http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/centre-planning-major-changes-in-rules-for-clinical-trials/article4038739.ece

Centre planning major changes in rules for clinical trials

A Polio free South-East Asia is within reach - WHO

A Polio free South-East Asia is within reach - WHO

VS

Eleven countries in WHO’s South-East Asia Region are now on track to declaring the Region Polio free, this was recognized during an event at the WHO’s Regional Committee Meeting in Yogyakarta, today. The last case of wild poliovirus in the Region was reported on 13 January 2011 in India making a regional polio free certification possible in early 2014.
“The magnitude of effort gone into achieving the Zero Polio status could be well understood by the fact that during each nationwide polio vaccination campaign, India has successfully vaccinated 172 million children through 2.3 million vaccinators in 202 million households,” said Mr Sudip Bandyopadhyay, India’s Minister of State for Health and Family Welfare. “India has several critical lessons learnt during the journey of polio eradication which will act as a guide not only for India but for the entire world in any public health intervention,” he added.
Twenty months without any cases of polio reported in the Region is an important milestone, but the mission has not been accomplished yet. Now is the time for maximum vigil, high levels of preparedness, high quality surveillance and maintenance of high immunity against polio among all children under five years old. This must be done through intensified routine immunization and supplementary vaccination campaigns when and where needed. The recent outbreaks in Asia-Tajikistan in 2010 and China in 2011 – have provided important lessons in maintaining high population immunity as protection against importations.
“On present trends, the South-East Asia Region is set to be declared polio-free in January 2014. This is a magnificent achievement. We must now eradicate polio globally. Medical officers from India, Bangladesh and Nepal are directly assisting countries that are still battling the wild virus. This region has the expertise, bolstered by success, to lead the world in this emergency response. We can and must win” said Dr. Margaret Chan, WHO Director General.
India had been the largest endemic reservoir of polio in the world and suffered the greatest burden of paralytic polio. At times as many as 250 000 cases of paralytic polio occurred in India each year. India launched its fight to eradicate polio in 1995.
One of the lessons learnt in India was the importance of maintaining political commitment, robust national and international partnerships, availability of quality data, its analysis and use, and evidence-based accountability at all levels of the programme.
The milestone of 20 months without polio has not come easily for WHO’s South-East Asia Region. The main lesson is that there is no single national approach. Experiences need to be carefully reviewed and translated to fit with each country.
WHO is working with countries to ensure the Region sustains the gains made on polio eradication and achieves the regional polio-free certification in early 2014.
WHO
WHO’s Constitution came into force on 7 April 1948 – a date we now celebrate every year as World Health Day. WHO is the directing and coordinating authority for health within the United Nations system. It is responsible for providing leadership on global health matters, shaping the health research agenda, setting norms and standards, articulating evidence-based policy options, providing technical support to countries and monitoring and assessing health trends. WHO is responsible for the World Health Report, a leading international publication on health, the worldwide World Health Survey. The World Health Organization is a member of the United Nations Development Group.
In the 21st century, health is a shared responsibility, involving equitable access to essential care and collective defence against transnational threats.
Objective
WHO identifies its role as one of six main objectives:

• providing leadership on matters critical to health and engaging in partnerships where joint action is needed;
• shaping the research agenda and stimulating the generation, translation and dissemination of valuable knowledge;
• setting norms and standards and promoting and monitoring their implementation;
• articulating ethical and evidence-based policy options;
• providing technical support, catalyzing change, and building sustainable institutional capacity; and
• monitoring the health situation and assessing health trends.

Real and synthetic milk [you must need to know ]

The Technology of Synthetic Milk [Milk Adulteration and Synthetic Milk ] 

[ Real and synthetic milk ]

When a person goes out to buy a product, they almost never think of the possibility of the product being counterfeit or fake, one almost never thinks to the extent of it being adulterated [Render (something) poorer in quality by adding another substance, typically an inferior one ] .

 

India is the top producer of milk in the world, a result of the white revolution of IDDB(Indian Dairy Development Board) in the 70’s. However, the paradox here is the fact that India is also the first country where synthetic milk was produced. Synthetic milk is the most common form of adulteration and since milk is a major component of any dairy product, thus, its effects spread out .

 

So, what exactly is Synthetic milk and why is it rising up such a big issue for haven’t we Indians already got a plentiful of issues like corruption, bad governance, religion to deal with . 

