Six months after she died, police in Bhopal have acted on the death of a two-year-old, malnourished girl. They have booked her parents, charging them with “causing death by negligence”. Activists say that this is perhaps the first instance in India where parents have been blamed for death caused by malnourishment. Adviser to Supreme Court commissioners in the right to food case Sachin Jain said the administration always tried to push malnutrition...

-The Times of India   State government finally seems to be taking the issue of lack of trained staff in public health sector seriously. Doctors posted in rural areas, sub-district hospitals and district hospitals will now be in specialties like paediatrics, emergency services like trauma, and gynaecology at the government medical colleges (GMCs) under specialists. The plan has support of directorate of medical education ( DMER). Public health department had been working...

The Planning Commission has received a sweeping set of recommendations that proposes free health care and medicines for diverse needs to all Indian citizens, irrespective of economic means. Whether or to what extent the proposals — described as “even bigger” than the UPA’s blockbuster job scheme — will be accepted will depend on the political and executive leadership. If the government throws its weight behind the initiative, it will effectively mean...

The Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) has posted an advertisement inviting, by December 31, research proposals on long-term effects of methyl isocyanate (MIC) gas on Bhopal’s residents. However, while it is yet to conduct this research 27 years after the Bhopal gas tragedy caused by MIC that left hundreds dead, data shows that the “gas patients” have been routinely used for clinical trials for new drugs at the Bhopal Memorial...

The pill that you pop when down with fever or the syrup you gulp for relief from cough are not cure for sure. They can be counterfeit drugs made in some substandard medicine-manufacturing centres as the one sealed in the city today. Operating from a two-storeyed building in the Rajiv Nagar area, the sealed unit was allegedly involved in making counterfeit drugs. The batch numbers of several medicines seized from the...