DMCH bone marrow transplant to start

10 patients suffering from cancer –multiple myeloma and lymphoma— have been selected and six of them were being prepared for the first set of transplants.

Health minister AFM Ruhal Haque unveiled the plaque of the sophisticated unit in a milestone event and said it has opened ‘a new horizon in Bangladesh’s medical science’. “Don’t do any short-cuts. Follow strictly what you learnt in your training in USA. This is very high-tech procedure. If you deviate, you will fall behind,” he told its trained personnel. The centre has been set up on the ninth floor of the new DMCH building, which was remodelled, with the help of the Boston’s Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH). MGH trained up its nurses and doctors while the government spent about Tk 200million for the whole project. Centre in-charge Prof MA Khan said they were expecting to start the first transplant on October 26 -- an autologous bone marrow transplant in which one’s own bone marrow is used. “It’ll depend on the bone marrow collection. We have already started the collection,” he said . Khan said they had selected 10 patients suffering from cancer –multiple myeloma and lymphoma— and six of them were being prepared for the first set of transplants. In bone marrow transplantation, doctors replace damaged or destroyed bone marrow – the soft and spongy tissue inside bones – with healthy bone marrow stem cells to treat different types of blood cancer, certain genetic blood and immunity disorders like thalassemia, and severe aplastic anaemia. There are no official data about people needing bone marrow transplants in Bangladesh but doctors say many go abroad for this replacement. But the costs in Bangladesh will be at less than one-third of what it costs outside. The in-charge Prof Khan said for autologous procedure the hospital will charge between Tk 0.5 million and 0.6 million while for the allogeneic in which bone marrow of siblings or donors are used would be between Tk 1 million and 1.5 million depending on patients. The second procedure, allogeneic, is more critical that he expects will be able to start after six months. The centre will appeal to the affluent people to donate for the centre so that the facility can help poor and maintain standards. It has five isolated cabins where five patients can be treated at a time. A patient will need to spend at least three weeks after the transplant, doctors say.

Doctor gets life for hepatitis outbreak

Dipak Desai, 63, who infected patients by re-using syringes at his Las Vegas endoscopy clinic, will be eligible for parole after 18 years under the sentence imposed by Clark County District Judge Valerie Adair. "When a trust that a patient places in his or her physician is betrayed, I don't think there is a greater betrayal in our society," Adair said in sentencing Desai. A jury in July found Desai guilty of 27 criminal counts including second-degree murder, insurance fraud, negligence resulting in substantial bodily harm and misdemeanor counts of theft and taking money under false pretenses. The hepatitis C outbreak tied to Desai's clinic was first discovered in 2007, prosecutors said.

The second-degree murder charge stemmed from the 2012 death of infected patient Rodolfo Meana. He was 77, according to local media. Authorities conclusively traced nine infections of hepatitis C back to Desai's clinic and found that another 105 people also may have been infected. Prosecutors said Desai was trying to save money by re-using syringes. Desai's practice of endoscopy involved investigating patients' symptoms by looking inside their bodies using a flexible tube and camera. "His concern was not for the patients themselves," Clark County District Attorney Steven Wolfson said in court. "Rather it was making as much money as he possibly could." Michael Washington, 73, another infected patient who testified against Desai at his trial, died in August. Also sentenced on Thursday was Dipak's assistant. Ronald Lakeman, 66, got between seven and 21 years in prison for his part in the outbreak. Desai, who suffered a stroke after his conviction in July, did not make a statement at the sentencing. His attorney, Richard A. Wright, said Desai was unable to address the court due to complications from the stroke and had not received therapy while in custody. The number of hepatitis C cases traced to Desai's clinic represents one of the largest ever outbreaks of the disease tied to a physician, according to the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Rising drug resistance threatens TB treatment

In its annual TB report, the Geneva-based World Health Organization (WHO) said the world is on track to meet UN goals for 2015 of reversing TB incidence and cutting the death rate by 50 percent compared to 1990.

Yet around 3 million people with TB are being missed by health systems, and "superbug" drug-resistant strains of the bacterial infection are putting progress at risk. "Far too many people are still missing out on care and are suffering as a result," Mario Raviglione, the WHO's director of the Global TB Program, told reporters in London. "And still the death toll from TB - a disease that is preventable and curable - is far too high," he said. TB is often seen as a disease of the past, but the emergence over the past decade of strains that cannot be treated with existing drugs has turned it into one of the world's most pressing health problems. Of all infectious diseases, only the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) that causes AIDS kills more people than TB. In 2012, an estimated 8.6 million people developed TB and 1.3 million died from the disease, including 320,000 deaths among HIV-positive people, according to Wednesday's WHO report, down from 8.7 million cases and 1.4 million deaths in 2011. The WHO says $7-8 billion a year is needed for a full response to the global TB epidemic by 2015, and there is a funding shortfall of some $2 billion a year. Raviglione said insufficient resources for TB were the biggest hurdle to further progress, but welcomed advances in the development of rapid diagnostic tools that allow patients to be quickly tested for drug-resistant TB strains. He also praised success in the development of potential drugs and vaccines to combat TB, noting that 10 new or re-purposed anti-TB drugs are now in clinical trials. WEAK LINKS Still, on the frontline in poorer countries, many TB programs lack the capacity to find and care for people in hard-to-reach groups - such as the homeless and marginalized, who often live outside any formal or state health system. Weak links in what health experts call the "TB chain" -connecting proper detection and diagnoses to quality treatment and care - lead to people in these groups being missed. The WHO estimates that 75 percent of the 3 million missed TB cases are in just 12 countries, with South Africa, Bangladesh, India and Pakistan among them. On the issue of multi-drug resistant TB (MDR-TB), the WHO report said the problem was not only that the links in the chain were weak, but that links were not even there. The UN health agency estimates that 450,000 people fell ill with MDR-TB in 2012 alone, with China, India and Russia worst affected, followed by another 24 other countries. More worrying, about 16,000 MDR-TB cases reported to WHO in 2012 were not treated, with long waiting lists a growing problem. Raviglione said it was unacceptable that increased diagnosis rates were not matched by more access to MDR-TB care. "We have patients diagnosed but not enough drug supplies or trained people to treat them," he said. Grania Brigden, a TB adviser for the international medical charity Medecins Sans Frontieres, said the failure to improve rates of diagnosis and treatment for drug-resistant TB costs lives. "The horrific scale of preventable suffering and death caused by the spiraling drug-resistant TB crisis must spur governments, donors and WHO to mobilize the political will and secure the funding ... to tackle this deadly epidemic head-on," she said. The WHO's report is based on data from 197 countries and territories that together have more than 99 percent of the world's TB cases.

HIV drugs may fight cancer

Interest in using so-called CCR5 inhibitors to fight tumors was fuelled last year when US researchers, testing the drugs on mice, reported a marked reduction in aggressive breast cancer cells spreading to the animals' lungs.

Researchers from the Thomas Jefferson University Kimmel Cancer Center described the results as "dramatic" after they were published in the Journal of Cancer Research. Now industry analysts at Citi believe Merck & Co is set to take things to the next stage by testing its CCR5 drug vicriviroc in cancer patients. The product was abandoned as a treatment for HIV in 2010 following an unsuccessful study. Pfizer and Bristol-Myers Squibb - which also have similar drugs in their portfolios - could follow suit, Citi said in a note on Friday. Asked to comment on the suggestion that it would start testing vicriviroc in patients in 2014 as part of a combination therapy for cancer, a spokesman for Merck said: "We have not disclosed any such plans." Citi said it expected vicriviroc to re-enter clinical testing in combination with cancer immunotherapy as Merck explores its potential across multiple tumor types, including melanoma, colorectal, breast, prostate and liver cancer. Immunotherapy, which harnesses the body's immune system to fight cancer, is a hot new area for cancer research, with some experts predicting the approach will in future form the backbone of many cancer treatments. However, drug combinations are expected to be critical to its success as oncologists will need to block cancer cells on several fronts at once. One option is to combine two immunotherapies, while another approach, also being pursued by other companies like Roche Holding AG and AstraZeneca Plc, is to combine immunotherapy medicines with different drug types. CCR5 inhibitors are one such option, given the encouraging signals from pre-clinical research. As these drugs have already been studied in HIV, their development could be relatively rapid. Pfizer could also start clinical trials in cancer with its approved CCR5 drug Selzentry, which is currently marketed for HIV via the ViiV Healthcare alliance with GlaxoSmithKline and Shionogi & Co Ltd. Bristol, meanwhile, has a dual CCR2/5 inhibitor in mid-stage Phase II development, which is being tested for diabetes and kidney disease. More from this section

DG drops pvt firm's data centre access order

The order came two days after bdnews24.com reported the matter.

