THE INDIAN SOLUTION FOR SWINE FLUE (H1N1 Influenza)- JUST STAY HOME FOR 10 DAYS

The India Govt simply prescribes home stay for 7-10 days after H1N1 influenza..... either you are death and than you can be burned or you arise out of the ashes and can fo back to school or business

New Delhi: Those showing mild symptoms of H1N1 Influenza need not get admitted to a hospital or even get tested for infection. They should simply stay at home for 7-10 days without stepping out or meeting anyone. Students should avoid going to class for a week, for which they don’t even have to produce a medical certificate to the school. Schools, on the other hand, have been asked to stay open in case a student tests positive for H1N1.
They will, however, have to inform the health authorities if a large number of students complain of flu-like symptoms so that contact tracing can be conducted. These are some of the few recommendations finalized by the Union government on Tuesday during the crucial meeting of the health ministry’s joint monitoring group. On Wednesday, the ministry will dispatch these national guidelines to all states informing them that India is gradually switching over to admitting only severe patients showing flu-like symptoms and complaining of lower respiratory disease.
Screening at airports will also be stopped in the near future and all suspected patients would no more be tested. Tamiflu will also be used judiciously and administered only to those with serious H1N1 influenza like symptoms.
With the number of positive H1N1 cases in India inching towards the 500-mark (475 positive cases at present), the country is fast bracing with the reality that the virus has got entrenched in the community and can no more be controlled. “In a directive to be sent on Wednesday, the Centre will ask states to ensure that schools don’t shut down because of H1N1 infection among its students. Students will be informed to stay at home if they feel unwell. They will, however, not have to produce medical certificates to prove they are H1N1 infected or not. Schools will be told not to press for such medical certificates,” officials who were part of the crucial meeting said. Delhi has already reported 30 cases of H1N1 infection among school students while Pune has reported around 45 cases among students.

In Thailand where there are a lot mor cases , things are take a little more serious , but of course Indian seeing themselves as the superior race of the world are immune against H1N!


Thai authorities on Wednesday announced another 21 deaths from swine flu in the past week, bringing the death toll to 65. Across the kingdom 30 women and 35 men have been killed by the A(H1N1) virus in 27 of the 76 provinces, a public health ministry statement said.
Of these victims, 41 had underlying diseases such as heart problems, diabetes or kidney failure, the ministry said, while the other 24 were admitted to hospital too late to be saved.
Thailand’s cabinet on Tuesday earmarked an additional 13.2 million dollars to combat swine flu as the number of infections climbed to an estimated 500,000.
A medical expert had reported the 500,000 figure to the cabinet, government spokesman Phumin Leetheeraprasert said, although Wednesday’s health ministry statement said it could not accurately confirm the total number.

From Kounteya Sinha | TNN

BRAVERY TEST AT SCHOOL

After the publication of the incredible and ridiculous so called bravery test in TIMES OF INDIA a political reaction came: Tamil Nadu school education minister Thangam Thennarasu directed officials to issue circulars to schools across the state, instructing them not to subject students to “any kind of unsafe practices”. The direction comes in the wake of a shocking report published in The Times of India on Tuesday about a government school in Villupuram organising a ‘bravery show’, in which a motorcyclist rode over the outstretched hands of young students, aged about 10 years, on July 15.
The video attached speaks for itselves how can anyone educational skilled person come to the idea to force kids to this kind of bravery test
Reacting strongly to the Villupuram incident, activists have condemned the school for “failing in its basic duty to protect and provide safety to its wards” and demanded action against the management. ‘‘When acts of bravery or adventure appear even remotely harmful to the child, they shouldn’t be a part of it,’’ an activist said.
Ossie Fernandes, convenor of the Tamil Nadu Child Rights Protection Network, said, “This is torture, not bravery. Anything could have gone wrong. The school shouldn’t be asking children to perform such feats. It has seriously failed in its duty to protect the children.”
Joint secretary of the Indian Council for Child Welfare Girija Kumarbabu said it was akin to child abuse when schools asked children to take part in such shocking events without bothering about their safety.

