-The Indian Express   A majority of children of primary classes in rural areas are at least two grades below the required level of proficiency in both mathematics and language, according to a study released today. It said that while the ability of children to correctly formulate and write sentences on their own is “exceedingly” low, a high proportion of children in class IV were struggling with basic multiplications and divisions. The Annual Status...

-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...

Even as the number of crib deaths reported from the state-run Dr. B.C. Roy Postgraduate Institute of Paediatric Science since Tuesday has risen to 13 (with one baby dying on Thursday), the Health authorities said there were no instances of medical negligence. Those who died were all very vulnerable and it would have been nearly impossible to save them. No negligence or any other reason was found that might have led...

Hope in sight finally with NHRC sending notice on the matter to SSP of Moradabad Nearly four months after they were detained by the police, three Muslim schoolchildren are still in the District Jail here, unable to get bail for an offence their distraught families claim they never committed. The children have been charged, among other things, with rioting and attempt to murder. But now, finally, hope seems in sight with the...

Close to one lakh children below the age of five years died of diarrhoea attributable to rotavirus infection in India in 2008, accounting for 22 per cent of the total deaths reported globally that year, the latest edition of the Lancet Infectious Diseases magazine has reported. Worldwide in 2008, diarrhoea related to rotavirus infection resulted in 4,53,000 deaths in children younger than 5 years — 37 per cent of deaths attributable...