Category Health & Science

After eradication: India’s post-polio problem

0 Comments read Disability, Health & Science, Poliomyelitis
Polio survivors performing Sufi dance on wheelchairs. Photo Credit: Ability Unlimited

By Neena Bhandari

New Delhi, 31.03.2014 (BMJ): As India celebrates three years of being polio free there is an urgent need to invest in medical care for the thousands of people who made the most of life after having had poliomyelitis but are now facing the debilitating post-polio syndrome (PPS).1 2 PPS describes the sudden onset of muscle weakness or fatigability in people with a history of acute paralytic poliomyelitis, usually occurring 15 to 40 years later.3 Many thousands of polio survivors experience muscle weakness, fatigue, joint and muscle pain, intolerance to cold, and difficulties in sleeping, breathing, or swallowing.

The March of Dimes, an international non-profit agency based in the United States and founded in 1938 by President and polio survivor Franklin D Roosevelt, warned in 2001 that as many as 20 million people worldwide are at risk of PPS, which could leave them using wheelchairs or ventilators for the rest of their lives.

After eradication_ India’s post-polio problem _ BMJ

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Lighting up young lives through mid-day meals in schools

0 Comments read Education, Health & Science
Pradeep and Sandeep sharing their mid-day meal at Rajkya Prathmik Vidyalaya, Ghanchiyon ki Gufa, Saraswati Nagar in Jodhpur. Photo Credit: ©Neena Bhandari

By Neena Bhandari

Jodhpur (Rajasthan), 09.03.2012 (WFS): The clock chimes 11 am. Neetu Yadav, 10, and her classmates’ eyes turn expectantly from the blackboard to the school gates. The roar of the approaching autorickshaw carrying their mid-day meal is growing louder, and the 35 students at the government-run Rajkya Prathmik Vidyalaya, Ghanchiyon ki Gufa, Saraswati Nagar in Jodhpur, erupt into a loud cheer.

Jodhpur, located in the vast Thar desert of western Rajasthan, is the state’s second largest city, with a population of around 3.68 million, according to the 2011 Census. The city prides itself on its educational institutions and the average literacy here is 81.56 per cent – with female literacy at 73.93 per cent. Impressive figures, given that the average literacy rate in the state is 67 per cent.

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Cuisine from the arid earth

1 Comment read Environment & Development, Gender, Health & Science
Chunni Bishnoi with her buffalo in Guda Bishnoiyan, 22 km south-east of Jodhpur in the western Indian state of Rajasthan. Photo Credit: ©Neena Bhandari

By Neena Bhandari

Guda Bishnoiyan & Khejarli villages (Rajasthan), India, 04.03.2012 (WFS/The Hindu): Traditional western Rajasthani delicacies are fast becoming a gourmet’s delight in India and abroad. In fact, no Marwari feast is complete without the ‘exotic’ Sangari, cooked as a dry vegetable or with gravy. This fruit of the versatile Khejari (Prosopis cineraria) tree, indigenous to the vast Thar Desert, has provided nutrition and nourishment to the local communities for generations.

As the sun rises on the eastern skyline, Chunni Bishnoi, 65, begins milking her three buffaloes and three cows in the outer courtyard of her `pucca house’, shaded by the thorny Khejari trees that grow thick and green in the villages of Guda Bishnoiyan, 22 km, and Khejarli, 26 km south-east of Jodhpur in the western Indian state of Rajasthan.

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