POVERTY IN INDIA - LOOKING FOR REASONS

Extract from an article of Jug Suraiya in Indian Times

Sixty-two years after independence, even as India boasts an economy widely acknowledged to be the second fastest growing in the world, there is another, alternative India which continues to be mired in the most appalling poverty. According to a recent World Bank report, 25 per cent of India’s population – that’s a projected 313 million human beings – will be living in “extreme poverty”, calculated at $1.25 a day, in 2015. India ranks only a little better than sub-Saharan Africa where the corresponding figure will be 37.1per cent, while that for China will be 6.1 per cent. In 1990, China’s “extreme poverty” population was 60.2 per cent, while that of India’s was 51.3 per cent. By 2005, totalitarian China had managed to reduce its figure to 15.9 per cent, while democratic India’s poverty quantum came down merely to 41.6 per cent. China had political dictatorship, but relative freedom from poverty; India enjoyed political freedom (at least in theory), but suffered under the brutal despotism of poverty.
This is not to argue the merits of dictatorship versus democracy. Without argument, democracy is better than dictatorship. If for no other reason than that in a democracy you can have a democracy-vsdictatorship debate; in a dictatorship you can’t. What can, and must, be argued, however, is that Indian democracy has tragically failed to protect so many of its citizens, for so long, from extreme economic degradation. The reasons for this – the many sins of omission and commission responsible for this shameful state of affairs – would fill entire libraries. But without going into details – where the Devil is said to lurk – it could, and ought, to be said that this national scandal clearly amounts to a case of massive and sustained malpractice on the part of all the governments elected into office since independence.
The answer to such questions is that our lawmakers see themselves, and have conditioned us to see them, as being above the laws they enact and enforce upon us. And till that changes, our much-celebrated dance of democracy will, for millions, remain a danse macabre. A dance of living death.

THE SIKH CONFLICT

In a congregation in Vienna in a Gurdwara where Sant Niranjan Dass and Sant Ram Nand were holding a sermon, at least six persons belonging to a rival Sikh group attacked the preachers injuring 30 people, nine of them critically. Sant Rama Nand later died in the hospital during operation. Sant Niranjan Dass who is head of the Guru Ravi Dass Gurdawara in village Ballan on Jhalandhar-Pathankot road was injured but out of danger, reports said.


Shri Guru Ravi Dass acknowledged the oneness, omnipresence and omnipotence of God. According to him the human soul is only a particle of the Divine; the difference between the two is like the difference between gold and the ornament, water and the wave (GG,, 93). He rejects distinctions between man and man on the basis of caste or creed, for, as he says, in the world beyond, no such differentiation will be acknowledged( GG, 345). To realize God, which is the ultimate end of human life, man should concentrate on His/Her name, giving up mere forms and rituals (GG, 658, 1106). Birth in a low caste is no hindrance in the way to spiritual development. The only condition required is freedom from duality; all else including pilgrimage to and bathing in the sixty-eight centres is in vain (GG, 875)/>


The neglection of cast and status is the cause of the conflict, since higher cast Sikh cannot accept Dalit Sikh to be equal in rang.


The clash in a Vienna gurdwara and the mob fury are yet another manifestation of simmering discontent that Dalits in Punjab feel due to increasing social inequality and oppression in a society that was supposed to be free of it.
Even as Punjab and booming city centres like Ludhiana clock impressive economic indicators, caste prejudices and biases remain steeped among followers of Sikhism, with Jat Sikhs and Dalits facing-off in a festering, endless dispute over rights, rituals and religion. Rising prosperity levels among sections of Dalits, especially in the NRI-rich belt of Doaba Jalandhar, Hoshiarpur and Nawashahar has deepened the polarisation.
While the so-called lower castes want equality and recognition as full Sikhs, those in the upper echelons still resist. And with a large population of Dalits, a substantial 29% and with a high 45 to 50% in prosperous Doaba, the reactions to incidents of harassment, or even a hint of it, are fast and furious.
To get an indication of just how insidiously the caste equation has played out in Punjab, the gurdwaras themselves have bifurcated, with separate gurdwaras for separate castes, sometimes up to five in one village.