The Director General’s (DG) office told bdnews24.com that its earlier order had been revoked on Sunday. On Nov 6, the DG Khondokar Md Shefayetullah, in a surprising order, gave a private firm full access to the MIS’s ‘data centre’ to enable what the order describes as ‘automation’ of doctors’ confidential annual performance reports. Following the directive, Director Admin asked the ACR office to hand over all the annual confidential reports of the 23,000 officers, most of them doctors, to the private firm Nazdaq Technology. bdnews24.com carried a report on Friday, prompting the Director Admin to review the step. He told bdnews24.com on Saturday that, now, only 100 ACRs, under strict government supervision, would be given for ‘automation’ on an experimental basis. The DG’s step had even surprised the Senior Secretary of the Public Administration, who had told bdnews24.com on Friday that there was no question of the ACRs being shared with others. He said the data was highly confidential and the room where they were managed was out of bounds to general people. Some officials had earlier told bdnews24.com that the DG’s office had awarded the automation job to Nazdaq without floating any tender as one of the firm’s patrons was an influential contractor of the DG office. Health Minister AFM Ruhal Haque had told bdnews24.com on Friday that he had not known of the development before being told about it, and promised to investigate.

Hallelujah! Gospel via social media

Dear Followers I understand there are now over 10 million of you!" the pontiff wrote on his nine accounts, which publish simultaneously in languages including Latin, Polish, and Arabic.

"I thank you with all my heart and ask you to continue praying for me."

The first non-European pope in 1,300 years has tripled the number of followers of the @pontifex handles since succeeding Benedict XVI in March, according to the Vatican, which announced Francis had reached 10 million after adding together the followers of all his accounts.

This would make the pontiff more popular than the New York Times and just behind rapper Kanye West, according to websites.

But he still has a lot of Tweeting to do before he can catch up with the three most followed people on Twitter: pop stars Justin Bieber, Katy Perry and Lady Gaga, who have more than 40 million followers each.

The Vatican has long been interested in using the latest technologies to keep in touch with the world's 1.2 billion Catholics and spread the faith, with radio inventor Guglielmo Marconi setting up Vatican Radio in 1931.

Nazi-looted trove contains lost works by Chagall, Dix

Customs investigators seized the 1,400 artworks, dating from the 16th century to the modern period and by artists such as Canaletto, Courbet, Picasso and Toulouse-Lautrec, last year, an official said.

While experts consider the works to be of huge artistic value, the task of returning them to their rightful owners could take many years and poses a huge legal and moral problem for German authorities.

The haul, found in the flat of Cornelius Gurlitt, the reclusive son of a war-time art dealer, is one of the most significant discoveries of works looted by the Nazi regime and could be worth more than $1 billion, according to a German magazine.

Gurlitt has since vanished and authorities have not explained why it has taken them about a year to announce the massive find. The paintings, which were found in generally good condition, are being stored in an undisclosed location and they will not be published online.

"When you stand in front of works that were long considered lost, missing or destroyed, and you see them again, in a relatively good condition - a little bit dirty but not damaged - it's an incredible feeling of happiness," said Meike Hoffmann, an art expert from Berlin's Free University who has been assessing the find.

Systematic Plunder

The Nazis systematically plundered hundreds of thousands of art works from museums and individuals across Europe. Thousands of works are still missing.

Investigators chanced upon the art after Gurlitt, believed to be in his seventies, aroused their suspicions as he travelled by train between Zurich and Munich, carrying thousands of euros in cash, according to German media. He has since disappeared.

"We cannot say where the accused is, we do not know ourselves," said Reinhard Nemetz of the public prosecutor's office in Augsburg.

Jewish groups have urged that the origins of the art works be researched as quickly as possible, so that, if looted or extorted, they can be returned to their original owners.

For some families missing art constitutes the last personal effects of relatives murdered during the Holocaust.

Officials declined to comment on the value of the art. Germany's Focus magazine, which revealed the find and prompted authorities to go into the open, said it could be worth over 1 billion euros ($1.35 billion).

"We were able to confiscate 121 framed artworks and 1285 non-framed works, including some famous masterpieces," Nemetz said. "We had concrete clues that we were dealing with so-called 'degenerate art', or so-called looted art."

Cornelius's father Hildebrand Gurlitt was, from 1920, a specialist collector of the modern art of the early 20th century that the Nazis branded as un-German or "degenerate" and removed from show in state museums, or displayed simply to be mocked.

Nazi propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels recruited Gurlitt to sell the "degenerate art" abroad to try to earn cash for the state. Gurlitt bought some for himself and also independently bought art from desperate Jewish dealers forced to sell.

Troubling Questions

Investigators said the collection comprises works which are clearly from the Nazi regime's state-owned collection of "degenerate art". Others, which may have had several owners or may have been extorted from owners fearing Nazi persecution, will need extensive research.

Siegfried Kloeble, from Munich's customs investigation office, said media reports that authorities had failed to disclose the find for two years were wide of the mark. The search took place in 2012, and not, as reported, in 2011.

Hoffmann said that among the previously unknown paintings was a self-portrait by Dix, in impeccable condition, and probably painted around 1919.

A similarly unknown Matisse painting, of a seated female figure that he painted several times, probably dated from the mid 1920s and was confiscated in 1942.

Germany has faced criticism that the restitution process is too complicated and lacks sufficient funding. Nemetz said there were no plans to publish a list of the works online and people should come forward with inquiries.

Jewish restitution groups have often criticised state and museum authorities for not doing enough to research works' origins themselves and instead leaving the onus on relatives.

Love for the elderly

With China's divorce rate rising, Liu was one of thousands of middle-aged and senior lonely hearts who took part in the annual event sponsored by the Shanghai government after the upper age limit was raised from 45 to 60 this year.

"I'm looking for someone not too ugly," Liu said as she glanced around at the participants, many of whom were also too shy to mix and mingle.

She wanted to find a second husband when she was younger but her daughter did not want her to, she said, so she put her love life on hold.

The event, which drew 30,000 people last year, attracted an estimated 40,000 this year after organisers lifted the age limit to satisfy demand from the growing number of divorcees, said Xu Tianli, vice chairman of the Shanghai Matchmaking Agency Management Association.

With some people there in their 60s and even 70s, the age limit was not absolute.

"If anyone has earnest love and marriage needs then we will do our best to help them out," Xu said.

Divorce rates in China have climbed for seven years in a row. In 2012, the year-on-year rise in divorces outpaced that of marriages for the first time, according to official data.

The Chinese city with the highest divorce rate is Beijing, at 39 percent, according to local media. About half of U.S. marriages end in divorce, while the figure for Britain is 42 percent.

The issue has not escaped the notice of China's government, which is concerned that broken homes will erode social stability.

"Previously, the government didn't collect statistics but sensitivity to this issue is increasing," said Sun Qiliang, who heads China's Marriage and Family Counselling website.

"It's likely that children from divorced families will become social outcasts and vagrants. So it does have a negative impact on society."

To mend ailing marriages and encourage senior singles to date, China has introduced a range of measures.

In March the "Family Harmony" project was launched to train a force of "marriage doctors and nurses" to help stabilise rocky relationships.

The match-making event in Shanghai, held in a vast furniture warehouse, was divided into different sections, with three set aside for senior participants.

Zheng Zhixin, 68, said he and his wife got divorced while they were living in Japan when he worked there as an engineer.

"She wanted to stay but I wanted to come back home. Our direction was not the same," he said.

Zheng said he still believes in love but realises that socialising with women is not one of his strengths.

For Liu, the event offered a chance to find companionship, even though she did not find anyone who took her fancy.

"My daughter is married. I am lonely," she said. "I want someone to live with in case I get ill. I don't need love because I am already old."

