers noted.

Source: www.timesofindia.com

28.08.2014

Some people will test you, some people will use you, some people will teach you but most importantly some will         bring out the best in you

27, August 2014

Ebola in India: 88 Indians screened, one quarantined with fever and sore throat

Eighty eight Indian nationals, who have been brought back from Ebola-hit Liberia, were Tuesday screened for the deadly virus after their arrival at the airports here and one was put in isolation, officials said. Of the 88 Indians brought back, 71 landed in Mumbai and 17 in New Delhi. A statement from the health ministry said all were screened and found healthy except for one passenger who had fever and a sore throat.  

He has been isolated in a quarantine-cum-isolation facility at the Delhi airport. The ministry statement said state governments have been requested to ensure monitoring of these passengers.
‘State governments have been requested to do rigorous tracking and monitoring of these passengers. The concerned states have been alerted for follow-up of these passengers on daily basis,’ the ministry said. ‘These passengers would be attached to the local health facility and the local authority would ensure that they would follow up these passengers on a day-to-day basis for one month,’ it said.

‘The passengers were also screened at the time of exit from Liberia and none of the evacuees had any symptoms prior to travel,’ said the medical director of International SOS which brought back the Indians. International SOS is a group that provides medical assistance, healthcare and security services to organisations with international operations.

‘Senior officers of the ministry have been pre-positioned at the Mumbai and Delhi airports to monitor the screening of these passengers from Liberia,’ the health ministry statement said. In addition, from the routine flights from affected countries, five passengers with symptoms of fever were quarantined at the quarantine-cum-isolation facility at the Delhi airport. Their samples were being tested at the National Centre for Disease Control.

The ministry said that as per guidelines, the high risk category (those with symptoms) are isolated at the airport, medium risk category (those giving history of contact with an Ebola case) are prioritised for active surveillance, and low risk category (those without symptoms and without any contact history) are informed about helpline numbers to be contacted in case they develop symptoms subsequently.

Meanwhile, five passengers (four doctors and a physiotherapist) who returned from Nigeria and who were admitted to the quarantine facility in Delhi for observation last Friday have tested negative for Ebola in tests done at the National Centre for Disease Control, the ministry statement said.

Three of them have been discharged from the quarantine facility. The other two (a doctor and the physiotherapist) had developed fever and were transferred to the RML Hospital for further treatment. Both of them have now been cured of the fever.

Source: www.thehealthsite.com

27.08.2014

Why make-up is bad for youngsters

Parents are being urged to ensure that their children aren’t using too much make-up particularly if they’re young as it can lead to major skin problems, says an expert. Girls as young as 12 years old are afraid to leave their home without wearing a full face of make-up, new research has revealed. An independent survey conducted by survey-led marketing research company OnePoll says that one in five girls aged between 12 and 17 are covering up their imperfections daily before leaving their home.

A worryingly high number of young girls are also topping up their make-up at least once a day as results reveal 46 percent of young girls will reapply make-up, reports femalefirst.co.uk. Skincare experts warn that applying too much make-up at a young age not only worsens existing and immediate skin problems but can also have an effect on long term skin health and condition that includes confidence and self esteem. 

This comes as the study found that 40 percent of young girls ‘forget’ to remove their make-up and a further 36 percent leave it on because they are ‘too tired’ to remove it.  ‘Applying too much make-up from as young as 12 years old without first using skincare products can cause sensitive skin to become dry and irritated.  ‘Skincare products such as face wash and cleanser help ensure that skin is clean and prevent build-up of spot-causing bacteria, while moisturisers are key for ensuring skin is hydrated and often contain SPF to protect against damaging UV rays,’ said skincare expert Caroline Frazer.

Mothers also admit to their daughters having insecurities about skin issues with 70 percent regularly hearing complaints from their daughter about it. ‘The results of this research suggest that while good skin is clearly very important to young girls, they are caking on make-up to cover their imperfections which unfortunately, enters them into a vicious circle as this excessive use is actually creating more problems for themselves,’ said Frazer. ‘Applying layers of make-up will only serve to block pores, create and harbour more bacteria and inevitably, lead to greater skincare problems as well as confidence and self esteem issues,’ added the expert.

Source: www.thehealthsite.com

27.08.2014

It’s better to walk alone, than with a crowd going in the wrong direction

26, August 2014

Heart exercises protect your brain too

Daily exercises to maintain good cardiovascular health also benefits brain, protecting us from cognitive impairment as we age, according to a promising study.