Till a few months ago, Vienna had just one gurdwara on Rudolphsheim Street, controlled by radicals loyal to Khalistan, a separate Sikh homeland.
With the Dera Sach Akhand, a Jalandhar-based sect that follows the teachings of guru Ravidass (the 14th century founder of the Ravidassia sect) setting up a gurdwara on the same street, radicals saw red. The new shrine took away a chunk of devotees and offerings.
Tempers frayed when sect head Niranjan Das was attacked on Sunday, allegedly by pro-Khalistan Sikhs.
The bloody clash in the temple in Vienna provoked a violent backlash by low-caste Sikhs in Punjab on Monday.

Two people were killed and scores injured as mobs blocked rail tracks and highways.
Authorities clamped curfew in four cities — Jalandhar, Ludhiana, Phagwara and Hoshiarpur — and called in the Army at Jalandhar as protesters set fire to train coaches and buses and clashed with police.



One person was killed and four injured as soldiers opened fire in Lambra village, near Jalandhar, and another died in police firing on protesters at Jalandhar Cantt railway station. Army and police had to resort to firing in at least five places in Jalandhar and Phillaur. As violence spread to Haryana, Punjab CM Parkash Singh Badal said he had sought 25 companies of paramilitary forces from the Centre.


Now the violence is entering in Haryana and I am once more afraid

THE SIKH CONFLICT -AN OVERVIEW

SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE- REALITY TOKE OVER FROM THE FAIRY TALE

Rubina the young female star of Slumdog Millionaire has now to pass the night on the street after the hut she was living in with her parents was demolished.

LONGLIVETY IN INDIA - FEMALE LIFETIME

Around 55 of 1,000 girls born every year don't live beyond their first
birthday and 77 per 1,000 births don't live beyond the age of five.

While a girl born in India today is expected to live for 65 years, the average life expectancy of a male child stands at 63.

Similar is the case with Pakistan and Nepal. While the life expectancy of girls in Pakistan stands at 64 and 63 for boys, in Nepal, an average girl child is expected to live till she is 63 and a male child till the age of 62.

In comparison, girls born in Japan will on an average live till they are 86 and those born in China and Sri Lanka will live till they are 75.
The tiny nation of San Marino, which is surrounded by Italy, has the world's lowest child mortality and boasts the longest average lifespan for men anywhere, at 81 years.

This has been revealed by WHO's World Health Statistics 2009.

Globally, WHO recorded 9 million deaths of under five-year-olds in 2007, 28% lesser than the 12.5 million who died in 1990.

India too recorded a fall in infant mortality. While 84 girls per 1,000 population died in 1990 before they reached they reached the age of one year, the number fell to 68 in the year 2000. In case of male children, 82 deaths per 1,000 births in 1990 reduced to 66 deaths per 1,000 live births in 2000.

The under five mortality rate too has decreased in India. While 109 male children per 1,000 births died before their fifth birthday, it dropped to 86 in 2000 and 67 per 1,000 births now.

"The decline in the death toll of children under five can be achieved by scaling up interventions such as insecticide-treated mosquito nets for malaria and oral rehydration therapy for diarrhoea, increased access to vaccines and improved water and sanitation," said Dr Ties Boerma, director of WHO's department of health statistics and informatics.

According to the report, adolescent pregnancy rates remained high across the world. There were 48 births for every 1,000 women aged 15-19 years in 2006, a small decline from 51 per 1,000 in the year 2000.

An estimated 1.2 billion people are affected by neglected tropical diseases every year. In 2007, 546 million people were treated to prevent the parasitic disease lymphatic filariasis.