Bombs don't stop business boom in Benghazi

The scene could be downtown New York or Milan if not for the occasional gun battles, car bombs and bearded Islamist fighters flourishing rifles and fundamentalist beliefs.

In Benghazi, Libya's eastern metropolis, the militias that plague much of the country flourish alongside a boom in sales of foreign brands catering to the city's burgeoning rich class.

Libya's second-largest city stands for almost everything wrong with the North African country and its fragile central government since the 2011 ouster of Muammar Gaddafi.

Tripoli government has little say in the rundown port where militias and Islamists set up private checkpoints, often beneath black Al Qaeda flags. The US ambassador was killed here during an Islamist assault on the US consulate in September 2012.

Benghazi sits at the heart of an autonomy movement resisting central government authority and taking over eastern ports to choke off nearly half of the OPEC nation's oil shipments in a push for more independence.

But that lawlessness has not hindered the arrival of expensive outlets and a three-floor mall. Venice Street, as it is called by locals, was once a dull backstreet. A year ago, luxury retailers turned it into a buzzing commercial strip.

"People have more money than under Gaddafi so business is excellent," said Mohammed Lara, chief executive of a perfume retailer, which has two Benghazi shops and plans another.

Customers are hungry for luxury goods because shopping under Gaddafi was frustrated by state controls and sanctions, he said. State markets sold anything from Turkish-made chocolate to Chinese socks to cover basic needs, but quality goods were out of reach for most on state salaries.

Despite suffering from anarchy and poor public services, Libyans are now better off financially. Gaddafi increased salaries for the public sector just before the NATO-backed uprising in a futile bid to ease dissent.

The new government, struggling to assert control of a vast country still filled with arms, has kept the salary increase and handed out more benefits, and not just for civil servants.

This year it raised salaries for oil workers by 67 percent in an apparent attempt to end protests at oil ports.

Half of the $54 billion national budget goes to state salaries and subsidies for anything from bread to petrol, health care and plane tickets to keep people happy.

"I am upgrading my fashion shops from Chinese textile to European brands as I see demand for quality products," said Ghanem Sheikhi, who is partner in a shopping mall and owner of fashion, computer game entertainment and fast-food shops.

One sector that is booming is travel. Local air traffic has risen to 1.8 million passengers annually, compared to some 800,000 in the Gaddafi era, said Qais al-Baksheshe, head of an organisation helping local authorities attract foreign firms.

Benghazi's tiny airport, with two ramshackle buildings dating back to before Gaddafi, is already served by carriers such as Turkish Airways or Egyptair.

Decades of neglect

Benghazi, a city with around one million residents, had been neglected for decades by Gaddafi who held a grudge against the eastern region known as Cyrenaica, the cradle of the uprising.

Despite the east sitting on 60 percent of Libya's oil wealth, buildings in Benghazi are dilapidated. Many houses built by Italian colonial rulers still show damage from air strikes during World War Two when the city changed hands between British and German troops.

Tripoli's government, hampered by infighting and militias refusing to disarm, has done little to improve public services. Aged hospitals, schools and universities have yet to be refurbished. At night, Venice Street is lit by sparkling shop fronts, not street lamps.

That has fuelled calls for more autonomy from Tripoli under a federal system to share wealth and power under post-colonial divisions of the Cyrenaica region to the east, southern Fezzan and Tripolitania to the west.

A Cyrenaica movement has already grown, declaring itself independent and set up its own administration and oil firm. Protesters have controlled oil ports in the east for months. It is still uncertain how much autonomy they can really exercise.

"We have many problems with the government in Tripoli," said Baksheshe from the business organisation, "For any project we need to go to Tripoli."

If there is development in Benghazi it comes from the private sector such as Chinese firms planning 20,000 housing units. Four large building projects and eight tower blocks are under way, and a Turkish firm plans an American University campus like in Cairo or Beirut.

Luxury and lawlessness

But the biggest obstacle in Benghazi remains the lack of security. Car hijackings are widespread, and assassinations of army or police officers are commonplace.

New luxury also attracts unwanted attention. When an armed gang attacked one perfume shop, some locals blame radical Islamists who tend to consider perfume or makeup as haram, or forbidden, under their fundamentalist interpretation of Islam.

"You can have growth for this, and the next, maybe three years but what then?" perfume retailer Lara said, sitting in his office in a high-rise tower in central Benghazi.

Baksheshe's institute is trying to persuade investors to come by guaranteeing them protection.

"We had a Turkish firm... which was afraid to come and demanded security. They've been here for three months and everything is going well," he said.

Even Islamists publicly welcome the shop bonanza, and say they reject violence. They said the Islamists would always respect others' beliefs, but hint they can show who is in charge when they are unhappy with Benghazi's direction.

"We only have a problem with violations of Islamic law like interest payments, alcohol or immoral places," said Ahmed Zlietny, spokesman for a local Islamic group campaigning for the introduction of Sharia law. "If we really wanted to impose Islamic law on Libyans we could do so by force."

Selfie' beats 'twerk' as word of the year

"Selfie" was chosen after it "gained momentum throughout the English-speaking world in 2013 as it evolved from a social media buzzword to mainstream shorthand for a self-portrait photograph", Oxford Dictionaries said in a statement.

The spike in popularity of the word, whose origin can be traced back to an Australian online forum in 2002, was based on "language research conducted by Oxford Dictionaries editors", the publisher said.

"Selfie" beat a number of other buzzwords of 2013, including "twerk" referring to dancing in a sexually provocative manner and which was popularized by singer Miley Cyrus at the MTV Video Music Awards last August.

"The Word of the Year need not have been coined within the past 12 months and it does not have to be a word that will stick around for a good length of time," Judy Pearsall, editorial director for Oxford Dictionaries, said.

"It is very difficult to predict accurately which new words will have staying power, and only time will tell if these words have lasting significance," she added.

"Selfie" has spawned a raft of spinoffs, including "helfie" for a picture taken of someone's own hair, "belfie" for taking a picture of your own posterior and "drelfie" for a self portrait while in a drunken state.

The word's usage was based on statistical analysis of the Oxford English Corpus, which is a structured set of texts stored electronically, and specifically the New Word Monitor Corpus, Oxford Dictionaries said.

It said that the New Monitor Corpus collects around 150 million words in use each month, using automated criteria to scan new web content using the English language worldwide.

This is used to track and verify new and emerging words and senses on a daily basis, and the firm has a dedicated team of editors whose job it is to add new words to the Oxford English Dictionary and OxfordDictionaries.com using this data.

Scientists identify new type of boredom

A group of scientists claim to have identified a new form of boredom which is an 'especially unpleasant' form of tedium, according to a report by the Independent.

The “apathetic boredom” elicits a feeling of learned helplessness similar to depression.

According to the scientists, led by Dr Thomas Goetz of the University of Konstanz in Germany, boredom can be categorised by levels of arousal (ranging from “calm” to “fidgety”), and how positive or negative boredom is experienced – its “valence”, according to the report.

The four types of boredom previously known were: “indifferent boredom”, in which people felt withdrawn but relaxed; “calibrating boredom”, a feeling of uncertainty in which people are receptive to but do not seek out change; “searching boredom”, which is restless and pursues distraction; and “reactant boredom”, wherein people are motivated to leave their situation for a specific change.


Goetz, his colleague Anne Frenzel, and a team of fellow researchers conducted two studies among 63 German university students and 80 German high school learners. Participants would fill in questionnaires through the course of a day on a PDA, discussing their activities and experiences.

Researchers found apathetic boredom in slightly more than a third of the high school students - a fact they said was "alarming".

The study also suggested that people might be disposed to feeling one particular type of boredom.

"We speculate that experiencing specific boredom types might, to some degree, be due to personality-specific dispositions," Dr Goetz was quoted as saying by the Independent.

New training for nurses

At least 25 nurses of the National Heart Foundation would receive the one-year training to improve their skills, it says.
National Professor Dr MA Malik praised the Trust’s initiative, saying continuous nurses' training was needed “to ensure a high level of patient care in any hospital”.
Tanvir Raquib, Executive Director of the Trust, thanked the management of the Research Institute for emphasising nurses' training and education.

