CNS

Why is tobacco still an issue ?

Diana Wangari, CNS Correspondent, Kenya
(First published in The Star, Kenya)
I must confess, there are health concerns that amaze me – not because they are complex or a rare find, but because I simply cannot understand how they are still an issue. These often fall under lifestyle choices, and a good example is cigarette smoking. When in primary school, we used to have a drug awareness week and the last day would be dedicated to tobacco. The reason behind it was that the session utilized what many would refer to as graphic images of the effects of smoking – from yellowing of teeth to a darkened lung in the late stages of lung cancer.

[Webinar recording] We welcome you to register for an exclusive media webinar in wake of largest-study published recently to guide us on: Is detecting drug resistance at the time of TB diagnosis important? Get connected with study author(s) and lead TB experts from the World Health Organization (WHO) and International Union Against Tuberculosis and Lung Disease (The Union), who will present and respond to questions live!

"A woman of substance": Kalawati

Shobha Shukla, Citizen News Service - CNS

Photo credit: Rahul/ CNS

[CNS Images] Kalawati comes from a family of small farmers. Hers is a ‘joint and happy family’ where she lives with her husband, 1 daughter, 2 sons, 1 daughter-in-law and 1 granddaughter. Her postgraduate sons working outside the village are doing fairly well and have helped her construct their own house in the village. Kalawati has been into farming for the last 30-35 years since her early childhood.

Parliamentarians on 'world we want beyond 2015': Sexual and reproductive health and rights in focus

Shobha Shukla, Citizen News Service - CNS

The Sustainable Development Goals or SDGs are a new, universal set of 17 proposed goals, with 169 targets that 193 countries (who are members of the UN) will be expected to use to frame their post-2015 development agendas and policies over the next 15 years, once the MDGs expire at the end of this year.

Periyar is no Ambedkar

Dr Sandeep Pandey, Magsaysay Awardee and CNS Columnist

The Human Resources Development Minister Smriti Irani coerced the IIT Madras Dean into banning the Ambedkar Pariyar Students Circle, which has now been lifted after a nationwide outcry from progressive organizations and individuals. The group was charged with spreading hatred against Narendra Modi and Hindus as it had criticised the decisions by some state governments to ban beef, make use of Hindi compulsory and the 'ghar wapsi' programme of RSS affiliated organisations.

Citizen News Service (CNS) is pleased to announce that it is currently accepting applications for CNS Young Correspondents Programme. CNS Young, is a network of under-30 correspondents sharing their viewpoints, perspectives and opinions on issues related to health, gender and development justice. This programme offers mentorship, peer support, networking opportunities, and capacity-building to under-30 writers. Last date to apply is Sunday, 28th June 2015.

In the final days of the Bonn Climate Change Conference of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), Corporate Accountability International delivered a resounding call to the governments who have ratified the UNFCCC: protect the treaty and climate policymaking from the undue influence of the globe’s biggest polluters. The call endorsed by over 224,000 sends a strong message to kick big polluters out of climate policy.

People are living longer but sicker and unhealthier lives

Shobha Shukla, Citizen News Service - CNS

Photo credit: CNS: citizen-news.org

So says a report published recently in the Lancet by an international consortium of researchers and led by the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) at the University of Washington. "Global, regional, and national incidence, prevalence, and years lived with disability for 301 acute and chronic diseases and injuries in 188 countries, 1990-2013: a systematic analysis for the Global Burden of Disease Study 2013" is the first of its kind study to examine the extent, pattern, and trends of nonfatal health losses across countries and provides a comprehensive description of morbidity levels and patterns worldwide.

"Be the change you want to see in the world": Pushpa Devi

Shobha Shukla, Citizen News Service - CNS

Photo credit: Rahul/CNS

[CNS images] Pushpa lives with her skilled-worker husband and four children—2 girls and 2 boys. Apart from being a woman farmer, she also doubles up as an ASHA bahu (Accredited Social Health Activist worker). Pushpa was born in a family of farmers in a village of Jalaun district. They were 6 siblings. Her father passed away when she was very young, and her mother and brothers took up to farming so that family sustenance could be maintained. She studied till class 8 and then marriage brought an end to her education.

Zehru Nissa, Jammu and Kashmir
(First published in The Greater Kashmir)
Cannabis abuse is reaching alarming levels across Kashmir. According to data maintained by De-addiction Centre at SMHS Hospital, 71% of people being treated for substance abuse are using multiple drugs, of which cannabis is the most commonly abused.

Road Safety Bill: Dying due to slow drive

Alka Pande, CNS Correspondent

Photo credit: CNS: citizen-news.org

On June 3, 2014, the Indian Minister for Rural Development, Gopinath Munde died in a car accident. Reacting swiftly, the Indian government assured the nation to bring a stringent Road Safety Law to curtail road accidents. Since then, in the last one year, road accidents have reportedly killed nearly 500 people, including women and children, and have left almost double the number with serious injuries. The alarming part is that this number represents only those accidents which were major and which were reported in the media.