Do you know that Only 25% of the milk being produced in India is coming from cows and buffaloes, the rest all is coming out of the scientific “jugaad” of our milkman’s [synthetic way ] and Its production and sale is approximately 1.1 crore litre everyday .

 According to Food Safety Standards Authority of India FSSAI 70 -100 per cent of the milk has been adulterated with very dangerous adulterants. Milk samples from all over the country were checked for fat (%), SNF (%), neutralizers, acidity, hydrogen peroxide, sugar, starch, glucose, urea, salt, detergents, skimmed milk powder, formalin and vegetable fat. Most of the samples were found to be adulterated. 

This is how synthetic milk is made: 

Synthetic milk is milk produced by mixing of synthetic products like caustic soda, urea, cheap cooking/refined oil and detergents. It was first made by milkmen in Kurukshetra region in Haryana and has since then spread out to all over the country. Detergent is used as an emulsifier and it helps in dissolving the oil in water to give it the frothy like look and white-cream colour of milk. Caustic soda is added to neutralize acidity and cooking oil fills in for the absent natural milk fat. Urea is also added for solid-not-fat(SNF) and it is blended with some portions of natural milk so as to improve its taste. Thus, the product that we get is a properly thought out and carefully produced synthetic product, much like our soaps and shampoos.  Hence it easily passes the tests carried out at the village level dairy co-operative society (fat and lactometer reading etc.).

harmful effect of synthetic milk

Synthetic milk is known to have cancerous properties and the presence of urea and caustic soda increase the risk for people suffering from heart ailments and also for pregnant women. Children are the biggest sufferers in this for their body’s immune system get slowly degraded at an early age. Also, the sodium being passed onto the body through this acts as a slow poison. There are many more negative impacts of its usage .

This is the difference between real and synthetic milk. 

The colour of both is white. But on storage real milk remains white, synthetic milk or adulterated milk turns pale yellow. If rubbed on the palm, synthetic milk becomes foamy. Real milk does not. Real milk does not change colour on heating. Synthetic milk turns yellow on boiling. The pH value of real milk is 6.6 – 6.8 and of synthetic milk 10-11 (extremely alkaline). The fat content is the same in both: 4.5 – 5 per cent, the SNF (Solid Not Fat) is also the same 8-9 per cent. 

With the onset of festival season, it is the start of business for some unscrupulous dealers in spurious milk duplicate khoya, paneer, desi ghee and other milk sweets.On Friday, the health department in Faridkot unearthed a unit manufacturing spurious milk in Kotkapura town. The police raid found the milk factory was manufacturing the synthetic milk, cheese, desi ghee, curd, khoya and various sweets and these products were to be supplied to sweet shops and marriage palaces at cheap rates.

 

Now, let’s discuss on the following two points:
who is to blame for this debacle in the first place and what are the possible solutions of this (if any):  The blame can be placed on a policy change by the government but The possible solutions are a nationwide awareness campaign against this evil and also, teaching people the easy way of differentiating between adulterated and natural milk. Since, this is something that includes their own health, so the people would definitely pay heed and perform the tests which will prevent their milk-vendors from supplying synthetic milk. Also, the offenders should be accorded with heavy punishment so as to ensure that those playing with the lives of millions learn their lesson well. Lastly, good education that imparts moral and ethical values to children is the only long-term solution that can totally eradicate this and other such evils borne out of materialism.

[this part is from Hindu newspaper]

Here are some methods to detect adulteration:

1. Detection of Neutralizers in milk — Rosalic acid test (Soda Test). Neutralizers like hydrated lime, sodium hydroxide, sodium carbonate or sodium bicarbonate are added to milk. Take 5 ml of milk in a test tube and add 5 ml alcohol followed by 4-5 drops of rosalic acid. If the colour of milk changes to pinkish red, then the milk is adulterated with sodium carbonate / sodium bicarbonate and unfit for human consumption.

2. The alkaline condition of the milk for the presence of soda ash. Take 20 ml of milk in a silica crucible. Evaporate the water and burn the contents in a muffle furnace. The ash is dispersed in 10 ml distilled water and it is titrated against decinormal (N/10) hydrochloric acid using phenolphthalein as an indicator. If the titre value exceeds 1.2 ml, then it is construed that the milk is adulterated with neutralizers.