According to the Good Heal Trust, the training module had been designed by the US-based Institute for Nursing Healthcare Leadership (INHL), an affiliate of the Harvard Medical School’s consortium hospitals.The training programme aimed at making the nurses “globally competitive” with improved patient managing knowledge, and exposure to the latest innovations.
They will be taught English, computer handling, and internet use to help them practise evidence-based nursing, the Trust says.

Link failure behind dyslexia

The problem lies in one part of the brain not being able to link up with another, the report says.

People with dyslexia cannot read or spell properly because of communication problems in their brain and not because they fail to form mental images of the sounds that make up a language, scientists have found.

Dyslexia has long been thought to result from an inability of the brain to learn all the small sound units or “phonemes” used to build up words, but a study suggests that this is false and that the real problem lies in one part of the brain not being able to link up with another, researchers said.

About one in ten people suffer from dyslexia which can lead to severe reading problems and difficulties with educational achievement even in highly intelligent people. Famous high-achieving dyslexics include Richard Branson, Steve Jobs, Walt Disney and Eddie Izzard.

Dyslexia is not associated with any obvious impairment in vision, hearing or general intelligence and this has led some to suggest that “word blindness”, as it is sometimes known, cannot be a genuine medical problem.

However, for about 40 years neuroscientists have argued that the problem is real and lies with the brain’s ability to acquire accurate representations of the various phonemes which are used in the communication of language.

More recently, other researchers have suggested that these phoneme representations are in fact there in the brain, it is just that they are not accessible by the other regions of the brain involved with language processing.

“The two hypotheses are very difficult to disentangle. This is because cognitive or behavioural tasks always tap both the representation and the access to this representation simultaneously,” said Bert Boets, a clinical psychologist at the Catholic University of Leuven in Belgium.

The study, published in the journal Science, managed to separate the two competing theories by using real-time brain scanning to observe how the brains of dyslexics and non-dyslexics coped with a set of mental tasks aimed at distinguishing between various sounds.

The scientists found that the dyslexic group was just as accurate as the non-dyslexics in completing the tasks and that the “crispness” of their brain scans were equal or even better to the people who could read normally.

Dr Boets said the findings demonstrated that the phonetic representations of the dyslexic subjects were “perfectly intact”. However, the dyslexics were about 50 per cent slower than the normal readers in making their responses, suggesting some kind of communication problem.

When the researchers analysed the overall activity of the brain, the dyslexics were notably different to the non-dyslexics. The dyslexics showed less coordination between the 13 brain regions that process basic phonemes and a region of the brain called Broca’s area, which is involved in higher-level language processing.

“Our neuroimaging findings suggest that it is not a deficit in underlying representations that characterise dyslexia,” the study concluded.

“Instead, our results suggest that a dysfunctional connection between frontal and temporal language areas [of the brain] impedes efficient access to otherwise intact representations of speech sounds, thus hampering a person’s ability to manipulate them fluently,” it found.

Dr Boets said that the findings are important because they could affect the way dyslexic children are trained to overcome their handicap. Traditional educational techniques for instance are designed to improve the quality of phonetic representations, not to increase access to them.

In the longer term, the results may also lead to new treatments based on improving these communication channels in the brain between various parts of the brain involved with the processing of language, he said.

“With this new knowledge, it is not inconceivable that we could design more focussed and effective interventions that specifically target improving the specific connections between frontal and temporal language regions [of the brain],” Dr Boets said.

Not everyone is convinced, however, Michael Merzenich, a neuroscientist at the University of California, San Francisco, said that previous scientific evidence has pointed to a lack of phoneme representation in dyslexic people and it would be wrong to just ignore the large body of scientific literature.

Q&A: Dyslexia explained

What is dyslexia?

It is one of the most common learning disorders, caused when children have difficulty with reading and spelling. They have problems in “decoding” the individuals sounds or phonemes that make up the words of a language.

Is it linked with low intelligence?

Dyslexia is called a learning disorder but it can affect all intellectual abilities. Not everyone on the dyslexia spectrum suffers to the same extent, so highly intelligent children with low-level dyslexia may read just as well as non-dyslexic children of lower intellectual ability.

How common is dyslexia?

Estimates range from 4 per cent to as many as 10 per cent. Dyslexia may become more apparent in certain cultures where the sounds and spelling of a language are not clear cut. Italian for instance, where the spelling follows the pronunciation quite closely, is probably easier for dyslexics than English, where words like “cough” and “dough” are spelt similarly but spoken very differently.

UNAIDS stresses gender equality for effective response

At a workshop, the UN officials on Monday said gender inequality must be addressed for effective HIV/AIDS response.

Such response should allow people at risk including women and girls equal access to services and treatment within communities and are treated equally before the law.

They said efforts to expand gender equality in national AIDS responses must be based on “a human rights approach”, including the elimination of stigma and discrimination which are high in countries like Bangladesh.

UN Women Country Representative Christine Hunter said “inequality permeates through many social and economic layers of society, which disadvantages women in a myriad of ways”.

And in such case, she said, “women do not have the right to control what happens to their own body, including who they have sex with and when”.

“According to the law marital rape does not exist, yet we know this is not the case,” she said.

On the opening day of the three-day workshop, the participants included different stakeholders including government officials, civil society representatives, NGOs, and key affected population groups.

They discussed gender equality, gender norms, stigma and discrimination and how it affects not only women and girls, but also men and boys.

The experts and the affected also talked about key affected populations such as men who have sex with men, female sex workers, injecting drug users, and transgender (hijra).

They also pointed out at emerging populations who are at risk of contracting HIV such as vulnerable young people and wives of returning migrants.

Line Director of the National AIDS/STD Program (NASP) Md Abdul Waheed said the government believed “gender issues must be a core consideration of the HIV response”.

He said this assessment process would “assist us to identify, and carry forward, areas where the response to HIV/AIDS in Bangladesh can be strengthened with respect to gender”.

UNAIDS Country Coordinator in Bangladesh Leo Kenny said the HIV/AIDS “response cannot be myopic in its view and address gender only in HIV, because gender is a priority in all areas”.

“The way we look at gender and HIV must be transformative,” he said, “transformative means that we must change, we must do things differently”.

The key findings of the workshop will be incorporated into the review of the National Strategic Plan, scheduled for early next year, and the Concept Note which Bangladesh will submit to The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria under the new funding model.

The workshop jointly organised by the government and the UNAIDS will end on Wednesday.

Malaria deaths drop: WHO

WHO said in its World Malaria Report 2013 that expanded prevention and control measures helped produce declines in malaria deaths and illness. Of the 3.3 million lives saved, most were in the 10 countries with the highest malaria burden and among children under age 5, the group most afflicted by the disease.

"Investments in malaria control, mostly since 2007, have paid off tremendously," said Ray Chambers, the United Nations Secretary-General's special envoy for malaria.

According to the WHO report, child deaths fell to fewer than 500,000 in 2012.

Overall, there were an estimated 207 million cases of malaria in 2012, which caused some 627,000 deaths, according to the report, which includes information from 102 countries with malaria transmission. That compared with an estimated 219 million cases and 660,000 deaths in 2010, the most recent year for which numbers are available.

"This remarkable progress is no cause for complacency: absolute numbers of malaria cases and deaths are not going down as fast as they could," WHO Director-General Dr Margaret Chan said in a statement accompanying release of the report.

"The fact that so many people are infected and dying from mosquito bites is one of the greatest tragedies of the 21st century."

Malaria is endemic in more than 100 countries worldwide but can be prevented by the use of bed nets and indoor spraying to keep the mosquitoes that carry the disease at bay. The mosquito-borne parasitic disease kills hundreds of thousands of people a year, mainly babies in the poorest parts of sub-Saharan Africa.

An estimated 3.4 billion people continue to be at risk for malaria, mostly in southeast Asia and in Africa where around 80 percent of cases occur.

Chambers said progress against malaria has been threatened by funding cuts in 2011-2012, which translated into a flattening in the curve of the decline. The WHO report noted significant drops in delivery of insecticide-treated bed nets in its 2013 report.

But that could begin to ease. Last month, the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, UNICEF, the UK's Department for International Development and the U.S. President's Malaria Initiative agreed to provide over 200 million nets in the next 12 to 18 months, which will replace 120 million existing bed nets and provide 80 million new ones.