Stop illicit trade of tobacco products

Carolyn Kavita Tauro, CNS Special Correspondent

Tobacco kills 6 million people annually of whom more than 600,000 are non-smokers dying from passive smoking. More than 80% of these preventable deaths in the future will be among people living in low-and middle-income countries. According to 5th edition of The Tobacco Atlas 2015, compared to other higher tobacco consumers, India has 106 million (>20%) adult males smoking daily (2013). India and China have 12.2 million daily females smokers, second only to US, which has 17.7 million.

Hitting roadblocks to tobacco endgame

Shobha Shukla, Citizen News Service - CNS

With one person dying every six seconds from a tobacco-related disease -- almost 5.4 million deaths per year of which more than 600,000 are of non-smokers due to secondhand smoke-- the tobacco epidemic is a global public health threat. If current trends continue, by 2030 nearly 8 million people are expected to die annually from tobacco-related illnesses. More than 80% of these preventable deaths will be among people living in low-and middle-income countries.

Despite unprecedented pressure from tobacco industry to delay, dilute or thwart progress on a range of tobacco control measures globally, considerable achievements have been made by governments over the past years to protect public health. The global tobacco treaty, which was the first corporate-accountability and public health internationally binding treaty of the World Health Organization (WHO), is one major leap forward to move the world towards ending game of tobacco.

Efforts to silence dissent dangerous for democracy

Dr Sandeep Pandey, Magsaysay Awardee and CNS Columnist

The decision by IIT Madras to de-recognise Ambedkar Periyar Student Circle is condemnable as it is clear violation of freedom of speech and expression, to form association or unions and to assemble peaceably and without arms as part of Article 19 of the Constitution of India. Criticising government policies like use of Hindi and ban on beef and ‘ghar wapsi’ programmes of RSS affiliated organisations cannot be construed as creating ‘hatred’ agasint the PM Narendra Modi or Hindus.

No relation between learning and examination

Dr Sandeep Pandey, Magsaysay Awardee and CNS Columnist

Photo credit: CNS: citizen-news.org

Some of my teacher friends are quite concerned with the fact that I don’t conduct any examination in the courses that I teach and almost all students in my class get ‘A’ grade. I believe there is no relationship between learning and examination. If the purpose of teaching is to make students understand a subject the job of a teacher is not complete until the students have learned the subject. Any failure of student to learn should be considered a failure of the teacher to make his/her students understand the subject.

CNS image Library/2014

Diana Wangari, CNS Correspondent, Kenya
(First published in The Star, Kenya)
Do you remember when you were young and had discovered one day to your delight that feigning illness could be used as a get out of jail free card or so to speak? Or is it a phenomenon more prevalent with the Millennials? Nevertheless, it is amazing the number of illnesses our imagination can conjure up just to get out of a tight situation or simply to serve as an excuse. And it starts right from childhood-- it does not matter how much fun school was, or how many friends you had, there must have been at least a few Mondays that you woke up and thought ‘today is a perfect day not to go to school’.

Photo credit: Rahul/ CNS

Shobha Shukla, Citizen News Service - CNS
[CNS images] Leela Shikhdhar was born in a farmer’s family of village Gabia. She had to leave her studies midway after passing Class 8 as her mother got sick and the responsibility of managing the household chores and looking after her four siblings fell upon her. But after her marriage she managed to finish her high school. Leela was married at the age of 13 years, in a farmer’s household that owned 30 bighas of land. Her husband, the eldest of 3 male siblings, had studied till class 7 and was into farming.

Carolyn Kavita Tauro, CNS Correspondent
The 68th World Health Assembly (WHA) held over the past week, from 18th May to 26th May, at Geneva was declared closed last night by the Indian Minister of Health, Mr. Jagat Prakash Nadda, elected President of the Assembly this year. Mr. Nadda said: “We need to think locally before we act globally. We must find out the strengths and weaknesses of each country; find out what gaps remain and then strategize accordingly.”

Eranga Isaac, CNS Correspondent, Nigeria
The most recently revised estimates of asthma suggest that as many as 334 million people are living with asthma worldwide, and that the burden of disability is high. Asthma is a chronic long term lung condition that is genetic in origin and can be affected by a host of environmental factors.

Putting patients at the centre of asthma management

Babs Verblackt, CNS Correspondent, Belgium

For the past few years ‘You Can Control Your Asthma’ has been the recurrent theme of the annual World Asthma Day, celebrated annually on the 1st Tuesday of May. Though therapies are available, controlling their disease often remains a personal struggle for asthma patients worldwide. Their voices should be heard in any research and development of new ways to beat the chronic condition, feel international asthma organizations.

Paul Quintos, IBON International
Photo credit: CNS: citizen-news.org

Experts analyze that public financing of post-2015 development agenda is possible, and vested interests are propelling misconceptions that it is not feasible. Paul Quintos from IBON International debunked the myth that 'public finance is not enough'. "We need to examine how can we plug illegal financial flows. Sustainable development goals (SDGs) in Asia and the Pacific alone could cost well over US dollars 1 trillion per year. According to Asian Development Bank (ADB), infrastructure needs alone may require over US dollars 750 billion per year over 2010-2020."

