‘Healthcare
needs government, private partnership’
To provide quality healthcare, the government, insurance
companies and pharmaceutical companies should come together, a group of experts
said on Sunday. India Health Progress (IHP), a healthcare forum brought
together experts at a conference to discuss and deliberate ‘Access to
Healthcare’. ‘About 85 percent of healthcare costs are paid by the end
consumer. To reduce this burden, innovative models of partnership amongst
government, insurance companies and pharmaceutical companies need to be worked
out to provide better access,’ Sundeep Kumar, head, corporate and public
affairs, Novartis, said at the conference.
‘We need to explore business models that tackle issues
specific to our country, including public-private partnership, social
entrepreneurship and patient assistance programmes. Innovation in healthcare
can be a game changer. However, the cost of innovation needs to be borne by
someone, which could be the government too,’ said Amit Kapoor, chairman,
Institute for Competitiveness India. Highlighting that mass awareness is
important because even if the treatment is free, there is no guarantee that the
people will avail these.
27.05.2013
Five
cups of coffee a day could kill you!
Drinking
five cups of coffee a day – even when decaffeinated – has been linked to
obesity and chronic disease, a new study has found. It is the first study in
the world to look at higher doses of coffee, rather than the equivalent of one
or two cups, and it found that five coffees doubled the fat around organs in
the abdomen – a type of fat that causes deadly conditions, News.com.au
reported.
A
compound in coffee known as Chlorogenic Acid (CGA) was thought to have health
benefits, such as preventing diabetes, but a new study has found too much may
cause a build-up of fat and other problems. Researchers from the WA Institute
for Medical Research and the University of Western Australia were hoping to
prove the cardiovascular benefits of coffee, but instead discovered it can
worsen obesity and its related diseases. The researchers found that mice given
an equivalent dose of five cups of coffee for a human developed twice the
amount of visceral fat – the most dangerous form of fat that collects around
the organs in the abdomen.
University
of WA professor Kevin Croft said that previous studies had only tested small
amounts of coffee equivalent to one cup of coffee a day. ‘Studies have shown
that coffee consumption lowers the risk of developing Type 2 diabetes,’ Prof
Croft said. ‘With this in mind, we studied the effects of CGAs, which are very
rich in coffee but also found in tea and some fruits including plums. ‘The CGAs
were previously known for their health benefits – increasing insulin
sensitivity and reducing blood pressure and body fat accumulation,’ he said.
But the study proved the opposite when dosages given to mice were equivalent to
five cups of coffee for a human per day, said WAIMR Assistant Professor Vance
Matthews. ‘We found that the equivalent of five cups of coffee a day had a
tendency to increase weight gain, particularly in regards to visceral fat,’
Prof Matthews said. ‘There was also increasing insulin resistance (which can
lead to diabetes) and glucose intolerance in mice having high levels of CGA,’
he said.
27.05.2013
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