Researchers found that healthy lifestyle helps maintain the elasticity of arteries, thereby preventing downstream cerebrovascular damage and resulting in preserved cognitive abilities in later life.

Our body's arteries stiffen with age and the vessel hardening is believed to begin in the aorta - the main vessel coming out of the heart before reaching the brain.

"Indeed, the hardening may contribute to cognitive changes that occur during a similar time frame," said lead researcher Claudine Gauthier from University of Montreal, Canada.

They found that older adults whose aortas were in a better condition and who had greater aerobic fitness performed better on a cognitive test.

"We think that the preservation of vessel elasticity may be one of the mechanisms that enables exercise to slow cognitive aging," Gauthier added.

For the study, they worked with 31 young people between ages 18 and 30 and 54 older participants aged between 55 and 75.

This enabled the team to compare the older participants within their peer group and against the younger group who obviously have not begun the ageing processes in question.

The results demonstrated age-related declines in executive function, aortic elasticity and cardiorespiratory fitness, a link between vascular health and brain function, and a positive association between aerobic fitness and brain function.

Source: www.timesofindia.com

26.08.2014

Foods for healthy hair

While regular oiling, shampooing and conditioning is important for your hair, what you eat is equally essential. Your hair needs nourishment in the form of a healthy diet so that it doesn't suffer from breakage or damage. Make sure that you include plenty of vitamins, proteins and minerals in your diet. A deficiency in iron can also cause hairfall. Here's what your diet should contain...

- Dairy products. A warm glass of milk early morning or before you go to bed is important not just for healthy bones but also for your hair. Make a habit to include milk products like cheese, yogurt and dahi in your diet.

- Fresh fruits and vegetables are another must. Spinach, broccoli, cabbage, lettuce, tomatoes, papaya, pineapples, apples and peaches, especially are great for your hair.

- Another excellent source of antioxidants is green tea, which helps get rid of toxins from the body and is good for hair. Don't forget drinking water — at least right to 10 glasses are a must. Have coconut water also on a daily basis.

- Avoid fried and junk food as well as food items that are high in the sugar content. These contain high calories and do no favours to your skin or hair.

Source: www.timesofindia.com

26.08.2014

Don’t expect your friend to be a perfect person but, help your friend to become a perfect person

Mother Teresa.

25, August 2014

Robotic walking stick for visually impaired

  

New York: In a first, engineers have designed a robotic walking stick for the visually impaired that can detect the user's immediate path and store localised geographical information.

The robotic cane has two cameras and Bluetooth audio functionality.

The cameras detect objects in the user's path, such as chairs and stairs, while the audio system communicates to the user.

Meanwhile, a computer holds information about recent pathways and objects within them.

"This allows the cane to recognise the user's location and guide the user, much as a seeing-eye-dog would do. Like a traditional cane, the robot cane is adjustable to different lengths," explained its designer Cang Ye from University of Arkansas at Little Rock - Engineering ERIQ Lab.

The technology has been prototyped under the National Robotics Initiative, funded by the US National Science Foundation and National Institutes of Health, Live Science reported.

Source: www.zeenews.india.com

25.08.2014

WHO ensures 'best care' for Ebola affected health workers

Geneva: The World Health Organisation (WHO) on Sunday ensured that it will provide best care to its Ebola-affected health workers in Sierra Leone as possible, including the option of medical evacuation to another care facility if necessary.

Nearly 400 people from across the organisation and from partners in the Global Outbreak Alert and Response Network has been deployed by WHO to help respond to the disease in four west African countries, since the beginning of the international response to the outbreak in March, as reported by Xinhua.

Ebola virus is spread through contact with bodily fluids and people giving care or working around infected patients are known to be a high-risk group, according to WHO.

Britain has evacuated its national, who contracted the Ebola virus in Sierra Leone, by flying him back to Britain on a Royal Air Force jet.

The unidentified patient, who worked as a healthcare worker, had tested positive for Ebola virus infection last week.

As many as 113 new cases of Ebola virus disease as well as 84 deaths were reported from Guinea, Liberia, Nigeria and Sierra Leone last week, WHO said.

In Guinea, where the epidemic started, the toll is 406 while in Sierra Leone, 392 have succumbed to the haemorrhagic fever. Five deaths have been witnessed in Nigeria so far.

In December 2013, an outbreak of Ebola virus disease began in Guinea, leading to an epidemic in West Africa after it spread to Liberia, Sierra Leone and Nigeria.

