As a science and health journalist, I have written a number of stories highlighting how lifestyle ailments, like diabetes and heart disease, have emerged as major health issue in India—including in rural areas. Scientists and doctors are pretty much unanimous on what we need to do to prevent the rising tide of cardiovascular diseases: eat […]
Category: South Asia
The BMJ Today: Essential medicines, evidence, and influence
Today an Analysis article questions the quality of applications to the World Health Organization’s essential medicines list. The WHO essential medicines list is a skeletal formulary of medicines that all countries should consider making available. Although the list just covers the basics, the medicines included such as amoxicillin and haloperidol are taken seriously—to be a […]
The BMJ Today: Improving vaccination rates
In the United States, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) held a press conference to discuss a recent survey, which found that rates of HPV vaccine coverage did not reach the 80% target. This in itself is not a surprise given the vaccination levels of previous years. But at the press conference, The […]
Richard Lehman’s journal review—28 July 2014
NEJM 24 July 2014 Vol 371 371 Long ago I had a patient who kept having odd things happen to her. She infarcted part of her cerebellum, and then did the same to two fingers on her right hand. She was full of pains, her kidneys were failing, and her erythrocyte sedimentation rate (ESR) stayed […]
Mayank Singh: The euthanasia debate in India
The case of Aruna Ramachandra Shanbaug was a landmark moment for the euthanasia debate in India. Aruna was a nurse working in the King Edward Memorial Hospital (KEM) in Mumbai. On the evening of 27 November 1973, Aruna was brutally raped. She survived, but asphyxiation had cut the blood and oxygen supply to parts of […]
The BMJ Today: More on transparency
In recent years, The BMJ has campaigned on transparency—the focus of our Open Data campaign, and an issue of vital importance if modern medicine is to retain the trust of doctors and the public, writes Trevor Jackson in this week’s Editor’s Choice. Dabigatran was the first of the new oral anticoagulants licensed to prevent stroke in […]
The BMJ Today: Time to rethink your assumptions about sepsis, Minerva
When I first arrived at the University of Bath, to study history and philosophy of science, our first lecture was about Sulis-Minerva: the combination of Minerva, Roman goddess of wisdom, and Sulis, the Celtic goddess who lived in the hot springs that gave the city its name. Sulis-Minerva became the goddess of health in Roman Britain, […]
Richard Lehman’s journal review—21 July 2014
NEJM 17 July 2014 Vol 371 203 Niacin is an abundant natural B vitamin, which lowers bad cholesterol and raises good cholesterol. What’s not to like? Well, niacin, unfortunately. In doses that make any difference to lipid levels, it is very likely to make you feel sick, get flushes and/or rashes, and/or feel muscle pains. So […]
The BMJ Today: Talking shit again
By the end of next month rural India could have an extra 5.2m toilets as part of a pre-election pledge by Narendra Modi, now prime minister, to build “toilets first and temples later.” Readers of The BMJ will no doubt be heartened by the Indian government’s announcement, coming seven years after sanitation topped a reader poll […]
The BMJ Today: Laws on money and sex
Being a doctor can sometimes feel glamorous. Soon after graduating from medical school, I found myself on a high floor of a fancy hotel in downtown Chicago, waking up to the sun rising over Lake Michigan, a perfect view through a glass wall. Yes, not a window, a wall. Plush carpets, marble bathroom, you know—the […]