At a time when economic wisdom is seen as lying in allowing unrestrained play of economic power and cutting social sector spending, here is a report emphasising the economic sense in addressing hunger, especially child malnutrition. It also brings out the positive impact of employment guarantee scheme, which has been a thrust area of the UPA government but has seen a cut in allocation in Budget proposals for 2012-13. The report...

-PTI Drinking just one can of soft drink daily may increase risk of heart attack, claims a new Harvard study but experts in India are sceptical about the findings even as they agree that excess consumption of such beverages is dangerous for health. The study, which surveyed over 40,000 men in the US for over a period of 22 years, found that taking just one sugar- sweetened drink a day increase the...

-The United Nations Tobacco use is responsible for five million or 12 per cent of all deaths of adults above the age of 30 globally each year, according to a United Nations report unveiled today, that for the first time provides estimated mortality rates attributable to tobacco for 2004, the year before the international treaty on tobacco came into force. The Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC) that came into force in...

-The United Nations Globalized food systems and the spread of Western lifestyles has spawned an international public health disaster with over a billion people suffering from undernourishment while another billion remain overweight or obese, an independent United Nations expert warned today. “Our food systems create sick people,” said Olivier De Schutter, the UN Special Rapporteur on the right to food, as he presented his latest report to the UN Human Rights Council...

India’s decision-makers seem to find it difficult to see that there are children in the country. Being unable to see them, they are unable to perceive that they are hungry. In an age when we are able to use euphemisms like ‘under-nutrition’, this is perhaps not surprising. But it is disgraceful none the less.   This country has a large population of children. Fortyone per cent of its total numbers. The national...