Source: www.zeenews.india.com

25.08.2014

Never change your originality for the sake of others, because no one can play your role better than you

23, August 2014

Alcohol use in movies influence drinking

Exposure to alcohol use in movies can encourage drinking in young people, a significant research shows. Moreover, exposure to alcohol portrayals in advertisements and digital media such as Facebook can also attract young adults towards drinking.

According to researchers, since movie characters can be regarded as role models by young people, the manner in which these characters portray alcohol use might have an impact on the beliefs and attitudes toward alcohol use by youngsters themselves.

"Viewers are often not aware of alcohol portrayals in movies. Product placement is more subtle than general ads, occurring when a company pays movie makers to portray its brand in a movie," explained Renske Koordeman from Radboud University Nijmegen in the Netherlands.

Alcohol use is widespread in contemporary movies, often portrayed positively or even glamourised. The study found that positive and negative portrayals of alcohol can contribute to viewers' emotional involvement (called 'transportation') and attitude towards evaluating the movie.

"In my understanding, alcohol portrayals are depicted in the majority of movies, 80 to 95 per cent, and that they are mostly framed or portrayed in a positive manner," remarked Marloes Kleinjan, an assistant professor of developmental psychopathology at Radboud University Nijmegen.

During the study, Koordeman exposed participants to eight different movie clips containing alcohol (positive or negative context), or no alcohol portrayals.

"This study provides initial evidence that alcohol and the way in which alcohol is portrayed in movies contributes to how people evaluate and become transported in movies," Koordeman noted. Participants were more transported into movie clips with negative alcohol portrayals compared to clips with positive alcohol portrayals.

"Stronger effects of negative events over positive events are found in various aspect of life," said Koordeman. For example in social network patterns, in learning processes and in interpersonal interactions.

"This process might also be extended to movies," Koordeman said in a paper, to be published in the Alcoholism: Clinical & Experimental Research journal.

Source: www.timesofindia.com

23.08.2014

High-intensity exercise safe for heart patients

High-intensity exercise can help stable heart transplant patients reach higher levels of exercise capacity and gain better control of their blood pressure than moderate intensity exercise, a study indicates.

Researchers compared the effects of 12 weeks of high-intensity interval training versus continued moderate training in 16 stable heart transplant recipients who had been living with their new heart for more than one year.

The findings revealed that high-intensity interval training is safe in heart transplant patients and the effect on exercise capacity and blood pressure control is superior to moderate intensity training.

"Our study documents that stable heart transplant recipients benefit from this type of training more than from the moderate training that has been recommended so far," claimed Christian Dall from Bispebjerg Hospital at University of Copenhagen, Denmark.

Importantly, the training is also safe and well received by patients, he added.

The impaired heart rate response has been considered a hindrance for more demanding high-intensity training.

In the study, researchers found that VO2 max, or maximal oxygen uptake, increased by 17 percent in patients performing high-intensity interval training compared with 10 percent in patients performing continued moderate training.

Systolic blood pressure decreased significantly in patients in the high-intensity group, while it remained unchanged in patients in the moderate intensity group.

Peak heart rate also increased in the high-intensity group but not in the moderate intensity group. Heart rate recovery improved in both groups.

The study appeared in the American Journal of Transplantation.

Source: www.timesofindia.com

23.08.2014

If friendship is your weakest point then you are the strongest person in the world

Abraham Lincoln

22, August 2014

Special oral health hospitals across India soon

New Delhi: The government plans to set up hospitals exclusively for oral health care at both the national and regional levels, Health Minister Harsh Vardhan said Thursday.

"Facilities for dental treatment and oral health are still inadequate in India. In rural areas, they are practically absent," he said while inaugurating the Centre for Oral Health Promotion at the Centre for Dental Education and Research at the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) here.

The minister said the coming years would see more investment in dental hospitals and colleges at the national and regional levels.

These would have the latest sophisticated equipment and research facilities.

The new centre at AIIMS has been recognised by the World Health Organization as a partner.

"Doctors on their own should act as points of dissemination of information on positive and healthy habits," Harsh Vardhan said.

"While the government will do its duty of framing policies and schemes and implementing them, it would require the cooperation and involvement of all to make 'health for all' a social movement," he said.

Source: www.zeenews.india.com

22.08.2014

Obesity in 30's increases risk of dementia in later life

Washington: A new study has found that people who are obese in their early to mid-life face more risk of dementia in their later lives, with the ones in their 30's facing triple the risk.

The researchers used the anonymised data from hospital records for the whole of England for the period 1999-2011, and data in which obesity had been recorded were then searched for any subsequent care for, or death from, dementia.