WHO also continues to track emerging parasite resistance to artemisinin, the core component of malaria drugs known as artemisinin-based combination therapies, or ACTs, and mosquito resistance to insecticides. Four countries in southeast Asia reported artemisinin resistance in 2013, and 64 countries found evidence of insecticide resistance, suggesting recent gains against malaria "are still fragile," Dr Robert Newman, director of the WHO Global Malaria Program, said in a statement.

TB: an ‘unfinished agenda’

The battle against tuberculosis has been an unfinished tasks in Bangladesh, BRAC said on Wednesday, urging global leaders to retain the eradication of the contagious lung disease in the post-2015 development goals.

“If we lose the priority, the disease may come back as an epidemic,” Md Akramul Islam, associate director of BRAC’s Health, Nutrition and Population Programme, said. Bangladesh has achieved the Millennium Development Goal (MDG) target of 70 percent case detection and 85 percent cure rate in tuberculosis well before the 2015 time frame. But half of the country's adult population happens to be TB carriers. “The germ remains dormant, and can cause disease if it finds favourable conditions,” he said. “So we have to continue our stringent programmes,” he said, adding that a growing number of drug-resistant TB cases could put the progress at risk. He was speaking at a discussion jointly organised by the National Tuberculosis Programme, BRAC that spearheads government’s TB control programme and the Bangladesh Health Reporters’ Forum. The appeal came when global leaders were shaping the post-2015 development agenda as the MDG targets have less than 1000 days. Environmental issues are likely to dominate the next outlay. “Even we have challenges in treating floating TB patients in city slums,” Islam said. TB patients living in city slums and in and around railway stations and bus terminals often leave the place without giving notice, making it difficult for healthcare providers to continue their treatment. The treatment is extensive with a six-month combined medicines regimen that patients often miss if the course is not directly observed. Considering the fact, the national tuberculosis programme carries out the WHO suggested strategy called ‘DOTS’ in which every patient is directly observed when they take the drugs. The combined drugs are available only with the government, except a pharmaceutical company that can offer for the first two months. The government, however, advises all to visit the government centres across the country to get the free drugs. “It’s a challenge to bring all in the national programme,” said Programme Manager Dr Nuruzzaman Haque. He said in the first two months a TB patient has to take a combined dose of four drugs. “From the third month, they need a combination of two drugs that no pharmaceutical companies supply in the market. “Ultimately they have to come to the government centres. But between this they miss the dose raising the risk of drug resistance,” he said. ICDDR,B researcher Dr K Zaman said resistance due to mindless use of drugs did not decline as much as the new resistant cases. Due to early MDG achievements, Bangladesh will get $ 11million from donors in next three years for further implementation of the national tuberculosis programme, BRAC says.

HIV treatment facilities poor

A representative of their network, Habiba Akhter, said five out of eight blood samples testing machines for HIV lay idle in as many hospitals as the government did not appoint technicians and supply testing reagents regularly.
She also said at the World AIDS Day inauguration function, where National AIDS/STD Programme officials were present on Sunday, that the government had not taken steps to increase the number of voluntary testing and counselling centres across Bangladesh, although the need for them was proven globally.
She raised the issue when officials said they were all set to start “one-stop” service at five government hospitals from Jan where free ‘antiretroviral’ drugs would also be supplied.
“We think those hospitals are not well-prepared,” Akhter said in response to their remark.
“The (hospital’s) infrastructure is yet to be developed to offer services (to people with HIV). Doctors, nurses and other healthcare providers are not trained enough. The hospital environment is not conducive to the HIV positives,” she said.
“It is very difficult to keep people with HIV on drugs for long. The new government centres will even discourage them,” she said.
Currently, people with HIV receive free drugs supplied by the government through different rehabilitation centres.
However, Line Director of the government’s AIDS/STD Programme Dr Md Abdul Waheed said the infrastructure would be developed at the Dhaka, Chittagong, Sylhet, Khulna and Rajshahi medical college hospitals before launching the service.

He acknowledged that the testing machines for HIV - known as “CD4 Cells” counting machine - lay idle and argued that: “We don’t get many people for testing. The testing reagents expire”.
The CD4 cells counting machine helps in the testing of HIV/AIDS blood samples, determine the stage of the infection, guide anti-retroviral drug choices as well as indicate the patients’ response to treatment and disease progression.

Waheed said “even reagents expire in functioning machines”.He, however, said the government would also involve NGOs in hospital services so that “they get proper service”.
Habiba Akhter told bdnews24.com that people with HIV fear status would get disclosed in hospitals. “There are many examples. So we have to train and make healthcare providers aware first”.
With stigma attached to the disease, UN reports indicate that Bangladesh was unable to detect as many cases as it should because people refused to undergo tests.
The latest government figure released on Sunday put the number of people living with HIV at 3,241 in Bangladesh since the first case was detected in 1,989. AIDS patients numbered 1,299 and 472 people died of AIDS.
However, UN estimates the number to be between 8,000 and 16,000, which means many are left undetected and untreated.
The UNAIDS Country Coordinator in Dhaka, Leo Kenny, told bdnews24.com Bangladesh needed to ponder “very seriously” how to detect more HIV cases.
Of many ways, he said: “One is to make available voluntary testing and counselling centres and another way is to integrate this into the existing maternal, child and sexual reproductive health services so that tests can be done anywhere, in any health facility”.

New training for nurses

At least 25 nurses of the National Heart Foundation would receive the one-year training to improve their skills, it says.
National Professor Dr MA Malik praised the Trust’s initiative, saying continuous nurses' training was needed “to ensure a high level of patient care in any hospital”.
Tanvir Raquib, Executive Director of the Trust, thanked the management of the Research Institute for emphasising nurses' training and education.

According to the Good Heal Trust, the training module had been designed by the US-based Institute for Nursing Healthcare Leadership (INHL), an affiliate of the Harvard Medical School’s consortium hospitals.The training programme aimed at making the nurses “globally competitive” with improved patient managing knowledge, and exposure to the latest innovations.
They will be taught English, computer handling, and internet use to help them practise evidence-based nursing, the Trust says.

Link failure behind dyslexia

The problem lies in one part of the brain not being able to link up with another, the report says.

People with dyslexia cannot read or spell properly because of communication problems in their brain and not because they fail to form mental images of the sounds that make up a language, scientists have found.

Dyslexia has long been thought to result from an inability of the brain to learn all the small sound units or “phonemes” used to build up words, but a study suggests that this is false and that the real problem lies in one part of the brain not being able to link up with another, researchers said.

About one in ten people suffer from dyslexia which can lead to severe reading problems and difficulties with educational achievement even in highly intelligent people. Famous high-achieving dyslexics include Richard Branson, Steve Jobs, Walt Disney and Eddie Izzard.

Dyslexia is not associated with any obvious impairment in vision, hearing or general intelligence and this has led some to suggest that “word blindness”, as it is sometimes known, cannot be a genuine medical problem.

However, for about 40 years neuroscientists have argued that the problem is real and lies with the brain’s ability to acquire accurate representations of the various phonemes which are used in the communication of language.

More recently, other researchers have suggested that these phoneme representations are in fact there in the brain, it is just that they are not accessible by the other regions of the brain involved with language processing.

“The two hypotheses are very difficult to disentangle. This is because cognitive or behavioural tasks always tap both the representation and the access to this representation simultaneously,” said Bert Boets, a clinical psychologist at the Catholic University of Leuven in Belgium.

The study, published in the journal Science, managed to separate the two competing theories by using real-time brain scanning to observe how the brains of dyslexics and non-dyslexics coped with a set of mental tasks aimed at distinguishing between various sounds.

The scientists found that the dyslexic group was just as accurate as the non-dyslexics in completing the tasks and that the “crispness” of their brain scans were equal or even better to the people who could read normally.

Dr Boets said the findings demonstrated that the phonetic representations of the dyslexic subjects were “perfectly intact”. However, the dyslexics were about 50 per cent slower than the normal readers in making their responses, suggesting some kind of communication problem.

When the researchers analysed the overall activity of the brain, the dyslexics were notably different to the non-dyslexics. The dyslexics showed less coordination between the 13 brain regions that process basic phonemes and a region of the brain called Broca’s area, which is involved in higher-level language processing.

“Our neuroimaging findings suggest that it is not a deficit in underlying representations that characterise dyslexia,” the study concluded.

