Among the many reasons cited for India to proceed ahead with the Unique Identification (UID) project -that it will facilitate delivery of basic services, that it will plug leakages in public expenditure and that it will speed up achievement of targets in social sector schemes - the most specious...

There have been reports of a large number of maternal deaths in recent months from Barwani, Madhya Pradesh with many of the deaths taking place in the District Hospital (DH), Barwani. This issue was initially raised by the local grassroots organisation Jagrit Adivasi Dalit Sangathan (JADS) and...

TRIPS is a reality and India has to rework its patent law to conform to it. But that does not mean that we have a patent law that provides for TRIPS plus rules. Our interest lies in taking full advantage of any flexibility available in the agreement

This statement following a workshop on ‘Hunger and Health: An Interdisciplinary Dialogue attended by a cross-section of India’s nutritional scientists, health professionals, public health specialists, economists, agriculturists and grass root activists draws attention to the...

Allocations to the budget for health appear to be impressive but a closer look shows that this is not so, especially taking into consideration the high inflation rate in the previous year. A substantive criticism is presented on allocation to HIV/AIDS, polio eradication, and leprosy control...

We examine why it is important to consider seemingly autonomous but more embedded socio-political-economic aspects in assessing the impact of changes in Science and Technology (S&T) on human capital. In capturing the linkage between S&T and human capital, as we show, the dynamics in labour...

Review of: A State of Health: New Jersey's Medical Heritage by Karen Reeds. Rutgers University Press, New Brunswick, 2001. Pp 142; $ 45. [Published on HNet, November 2005] A State of Health, like Cowen's earlier book, offers a coherent overview of New Jersey's medical history. Primarily, however,...

Strategic Issues and Challenges in Health Management Edited by V.Ramani, Dileep Mavalankar and Dipti Govil Sage Publications, New Delhi.

What are the critical areas in social science research and intervention which might require systematic attention to ethical issues? A national level consultation on ‘ Ethics in Social Science Research’ drew the active participation of social scientists and explored the means and...

Modern epidemiology has, by and large, been based on a narrow model of biomedicine and behaviour modification. It fails to answer, for instance the following questions: Why certain populations are inflicted with certain kinds of disease, and why the access to its cure and prevention is so...