Out of every 100 deaths worldwide, 51 are due to non-communicable conditions 34 due to communicable, maternal or nutritional conditions and 14 due to injuries.

"Action needs to be taken now to implement preventive interventions, including reductions in tobacco use, overweight and obesity, and high blood pressure," the report said.

Child mortality is one of the millennium development goals adopted by UN member states, with the aim of cutting infant deaths by two-thirds between 1990 and 2015.

But that progress was still slow and sparse, especially in poor countries and in Africa.

In low income countries, $22 per capita goes to health care, compared to $4,012 in wealthy nations, according to WHO.

Pneumonia and diarrhoea kill 3.8 million infants every year, even though both conditions are treatable, WHO said.

Another development goal, maternity mortality, remains largely unchanged since 1990, with a global average death rate of 400 maternal deaths per 100,000 births a year, and more than double that rate in sub-Saharan Africa.

THE ULTIMATE TEST- WHO CAN FLY ?

The early selection of young parachutist recruts by the juvenile section of the Indian Air Force

VEG ART VII

REIKI MEDITATION

An Article from THE SPEAKING TREE IN TIMES OF INDIA

Contact:svn.mittal@gmail.com
THE SPEAKING TREE


Doing Meditation The Reiki Way



V N Mittal



Regular practice of the simple two-way technique of Reiki meditation can not only help you improve your focus and awaken you spiritually, but also can amplify your innate healing abilities to help you achieve holistic health
Maintaining a high level of life force energy, prana, is a prerequisite for holistic health, achieved through practice of various techniques that can generate balance between body and mind, such as yoga, Tai Chi, Quantum Touch, or Reiki, to name just a few. All of them employ one or the other form of meditation as an important component for treatment at the physical, mental and emotional levels.
The two-in-one Reiki meditation technique deftly combines the healing powers of both meditation and Reiki. The benefits accruing from them increase manifold as a consequence of synergy generated by blending them together. What keeps Reiki meditation apart from other meditation forms is its unique ability to strengthen the innate healing capability of the practitioner.
Mikao Usui revived the ancient art of tapping into the universal life force energy for healing known as Reiki. He was once asked by a pupil, "I have practised meditation for a number of years, why do i need to learn Reiki to help me learn to meditate?" Meditation is an integral part of Reiki. In his Reiki practice and teachings, Usui practised meditation as an important constituent. In fact, he often used Gassho (hands held in prayer position) meditation as a means to pass the ability to channel Reiki to the practitioner. Also, Osho Rajneesh who developed Osho Neo Reiki 20 years ago included powerful meditations for a faster healing.
After Usui, a number of forms of Reiki meditations have found their way in Japan and other countries. One of the simplest but effective forms involves the following steps:
1. Sit quietly with closed eyes in a Sukh Asana or upright in a chair, with both hands held in front of your chest in prayer ‘Gassho’ position and the soles of the feet joined together.
2. Connect to Reiki by simple intent or by drawing distant healing symbol.
3. Draw the power symbol with your hand in front of you and say it three times. Visualise white light emanating from your fingers.
4. Visualise the symbol in the third eye chakra and meditate on it.
5. Now allow the symbol to float up as a brilliant light above your crown. Return your awareness to the third eye chakra.
6. When finished, relax and release your all thoughts. You feel fully energised with the healing energy

For those who do not possess the ability to channel Reiki, the Gassho meditation can be performed in this way:
1. Hold your hands a little above the chest in prayer position in such a way that your exhaled breath can be felt at a point where the top of the middle fingers representing fire element meet the hands joined together.
2. Now focus your attention at that point and try to release stray thoughts by focusing at the point repeatedly. Do not try to chase stray thoughts. Return your focus to the point by pressing the two middle fingers against each other.
Practise Reiki meditation for 20 minutes a day or as long as you feel comfortable. Reiki meditation deftly combines the usual healing effects of simple meditation techniques with Reiki and works in more ways than one.
The writer is a Reiki Sensei based in Dehradun. E-mail: vn.mittal@ gmail.com