“Instead, our results suggest that a dysfunctional connection between frontal and temporal language areas [of the brain] impedes efficient access to otherwise intact representations of speech sounds, thus hampering a person’s ability to manipulate them fluently,” it found.

Dr Boets said that the findings are important because they could affect the way dyslexic children are trained to overcome their handicap. Traditional educational techniques for instance are designed to improve the quality of phonetic representations, not to increase access to them.

In the longer term, the results may also lead to new treatments based on improving these communication channels in the brain between various parts of the brain involved with the processing of language, he said.

“With this new knowledge, it is not inconceivable that we could design more focussed and effective interventions that specifically target improving the specific connections between frontal and temporal language regions [of the brain],” Dr Boets said.

Not everyone is convinced, however, Michael Merzenich, a neuroscientist at the University of California, San Francisco, said that previous scientific evidence has pointed to a lack of phoneme representation in dyslexic people and it would be wrong to just ignore the large body of scientific literature.

UNAIDS stresses gender equality for effective response

At a workshop, the UN officials on Monday said gender inequality must be addressed for effective HIV/AIDS response.

Such response should allow people at risk including women and girls equal access to services and treatment within communities and are treated equally before the law.

They said efforts to expand gender equality in national AIDS responses must be based on “a human rights approach”, including the elimination of stigma and discrimination which are high in countries like Bangladesh.

UN Women Country Representative Christine Hunter said “inequality permeates through many social and economic layers of society, which disadvantages women in a myriad of ways”.

And in such case, she said, “women do not have the right to control what happens to their own body, including who they have sex with and when”.

“According to the law marital rape does not exist, yet we know this is not the case,” she said.

On the opening day of the three-day workshop, the participants included different stakeholders including government officials, civil society representatives, NGOs, and key affected population groups.

They discussed gender equality, gender norms, stigma and discrimination and how it affects not only women and girls, but also men and boys.

The experts and the affected also talked about key affected populations such as men who have sex with men, female sex workers, injecting drug users, and transgender (hijra).

They also pointed out at emerging populations who are at risk of contracting HIV such as vulnerable young people and wives of returning migrants.

Line Director of the National AIDS/STD Program (NASP) Md Abdul Waheed said the government believed “gender issues must be a core consideration of the HIV response”.

He said this assessment process would “assist us to identify, and carry forward, areas where the response to HIV/AIDS in Bangladesh can be strengthened with respect to gender”.

UNAIDS Country Coordinator in Bangladesh Leo Kenny said the HIV/AIDS “response cannot be myopic in its view and address gender only in HIV, because gender is a priority in all areas”.

“The way we look at gender and HIV must be transformative,” he said, “transformative means that we must change, we must do things differently”.

The key findings of the workshop will be incorporated into the review of the National Strategic Plan, scheduled for early next year, and the Concept Note which Bangladesh will submit to The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria under the new funding model.

The workshop jointly organised by the government and the UNAIDS will end on Wednesday.

UNAIDS stresses gender equality for effective response

At a workshop, the UN officials on Monday said gender inequality must be addressed for effective HIV/AIDS response.

Such response should allow people at risk including women and girls equal access to services and treatment within communities and are treated equally before the law.

They said efforts to expand gender equality in national AIDS responses must be based on “a human rights approach”, including the elimination of stigma and discrimination which are high in countries like Bangladesh.

UN Women Country Representative Christine Hunter said “inequality permeates through many social and economic layers of society, which disadvantages women in a myriad of ways”.

And in such case, she said, “women do not have the right to control what happens to their own body, including who they have sex with and when”.

“According to the law marital rape does not exist, yet we know this is not the case,” she said.

On the opening day of the three-day workshop, the participants included different stakeholders including government officials, civil society representatives, NGOs, and key affected population groups.

They discussed gender equality, gender norms, stigma and discrimination and how it affects not only women and girls, but also men and boys.

The experts and the affected also talked about key affected populations such as men who have sex with men, female sex workers, injecting drug users, and transgender (hijra).

They also pointed out at emerging populations who are at risk of contracting HIV such as vulnerable young people and wives of returning migrants.

Line Director of the National AIDS/STD Program (NASP) Md Abdul Waheed said the government believed “gender issues must be a core consideration of the HIV response”.

He said this assessment process would “assist us to identify, and carry forward, areas where the response to HIV/AIDS in Bangladesh can be strengthened with respect to gender”.

UNAIDS Country Coordinator in Bangladesh Leo Kenny said the HIV/AIDS “response cannot be myopic in its view and address gender only in HIV, because gender is a priority in all areas”.

“The way we look at gender and HIV must be transformative,” he said, “transformative means that we must change, we must do things differently”.

The key findings of the workshop will be incorporated into the review of the National Strategic Plan, scheduled for early next year, and the Concept Note which Bangladesh will submit to The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria under the new funding model.

The workshop jointly organised by the government and the UNAIDS will end on Wednesday.

UNAIDS stresses gender equality for effective response

At a workshop, the UN officials on Monday said gender inequality must be addressed for effective HIV/AIDS response.

Such response should allow people at risk including women and girls equal access to services and treatment within communities and are treated equally before the law.

They said efforts to expand gender equality in national AIDS responses must be based on “a human rights approach”, including the elimination of stigma and discrimination which are high in countries like Bangladesh.

UN Women Country Representative Christine Hunter said “inequality permeates through many social and economic layers of society, which disadvantages women in a myriad of ways”.

And in such case, she said, “women do not have the right to control what happens to their own body, including who they have sex with and when”.

“According to the law marital rape does not exist, yet we know this is not the case,” she said.

On the opening day of the three-day workshop, the participants included different stakeholders including government officials, civil society representatives, NGOs, and key affected population groups.

They discussed gender equality, gender norms, stigma and discrimination and how it affects not only women and girls, but also men and boys.

The experts and the affected also talked about key affected populations such as men who have sex with men, female sex workers, injecting drug users, and transgender (hijra).

They also pointed out at emerging populations who are at risk of contracting HIV such as vulnerable young people and wives of returning migrants.

Line Director of the National AIDS/STD Program (NASP) Md Abdul Waheed said the government believed “gender issues must be a core consideration of the HIV response”.

He said this assessment process would “assist us to identify, and carry forward, areas where the response to HIV/AIDS in Bangladesh can be strengthened with respect to gender”.

UNAIDS Country Coordinator in Bangladesh Leo Kenny said the HIV/AIDS “response cannot be myopic in its view and address gender only in HIV, because gender is a priority in all areas”.

“The way we look at gender and HIV must be transformative,” he said, “transformative means that we must change, we must do things differently”.

The key findings of the workshop will be incorporated into the review of the National Strategic Plan, scheduled for early next year, and the Concept Note which Bangladesh will submit to The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria under the new funding model.

The workshop jointly organised by the government and the UNAIDS will end on Wednesday.

Diabetes battle 'being lost' as cases hit record 382 million

The vast majority have type 2 diabetes - the kind linked to obesity and lack of exercise - and the epidemic is spreading as more people in the developing world adopt Western, urban lifestyles.

The latest estimate from the International Diabetes Federation is equivalent to a global prevalence rate of 8.4 percent of the adult population and compares to 371 million cases in 2012. By 2035, the organization predicts the number of cases will have soared by 55 percent to 592 million. "The battle to protect people from diabetes and its disabling, life-threatening complications is being lost," the federation said in the sixth edition of its Diabetes Atlas, noting that deaths from the disease were now running at 5.1 million a year or one every six seconds. People with diabetes have inadequate blood sugar control, which can lead to a range of dangerous complications, including damage to the eyes, kidneys and heart. If left untreated, it can result in premature death. "Year after year, the figures seem to be getting worse," said David Whiting, an epidemiologist and public health specialist at the federation. "All around the world we are seeing increasing numbers of people developing diabetes." He said that a strategy involving all parts of society was needed to improve diets and promote healthier lifestyles. The federation calculates diabetes already accounts for annual healthcare spending of $548 billion and this is likely to rise to $627 billion by 2035. Worryingly, an estimated 175 million of diabetes cases are as yet undiagnosed, so a huge number of people are progressing towards complications unawares. Most of them live in low- and middle-income countries with far less access to medical care than in the United States and Europe. The country with the most diabetics overall is China, where the case load is expected to rise to 142.7 million in 2035 from 98.4 million at present. But the highest prevalence rates are to be found in the Western Pacific, where more than a third of adults in Tokelau, Micronesia and the Marshall Islands are already living with the disease. Pharmaceutical companies have developed a range of medicines over the years to counter diabetes but many patients still struggle to control their condition adequately, leading to a continuing hunt for improved treatments. Novo Nordisk, Sanofi and Eli Lilly are all major suppliers of insulin and other diabetes therapies.