True blue

3. Detection of hydrogen peroxide. Take 5 ml milk in a test tube and then add 5 drops of paraphenylene diamine and shake it well. Change of the colour of milk to blue confirms that the milk is added with hydrogen peroxide.

4. Test for detection of formalin. Formalin (40 per cent) is poisonous. It is added because it can preserve milk. Take 10 ml of milk in test tube and add 5 ml of concentrated sulphuric acid on the sides of the test tube without shaking. If a violet or blue ring appears at the intersection of the two layers, then it shows the presence of formalin.

5. Test for detection of sugar in milk. Sugar is mixed in milk to increase the solids not fat content of milk. It increases the lactometer reading of water diluted milk. Take 10 ml of milk in a test tube and add 5 ml of hydrochloric acid along with 0.1 g of resorcinol. Shake the test tube well and place it in boiling water for five minutes. Appearance of red colour indicates the presence of added sugar in milk.

6. Test for detection of starch. Addition of starch also increases the SNF content of milk. Apart from the starch, wheat flour, arrowroot, rice flour are also added. Take 3 ml milk in a test tube and boil it thoroughly. Cool the milk to room temperature and add two to three drops of 1 per cent iodine solution. Change of colour to blue indicates that the milk is adulterated with starch.

7. Test for detection of glucose. Usually poor quality glucose is added to milk to increase the lactometer reading. There are two tests available to detect the adulteration of milk with glucose. Take 3 ml of milk in a test tube and add 3 ml Barford's reagent and mix it thoroughly. Keep it in boiling water for three minutes and cool for two minutes by immersing in tap water. Add 1 ml of phosphomolybdic acid and shake. If blue colour is visible, then glucose is present. Take a strip of diacetic and dip it in the milk for 30 seconds to one minute. If the strip changes colour, then it shows that the sample of milk contains glucose. If there is no change in the colour of the strip, then glucose is absent.

8. Test for detection of urea. Urea is added to raise the SNF value. Five ml of milk is mixed well with 5 ml paradimethyl amino benzaldehyde (16 per cent). If the solution turns yellow in colour, then the milk is contaminated. Take 5 ml of milk in a test tube and add 0.2 ml of urease (20 mg/ml). Shake well at room temperature and then add 0.1 ml of bromothymol blue solution (0.5 per cent). Appearance of blue colour after 10-15 minutes indicates adulteration.

9. Test for detection of ammonium sulphate. Sulphate in milk increases the lactometer reading. Put 5 ml of hot milk in a test tube and add citric acid. The whey will separate. Collect the whey in another test tube and add 0.5 ml of 5 per cent barium chloride. A precipitate indicates the presence of ammonium sulphate.

10. Test for detection of salt. Addition of salt increases the lactometer reading. Take 5 ml of silver nitrate (0.8 per cent) in a test tube and add two to three drops of 1 per cent potassium dichromate and 1 ml of milk and mix. If the contents turn yellow in colour, then milk contains salt in it. If it is chocolate coloured, then the milk is free from salt.

11. Test for detection of pulverized soap. Take 10 ml of milk in a test tube and dilute it with equal quantity of hot water and then add one – two drops of phenolphthalein indicator. A pink colour indicates soap.

12. Detection of detergents in milk. Take 5 ml of milk in a test tube and add 0.1 ml of bromocresol purple solution. A violet colour indicates detergent in milk. Unadulterated milk samples show a faint violet.

More colours

13. Detection of skim milk powder in milk. If the addition of nitric acid drop by drop in to the milk sample results in an orange colour, it indicates skim milk powder. Pure milk shows yellow colour.

14. Detection of benzoic and salicylic acid in milk. Five ml of milk is taken in a test tube and acidified with concentrated sulphuric acid. 0.5 per cent ferric chloride solution is added drop by drop and mixed well. A buff colour indicates benzoic acid and violet colour indicates salicylic acid.

15. Detection of borax and boric acid in milk. Add 1 ml of concentrated hydrochloric acid to five ml of milk in a test tube and mix well. Dip the tip of a turmeric paper into the acidified milk and dry in a watch glass at 100°C or over a small flame. If the turmeric paper turns red, it indicates the presence of borax or boric acid. Or add a drop of ammonia solution on the turmeric paper. If the red colour changes to green, it shows boric acid.