Suchergebnisse

The Finance Minister of India Nirmala Sitharaman announced the Budget in February 2021, giving health and well-being as a top priority for the government, with an impressive increase of 137% over the previous year's health sector budget. The need to strengthen primary, secondary and tertiary public healthcare systems was a clear message from the budget statement. The authors analyse the current budget in the context of chronic underinvestment in health and question whether this allocation will make any meaningful impact on the public health infrastructure as the impressive headline allocation appears to be more of a trick than a treat to the health sector.

The Finance Minister of India Nirmala Sitharaman announced the Budget in February 2021, giving health and well-being as a top priority for the government, with an impressive increase of 137% over the previous year's health sector budget. The need to strengthen primary, secondary and tertiary public healthcare systems was a clear message from the budget statement. The authors analyse the current budget in the context of chronic underinvestment in health and question whether this allocation will make any meaningful impact on the public health infrastructure as the impressive headline allocation appears to be more of a trick than a treat to the health sector.

Rice and sugarcane are the two dominant crops produced in Guyana while scorn is not yet cultivated on a commercial scale, resulting in import of corn (30009tonnesannually) at a cost of $11.6 million annually. The domestic commercial production of corn has been emphasized recently by government to meet the local demand of agro industries involving in poultry feed production. Consequently, coordinated trial1 of improved corn varieties was initiated at Ebini (Savannah region)during June-September, 2013 and repeated during the 2013-2014 crop season at Mon Repos in the coastal region. A total of twenty two improved genotypes of hybrid corn along with two local check varieties were tested for their yield performance at Ebini whereas at Mon Repos, the same set with two more composite varieties were tested during October, 2013- January, 2014 cropping season. These new hybrids and composites were procured from CIMMYT, Colombia. Additionally, 22 and 14 new genotypes of hybrid corn were also tested in the Coastal region during 2013-2014 along with composite and a local variety as checks, in trials 2 and 3 respectively. The performance of new hybrid and composite varieties of corn was outstanding with average grain yields ranging from 23.16 to 37.75 q/ha at Ebini during 2013 crop season under rain fed conditions, whereas in the Coastal region the yield was further high in the range of 58.39-86.62 q/ha during 2013- 2014 in trial 1. In trials2 and 3, these ranges were 56.18-95.77 q/ha and 31.02-90.82 q/ha, respectively. These new genotypes except one (GC56) out-yielded local varieties significantly, at both regions and seasons. Based on the average yield of both seasons and regions, the genotypes, GC9,GC13 and GC1 were the most high yielding types with yields of 61.70, 59.70 and 58.60 q/ha, respectively, as compared to 26.11and 32.87 q/ha in the case of check varieties (local yellow and local red), respectively. The cost of production was G$ 82/kg or G$37/lb at Ebini and G$ 32/kg or G$14/lb in the coastal region as compared ...

Caste has always been a subject of socio-political segregation in India. Inequality across caste is prominent for varying health and development outcomes, which is a subject less researched till date. Four rounds of National Family Health Surveys (1–4) conducted in the last 25 years are analysed to portray the fertility and mortality differentials across castes/ tribes. The article signifies, that distinct inter and intra-caste differences in association with the region of residence are present that must be taken into consideration while understanding the health outcomes. Despite a decline in the fertility and child mortality rates in India, caste-wise differentials suggests that the decline is associated with the socio-economic position and transition experienced by these groups. Though schemes and benefits are targeted towards backwards castes, however, sub-castes under each caste are far from realization of those benefits at equal pace. Realization of the developmental processes among castes is a matter of proper enumeration and intricate research that rationalize the distributive and affirmative policies of India.

Vaccines have taken the centre stage in the fight against COVID-19 pandemic, and in reducing hospitalisation and associated mortality. Countries around the world are heavily dependent on the successful rollout of their vaccination programmes to open up the societies and re-start their economies. However, the success of any vaccine programme, to a large extent, depends upon the efficacy and safety of the vaccines. Given that UK has been way ahead in vaccinating its population, is considered a successful model compared to other countries in Europe and elsewhere and has a yellow card reporting system for adverse events, we use UK as an example to understand the side effects and fatal outcomes following vaccinations. Our results show that AstraZeneca seems to be underperforming in terms of overall reporting of minor adverse events, serious incidents and fatal outcomes following vaccination. The risk of serious anaphylactic reaction and fatal outcome was 1.36 and 1.17 times more in case of AstraZeneca vaccine when compared with Pfizer BioNTech vaccine. The analysis has implications for vaccine policies and programmes both at nation-state and global levels.