-Live Mint The Indian state has done little to provide preventive public health services New data released by the National Sample Survey Office (NSSO) have once again underlined the abysmal state of sanitation in the country, particularly in rural India where two-thirds of the country lives. Only 32% of rural households have their own toilets, according to the recently released results of a large-scale survey conducted by NSSO in 2012. An additional...

-The Hindu After years of neglect, childhood tuberculosis - which accounts for over six per cent of the global TB burden - is finally getting due attention. WHO recently published its first-ever targeted road map outlining the steps needed to move towards zero childhood TB deaths. The report comes close on the heels of the organisation including for the first time the estimates of the global TB burden in children...

-The Hindu Lax monitoring, poor public engagement and inadequate training to vaccinators have dealt a serious blow to the crucial pentavalent immunisation programme The Pentavalent vaccine, the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare's latest addition to the immunisation programme, has run into a storm. The Supreme Court has sent a notice to the Ministry asking why the vaccine should not be banned in the country. The vaccine is no stranger to controversy. A...

-The Indian Express Pune: Setting up a central storage facility for pesticides and restricting their access could help in preventing pesticide-related suicides, claims a study funded by the World Health Organisation (WHO). The study published in the BMC public health journal on September 16 claimed that by setting up a central facility where each family had a locker to store their pesticides has the potential to reduce 295 suicides per one...

-Kafila.org This fact-finding exercise was coordinated by the CENTRE FOR POLICY ANALYSIS. Team members were the human rights activist and former civil servant Harsh Mander; former Director-General of the Border Security Force, E N Rammohan; Professor Kamal Mitra Chenoy of Jawaharlal Nehru University; National Integration Council member John Dayal; senior journalist Sukumar Muralidharan and CPA Director and senior editor Seema Mustafa. Introduction and Overview The first impression of the Muzaffarnagar countryside, now green...