-The Indian Express Raising the diet of our people from subsistence level to higher levels of nourishment by overcoming the triple deficit is the only way to improve the nutritional Indicators of our population — amongst children, adolescents and adults. It is nearly a month since the first phase of the NFHS-5 survey was published. While we await a response from the government or any policy-making authority, several articles by public health/policy...

-The Indian Express Though overall trends do suggest an improvement in population control, use of modern contraception, reproductive and child health, immunisation and social determinants of health, a complete overhaul is needed to identify and address the multidimensional aspects of child malnutrition. Population-based surveys form the bedrock of the country’s health information systems. Use of accurate and nationally representative data can be instrumental in policy planning, programme design, health system monitoring and...

-Livemint.com Over 1.8 million vehicles were sold across India last month, 10 percent higher than December 2019, vehicle registration data suggests. This is the first time during the pandemic that vehicle registration data has shown a year-on-year increase India’s economic recovery appears to have picked up pace over the past few weeks, led by the largest states of the country. All four high-frequency Indicators of economic activity considered in Mint’s monthly state...

-Livemint.com With a slew of development targets getting pushed back to at least 2030, what visions and goals are realistic? The year 2020 was bleak. And while the calendar changes, things may not change all that much until the public health benefits of a mass vaccination campaign kicks in. Meanwhile, it is important to take stock of where India’s development dreams stand and where the country can go from here. Many visions and...

-The Indian Express Jean Dreze writes: Surjit Bhalla picks on data, but fails to debunk evidence of alarming trends in child nutrition. I must thank Surjit Bhalla (‘Ideology trumps evidence’, IE December 26) for confirming the main point of an earlier article of mine (‘Give children weight’, IE December 17) — namely, that child undernutrition tends to be taken lightly in the corridors of power. His intention, of course, was the opposite...