India’s new pharmaceutical policy seeks to bring at least 400 essential Medicines—or 60% of the drugs sold in the country—under the government’s pricing control. The department of pharmaceuticals on Friday put out a draft policy, pending since 2005, after a committee prepared a list of essential Medicines, laying down new rules governing drug pricing. Currently, the government controls the prices of only 34 essential Medicines. The draft says the policy, to be finalized...

-The Hindu   When the World Health Organisation published its revised guidelines for malaria treatment in March 2010, just four years after it came out with its maiden version, an editorial in the British Medical Journal (BMJ) was quick to highlight its significance. It was a “testament of how quickly malaria control” had developed and a “marked reduction in the global burden of malaria” had been achieved. A WHO report now confirms...

Prof. Thomas Pogge of Yale University on Tuesday strongly advocated the need for global institutional reforms to eradicate poverty, ensure human rights and secure global justice. He suggested establishing a Health Impact Fund (HIF) to complement the Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS). Prof. Pogge made these observations while delivering the First Dr. Arjun K. Sengupta Memorial Lecture at O. P. Jindal Global University in Sonepat near Delhi. Prof. Pogge said:...

-The Telegraph   The Union health ministry today warned that bottle gourd juice should not be consumed if it comes from bitter-tasting pulp in an advisory on a practice promoted by yoga and Ayurveda evangelist Baba Ramdev among others. “Bitter-tasting bottle gourd juice should not be consumed at all,” the ministry said, urging that a small piece of the pulp of bottle gourd, lauki in Hindi, should be tasted before the extraction of...

The verdict on yoga guru Baba Ramdev's weight loss drink, lauki juice, is out. First, slice a piece from lauki (bottle gourd), taste if it's better. If it's bitter, discard it immediately, says an expert panel commissioned by the Indian Council of Medical Research ( ICMR). The panel - headed by professor S K Sharma, who is the head of department of Medicine at the All India Institute of Medical Sciences -...