During the study period, 451 232 of those admitted to hospital in England were diagnosed with obesity, 43 percent of whom were men.

The analysis revealed an incremental decrease in overall risk of hospital admission for dementia the older a person was when a diagnosis of obesity was first recorded, irrespective of gender.

For those aged 30-39, the relative risk of developing dementia was 3.5 times higher than in those of the same age who were not obese. For those in their 40s, the equivalent heightened risk fell to 70 percent more; for those in their 50s to 50 percent more; and for those in their 60s to 40 percent more.

People in their 70s with obesity were neither at heightened or lowered risk of developing dementia, while those in their 80s were 22 percent less likely to develop the disease, the findings indicated.

There were some age differences between the risk of developing vascular dementia or Alzheimer's disease, with those in their 30s at greater risk of both. A diagnosis of obesity in the 40s through to the 60s was associated with an increased risk of vascular dementia, while the risk of Alzheimer's disease was lower in those diagnosed with obesity from their 60s onwards.

The researchers concluded that while obesity at a younger age was associated with an increased risk of future dementia, obesity in people who had lived to about 60-80 years of age seemed to be associated with a reduced risk. 

Source: www.zeenews.india.com

22.08.2014

Happiness is not something you find ….. It’s something you create

21, August 2014

‘Tickle’ your ears for a super heart

How often do you want to kill that itchy feeling in your ears? Well if we believe researchers, tickling your ears can actually improve the health of your heart! When they applied electrical pulses to the tragus – the small raised flap at the front of the ear immediately in front of the ear canal – they found that the stimulation changed the influence of the nervous system on the heart by reducing the nervous signals that can drive failing hearts too hard.

The technique works by stimulating a major nerve called the vagus that has an important role in regulating vital organs such as the heart. The researchers applied electrodes to the ears of 34 healthy people and switched on the standard TENS (Transcutaneous electrical nerve stimulation) machines for 15-minute sessions. They monitored the variability of subjects’ heartbeats and the activity of the part of the nervous system that drives the heart.

‘The first positive effect we observed was increased variability in subjects’ heartbeats. We found that when you stimulate this nerve, you get about a 20 percent increase in heart rate variability,’ said lead researcher Jennifer Clancy from University of Leeds’ school of biomedical sciences. ‘You feel a bit of a tickling sensation in your ear when the TENS machine is on but it is painless. It does have the potential to improve the health of the heart and might even become part of the treatment for heart failure,’ claimed Jim Deuchars, a professor of systems neuroscience at University of Leeds.

The second positive effect was in suppressing the sympathetic nervous system, which drives heart activity using adrenaline. ‘We measured the nerve activity directly and found that it reduced by about 50 percent when we stimulated the ear. This is important because if you have heart disease or heart failure, you tend to have increased sympathetic activity,’ Clancy explained. A lot of treatments for heart failure try to stop that sympathetic activity – beta-blockers, for instance, block the action of the hormones that implement these signals. ‘Using the TENS, we saw a reduction of the nervous activity itself,’ researchers noted.

Source: www.thehealthsite.com

21.08.2014

‘Government aims to immunise every child against fatal diseases’

The government aims to immunise every child in the country against fatal diseases, Union Health Minister Harsh Vardhan said here Tuesday. ‘The Indian government is very serious about achieving total immunisation in India and it aims to immunise almost every child against the fatal diseases,’ Harsh Vardhan said speaking at the launch of a music video ‘Phool Khil Jayenge’, a awareness campaign for child health and immunisation.

The music video highlights the importance of immunisation in saving lives of Indian children. Vardhan said every year lakhs of young children die of diseases in India, most of which can be prevented by simple immunisation. ‘Lakhs of children in India die from the diseases that are easily preventable. Even 29 years after the launch of the immunisation programme, only 65-70 percent of children got immunised. The rest are susceptible to diseases which often turn fatal,’ he said.

According to the health ministry over 14 lakh children in the age group of 1-5 years die every year due to preventable diseases, like pneumonia and diarrhea. Emphasising the role of various stake-holders, Vardhan said: ‘Each of us needs to volunteer and turn into a ‘health soldier’ to achieve 100 percent immunisation. The support of all political and religious leaders is essential in this endeavour.’ ‘I am confident that this music video will help us repeat the success story of polio (immunisation programme) with many other preventable diseases as well, by creating awareness about how essential immunisation is in saving lives,’ Vardhan said.

Source: www.thehealthsite.com

21.08.2014

If we don’t learn to control our thoughts, we will never learn to control our behavior