Trust for Autistic children

These kids cannot watch and learn how to dress up, eat or use a toilet. They fail to make eye contact as they speak and have single-track thought process.

But many of them have ‘hidden’ talents like paintings and music. “When you see a man without a hand, you know he is disabled and you go to help him. But you will not understand someone like my boy and he will not be helped,” said 11 year old Mughdo’s father Khandaker Enamul Basir. Even few days back the couple was worried what would happen to Mughdo when they are dead and gone. But now they are hopeful. To the respite of parents of hundreds of autistic children like Mughdo, the Parliament has passed a landmark legislation to form a trust that would look after autistic children when no one is there to help them. The law asked the government to set up the trust as soon as possible for the protection of the children with neuro-development disorders like autism, down syndrome, intellectual disability, and cerebral palsy. The government will inject Tk 1 billion as a start-up fund for the proposed trust. The Prime Minister, possibly to be the President of its board, will head the advisory team. The board will bring together all 14 relevant ministries in its advisory team including the ministry of labour and employment that will look for jobs for these children. The 27 members of the board will be drawn from all walks of life but a government appointed expert on neuro-development disorder will be its chairperson. At least four parents of such disadvantaged children will also be the part of the board. The government will also nominate two persons from philanthropic and industrial entities for the board with a view to generate funds. “They (the trust board) will work for improving their living conditions and future rehabilitation,” Sajida Rahman Danny, President of a forum, the Parents Forum for Differently Able, said. “They will never be able to live independently,” Danny said, adding that Trust will try to bring out the best in their talents. Campaign on autism, new in Bangladesh, started with Saima Hossain Putul, a US-licensed school psychologist, organising a global meet in Dhaka in July 2011. Putul is Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina's daughter. Sonia Gandhi, president of India's ruling Congress party took part in the event among other global leaders that brought the issue to the forefront. Parents, who used to keep their kids suffering autism at home, came out and formed groups. Due to Bangladesh’s initiative, United Nations accepted a resolution on autism and World Health Organisation’s Executive Board ‘unanimously’ accepted an autism resolution Bangladesh placed in Geneva in May this year. But there is no national survey on autism. Estimates suggest every 8 in 1000 children are autistic in Bangladesh. It is 1 in 88 children in US. Danny, president of the Parents Forum that was actively engaged with the drafting of the law said the board would conduct a survey first to find out the number of children with this disorder. “The vision is when I am not here in the world to help him, the trust will be there,” the mother of a 20-year old child with autism said. She said a child with autism cannot handle properties or any assets, even if parents keep it for them. “Now the trust will look after them. They (parents) will be able to hand over the assets to the trust for their kids”. The board will sit in a meeting at least one in four months. The Parents Forum says the law recognises the problem of the autistic kids and wants it to be implemented. “People now understand they have a kind of talent. They are special,” President Danny said.

Boys more vulnerable than girls: Study

Premature birth is also a challenge in Bangladesh where it accounts for 45 percent of all under-1 month deaths.

Boys are more prone to premature birth than girls, according to a new research. Born before terms, the research also finds, boys are also more vulnerable to death and suffering than girls. The paediatric research published in the journal ‘Nature’ shows that boys are 14 percent more likely to be born preterm than girls. These premature babies suffer from learning problems and blindness to deafness and neuro-development disorders like cerebral palsy. The United Nations Children Fund and international NGO Save the Children called the new findings ‘groundbreaking’ in a joint statement. “Baby boys have a higher likelihood of infections, jaundice, birth complications, and congenital conditions but the biggest risk for baby boys is due to preterm birth,” Prof Joy Lawn of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine who was the team leader of the new research, said. A group of 50 researchers from 35 different institutions across the world carried out the research. They analyse different newborn conditions as estimated 13 million babies globally survive beyond the first month of their life every year out of the total 15.1 million preterm babies. “For two babies born at the same degree of prematurity, a boy will have a higher risk of death and disability compared to a girl,” Lawn said. “Even in the womb, girls mature more rapidly than boys, which provides an advantage, because the lungs and other organs are more developed. “One partial explanation for more preterm births among boys is that women pregnant with a boy are more likely to have placental problems, preeclampsia, and high blood pressure, all associated with preterm births,” Lawn explained. However, after the first month of life, in some societies where girls receive less nutrition and medical care, the girls are more likely to die than boys, despite this biological survival advantage for girls. Premature birth is also a challenge in Bangladesh where it accounts for 45 percent of all under-1 month deaths. Bangladesh had cut newborn deaths to almost double the regional and global averages last decade and achieved Millennium Development Goal on under-5 child deaths. But experts warn rising number of premature births could frustrate the success this decade. Statistics show at least one out of 10 infants is born weeks before the expected date of delivery on completion of 37 weeks of pregnancy in Bangladesh, and with less than 2.5 kilogram of weight. The recent ‘World prematurity Day-Country Data’ showed that estimated 237,100 premature boys were born in Bangladesh last year compared to 198,400 girls. These babies are usually born with underdeveloped organs, which lead to many other short- and long-term complications. They die of infections and many other complications as their immune system is incapable of fighting various germs. The Unicef and the Save the Children, however, said the issue was not getting adequate priority when it comes to funding on child health. In a joint statement, they said, in the last three years, globally $25 billion new funds have been spent on maternal, newborn and child health. Low- and middle-income countries, as well as private foundations, non-government organizations, and the private sector have raised about 40 percent of the funds. But less than 1 percent is specifically directed at premature or newborn care, according to the joint statement issued on World Prematurity Day observed on Sunday. Bangladesh, however, adopted some “proven and low-cost” solutions to cut premature deaths. In July this year, the government declared its commitment to scale-up affordable interventions like Kangaroo mother care management for premature babies in which babies are kept in direct contact of their mother. The government will also provide ‘corticosteroid’ to the pregnant mother with impending premature deliveries to reduce their babies’ complications.

HIV infections unabated

This despite low overall incidence in the country.

The report released on Monday, just before a major AIDS conference in Bangkok opened, was surely bad news for Bangladesh. “In epidemiological term an increase in incidence of new cases is not good for any country,” Dr Tajuddin Oyewale, Unicef Bangladesh chief on HIV/AIDS told bdnews24.com while reacting to the report. The report ‘HIV in Asia and the Pacific’ showed that some countries of the region like India, Myanmar, and Nepal could check the new bout of HIV infections by as much as 50 percent. The control went up exponentially in countries like Malaysia, Indonesia, Pakistan, and Philippines. But in Bangladesh and Sri Lanka, there is ‘no change’, meaning the increasing trend continues. “We need to ask ourselves why?” UNAIDS Country Coordinator in Bangladesh Leo Kenny told bdnews24.com. He said Bangladesh was not detecting enough cases and thus left many untreated . That's bad for prevention. The government record shows Bangladesh has less than 3000 people living with HIV as of last year and less than 1000 have access to the government supplied expensive drugs. But the UN estimates the number to be more than 8,000, which means many are left without treatment. “You cannot find them because they avoided getting tested with all the stigma attached," he said. "Bangladesh also lacks testing facilities." According to the report, Bangladesh has criminalised homosexuality, people who use drugs, and sex work, and it identifies these as barriers to HIV response. It said at least 20 percent people told researchers that they avoided going to a local clinic when needed because of their HIV status. He said the UN bodies were trying to find a way out. “The challenge is we cannot increase effort to get people on treatment. That is preventive and that will prevent new infections, but we cannot do that. Still, stigma keeps many away from coming for testing and treatment,” the UNAIDS Coordinator Kenny said. “We still use western blot and ELISA testing, we have to look at the community based testing. “It’s going to be critical if we scale up our efforts to treat more people,” he said particularly after a recent WHO guideline that advised starting drugs soon after the virus appears positive in blood. “It means we need to double the number of people on treatment.” Integrating HIV with the sexual reproductive health and mothers and child health services can increase their services, he said and that steps were on to find how the integration can take place. As a whole integration would be needed for the “continuum of care”, he said it would help scale up prevention, treatment, care and support. Bangladesh first identified a person with HIV in 1989. The response was extolled by many as Bangladesh started early intervention among the vulnerable people. The UNAIDS coordinator said ‘very strong effort’ of proving services to the injecting drug users helped Bangladesh to keep the epidemic below 0.1 percent. “That goes to the credit of Bangladesh’s strong leadership,” he said. But he says the new bout of infections would be a serious problem. But Bangladesh can eliminate at least new infections among infants as mother to child infection is easily preventable and the number is very low, he said. The Asia and the Pacific congress has brought together more than 3,000 participants from 80 countries to find ways for collective efforts to achieve ‘zero new infections, zero AIDS related deaths and zero discrimination’.

