India is all set to unveil a path-breaking test for diabetes that will save both money and blood. The Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) is almost ready with a new digital finger-pricking blood sugar machine that will not require repeated use of testing strips. Significantly, it will cost less than Rs 2 per blood sample and require 1,000 times lesser blood than what glucose meters use now. Even better, it...

-The United Nations The number of people with high blood pressure and diabetes is drastically increasing in both developed and developing countries, according to a United Nations report released today. “This report is further evidence of the dramatic increase in the conditions that trigger heart disease and other chronic illnesses, particularly in low- and middle-income countries,” said the Director-General of the World Health Organization (WHO), Margaret Chan. “In some African countries, as...

-The Hindu Business Line The onus of granting approvals to medicines marketed in the country is on the regulator Drug Controller General of India (DCGI), say drug companies, adding that they have adhered to the law of the land. The drug-makers were responding to a Parliamentary panel report on health that severely indicted the drug regulatory authority, besides alleging that “invisible hands” of drug-makers were involved in getting favourable reports on medicines...

A key finding in the report was that several multinational firms had launched drugs without conducting mandatory clinical trials or seeking expert medical opinion The health ministry has denied the presence of any systemic rot in the drug approval process and pharmaceutical firms have refuted charges of collusion after a report by a parliamentary panel pointed to regulatory lapses in clinical trials. The panel, which looked into the functioning of Central Drugs...

When a corporate executive recently landed in the emergency ward of Hiranandani Hospital in Powai with palpitations, doctors first checked his heart. When tests ruled out any cardiac problem, they found an unlikely culprit-too many cups of green tea. "After talking to him, we realized he had had over a dozen cups of green tea within the span of a few hours,'' said cardiologist Ganesh Kumar. Some brands of green tea...