One of the major failures of current times is how democratic systems are being made ineffective so that people with a 'power of one vote' are not able to hold elected representatives to account. How else can governments get away with making promises and not delivering? Rather often governments instead of delivering on pro-people promises, have harmed people's interests even more, thereby allowing corporations to siphon away profits and resources. With democracy failing the people to hold governments to account, it is no surprise that non-performing governments often get re-elected!

Through the people's lens: Modi's development model so far

Dr Rahul Pandey, Bobby Ramakant and Dr Sandeep Pandey

Story of Modi’s development model so far: Cutting health and education expenditure, forcing land acquisition, buying expensive jets and unsafe nuclear power, benefitting Big Business, diluting employment guarantee, fanning communal fires, exploiting Ganga, curbing dissent and shielding governance from public scrutiny.
If we separate Modi government’s actions from mere words and assess its priorities from the former, there is now enough evidence to form a clear picture. The picture that emerges is one of grossly skewed priorities.

Swapna Majumdar, CNS Special Correspondent
December 31, 2012, will always be a special day for Sheila Devi. It was the day the 21-year old played a pivotal role in the closure of a diagnostic centre suspected of misusing technology to eliminate girls. It was because of her participation in a decoy operation that the police was able to swoop down on the clinic located near her village in Bakshi Ka Talab block of Lucknow district in the most populous Indian state of Uttar Pradesh.

[Video recording of the webinar] We welcome you to register for an exclusive media webinar in the lead up to this year's World No Tobacco Day, where noted tobacco control experts will present and respond to questions live!

Susmita Choudhary, IPPF

The dream of development justice cannot be realized unless governments also recognize bodily autonomy and sexual rights for every human being, especially for those who are marginalized and seldom heard or 'visible'. If we look closely at the data, it will become evident that women and girls are among those key populations whose rights get violated when it comes to bodily integrity and sexual and reproductive health, and rights. Susmita Choudhary from International Planned Parenthood Federation (IPPF) said that "sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR) are not only women's issues but also issues of other constituencies we work with, and different areas we work on, are also linked to SRHR. It is indeed a cross-cutting issue!"

"I could have been Mary Jane Veloso"

Erwiana Sulistyaningsih, Indonesia
(First published in The Jakarta Post, 20th May 2015)

Mary Jane Fiesta Veloso was spared from execution at the last minute. She got a temporary reprieve but still faces execution. Veloso is a migrant Filipino domestic worker just like me. Like me, Veloso was forced to become a migrant domestic worker because of poverty, because of a commitment to support her family, because she had no other choice.

CNS image Library/2014

Clarity Sibanda, CNS Correspondent, Zimbabwe
The statistics on asthma are indeed worrying, as it is estimated that globally nearly 300 million are living with the illness and nearly 250,000 are said to die prematurely every year from the condition. It is disheartening to note that this public health issue affects high and low income countries equally, but the burden of mortality falls most heavily on the developing world where some 80% of asthma-related deaths occur. Third world countries like Zimbabwe are ineptly facing the asthma scourge.

Kate Lappin, APWLD

Without robust accountability and monitoring mechanisms, how will people ensure that their governments deliver on the promises they make towards post-2015 sustainable development agenda? Past experience tells us that governments may make promises at the global level but seldom translate them into ground realities back home! Even worse is when at times the commitments made by governments in one treaty are contradictory to their obligations in another! Profit-driven corporations often have a major influence in policy making and thwart measures that may harm business interests.

Photo credit: CNS: citizen-news.org

UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon had said earlier, "our goal must be a world of dignity, opportunity and well-being, where no-one is left behind." But there are specific communities that feel they are slipping on the blind-spot as post-2015 sustainable development agenda-setting process is moving forward - indigenous peoples and people in the Pacific nations are among them. "Why is the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) working group document leaving us behind? That is why United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues (UNPFII) has expressed specific concern over the way SDGs are again overlooking the rights of indigenous peoples" said Pranika Koyu from Asia Indigenous Peoples Pact (AIPP).

Photo credit: CNS: citizen-news.org

"Inequality has grown so high and so obscene that 85 people in the world hold as much wealth as 3.5 billion - half the world's population; within the year just 1 per cent of the world's population will hold more weath than the remaining 99 per cent" - this was one of the key messages in a powerful poster exhibit calling for development justice, at the ongoing Asia Pacific CSOs Forum on Sustainable Development in Thailand.

Photo credit: CNS: citizen-news.org

Key consultative processes have been going on globally to gather the broadest voices with the intent to effectively shape the post-2015 sustainable development agenda. In the Asia Pacific region there is a considerable effort put in to engage different communities and sectors in these consultations. Representatives of 17 constituencies are in Thailand to take this dialogue further ahead and consolidate peoples' agenda for development justice before the regional intergovernmental meeting (Asia Pacific Forum on Sustainable Development - APFSD) opens later this week.