MERS found in Qatar, linked to human spread

The SARS-like coronavirus, which emerged in the Middle East last year and has killed almost 40 percent of the around 170 people so far infected, was found in three camels in a herd in a barn also linked to two human cases of MERS infection.

"The three camels were investigated among a herd of 14 camels, and the samples were collected as part of the epidemiological investigation," Qatar's Supreme Council of Health said in a statement.

It added that the two confirmed human cases linked to the barn had since recovered. Scientists around the world have been seeking to pin down the animal source of MERS virus infections since the first human cases were confirmed.

British researchers who conducted some of the very first genetic analyses on MERS last September said the virus, which is from the same family as Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome, or SARS, was also related to a virus found in bats.

Confirming and commenting on the virus being found in camels in Qatar, WHO spokesman Gregory Hartl said there was still insufficient evidence to say for sure what the source of the human MERS infections was.

"Neither camels nor bats can yet be said to be reservoir of MERS," he said on the networking site Twitter.

Ab Osterhaus, a professor of virology at the Erasmus Medical Centre in The Netherlands that worked on the camel study, told Reuters the results were confirmed by a range of tests including sequencing and antibody testing.

Dutch scientists said in August they had found strong evidence that the MERS virus is widespread among one-humped dromedary camels in the Middle East - suggesting people who become infected may be catching it from camels used for meat, milk, transport and racing.

Saudi officials said this month that a camel there had tested positive for MERS a few days after its owner was confirmed to have the virus.

The World Health Organisation (WHO) said in its latest MERS update on November 22 that of the 176 laboratory-confirmed and probable reported human cases to date, 69 people had died.

Human cases of MERS, which can cause coughing, fever and pneumonia, have so far been reported in Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Kuwait, Jordan, United Arab Emirates, Oman, Tunisia, France, Germany, Spain, Italy and Britain.

Osterhaus, whose team worked with Qatar's Health and Environment Ministries on the study, said that, at this stage, "no more details can be disclosed" about the findings since a scientific paper was in the process of being prepared and submitted for peer review and publication.

The Qatari health council said, however, as a precaution, the elderly and people with underlying health conditions such as heart disease, diabetes and respiratory illnesses should avoid any close animal contact when visiting farms and markets.

Doctors’ spread HIV stigma’

After a clinic near his garment factory in Narayanganj found his blood HIV positive, the news spread to his workplace.

He and his wife lost their jobs and the landlord refused to let them live in his apartment.

After a few days in hiding to avoid the furore, the couple found a place in a centre in Dhaka.

Hossain was narrating his horrendous experience to bdnews24.com from the centre on Saturday, a day before World AIDS Day.

The theme of this year is achieving the 'Three Zeros' – zero new infections, zero AIDS deaths and zero stigma and discrimination.

Bangladesh boasts of low HIV/AIDS prevalence, but the stigma runs very deep even with the healthcare providers, that UNAIDS warns, can frustrate efforts to achieve the 'Three Zeros'.

Hossain looks like a healthy man. But when doctors told him about his HIV status in Feb, he says his heart 'just dried up'.

The doctors told him he would not live much longer.

"They told me you will die soon. Fulfil whatever dreams you have. Your wife will also die,” is what Hossain was told.

The clinic doctor did not see his wife but presumed her to be HIV positive as well because the virus is sexually transmitted, besides through blood.

To Hossain's queries about the possibility of a child, the doctors said: “You’ll not survive. How can you expect a child?”

Hossain came out of the clinic devastated, but something worse waited for him at his office.

“I broke into tears, but controlled myself to go to the office. In my 15 minutes to office, I took two to three litres water.

“On entering my office, I was taken to a separate room where I saw my wife was waiting. Our supervisors were talking to her and enquiring about her health condition.

“It was lunch time but we were not allowed to go to the lunch.

“They gave us a full month pay and told us not to come to the office anymore. Even we were not allowed to say goodbye to our colleagues with whom we worked for the last 10 years or so”.

How would his office come to know and so quickly?

“The clinic informed them,” Hossain said. “The clinic disclosed my status so that we cannot spread the virus”.

“They got my office details while talking with me”.

He said the news spread so quickly within the community that many came to their home for a good-bye last look.

The landlord of the rented house where they used to live nearby the garment factory came to know that both of them were HIV positive and asked them to leave ‘immediately’.

“We just managed to hide in a place for some days at a far off place.

“Later one of my younger brothers managed information about this centre and then we came,” Hossain sighed a relief, “Life changed”.

He also got a job at the centre and managed a healthy living with free drugs supplied for both of them.

Both of them were tested again at the centre and found HIV positive.

Hossain said that his wife was infected with HIV when she underwent a major brain surgery three years back.

“I had to manage more than 10 bags of blood for her (brain surgery) in 2010. The virus came to her body from the blood bought and then it passed to me.

“But we were not aware of this until this Feb. Despite worsening health, both of us were so busy working for survival”.

Hossain said before telling him his HIV status the doctors charged him whether “I had unsafe sex around”.

“They told me straight you got AIDS, you will die soon. Your wife is also infected”.

Executive Director of Ashar Alo Society

Executive Director of Ashar Alo Society Habiba Akhter who champions the cause of HIV infected patients says after more than 20 years of detecting the first case in Bangladesh, the HIV stigma is beginning to come down somewhat.

She is herself affected by HIV.
“But it (stigma) is widespread among the healthcare providers. Some of them directly drive them (people with HIV) out of their clinic. And others refer them from one place to another”.

The government record shows Bangladesh has less than 3,000 people living with HIV until last year.

But the UN estimates the number at more than 8,000, which means many are left without treatment because they are not capable of braving the stigma.

She said even a big hospital in Dhaka rejected one of their patients with HIV positive for his gall bladder operations this year.

“They write in big letters in his prescription that he is HIV positive and put a seal ‘no bed vacant’ ”, said Akhter.

Line Director of the National AIDS/STD Programme, Dr Md Abdul Waheed, however, said these were “scattered incidents”.

“Things have improved than before,” he said.

“We have less HIV/AIDS patients. So it’s not difficult for us to treat them”, said Dr Waheed.

He said they were preparing five medical college hospitals in Dhaka, Chittagong, Sylhet, Khulna, and Rajshahi from where one-stop service would be provided to HIV patients from January.

“So I think there will be no problem in future,” he said.

Waheed's optimism is not shared by Ashar Alo Society’s Akhter who give shelter to many like Hossain.

“I have visited such a centre at Chittagong Medical College Hospital. It is a filthy abandoned small room.

“Patients will stop going there. It is very difficult to keep people with HIV on drugs for long. The new government centres will discourage them all the more,” she said.

“And they will not find doctors after the office time. They also have fears of their status being disclosed in hospitals,” she said suggesting “strong government and NGO collaboration” for their treatment.

Hossain who was narrating his own experience was also sceptical.

“In 10 days (in Feb) I lost 20 kgs. The clinic sent me in a tizzy and I was so frightened”.
“But here I found many living with HIV for 15 years, 20 years and even more. You can't believe they have been living with HIV. They are very healthy,” Hossain said, insisting he has gained weight at the centre.

Then came the unbelievable -- the news that his HIV positive wife is also pregnant.

“The clinic told me we will not survive…forget about children…no possibility. But here we came to know that my wife still can give birth to a healthy baby with proper drugs”.