Morning Medtalks with Dr KK Aggarwal

1. Soumya Swaminathan, an Indian paediatrician and clinical scientist has been named as chief scientist at World Health Organization (WHO).

2.In a move that will help thousands of students planning to pursue medical courses abroad, the government mulls extending the validity of their NEET score to three years. At present, the validity of the National Eligibility cum Entrance Test is one year — the same year it is being attempted

3.The US Food and Drug Administration today granted accelerated approval to atezolizumab plus the chemotherapy nab-paclitaxelfor the first-line treatment of unresectable locally advanced or metastatic, PD-L1-positive triple-negative breast cancer(TNBC).

4.Heart burn and Certain foods. Coffee, tea, cocoa, cola drinks, and other caffeine-containing products loosen the LES and stimulate gastric acid production. Mints and chocolate, often served to cap off a meal, can make things worse by relaxing the LES. Fried and fatty foods contribute to heartburn. Some may not tolerate onions, garlic, citrus fruits or tomato products, which irritate the esophageal lining.

Also how you eat can be as important as what you eat. Skipping breakfast or lunch and then consuming a huge meal at days end can increase pressure in the stomach and the possibility of reflux. Lying down soon after eating will make the problem worse.

5.Intensive antihypertensive therapy was associated with worse outcomes among smokers in an unplanned secondary analysis of SPRINT (Systolic Blood Pressure Intervention Trial) data. Current smokers with baseline systolic blood pressures greater than 144 mm Hg treated to a target of 120 mm Hg had significantly higher rates of myocardial infarction, stroke, and other cardiovascular events than those assigned to more conventional treatment, the analysis showed. Intensive treatment was also associated with a higher incidence of acute kidney injury in smokers within the SPRINT cohort, wrote Aaron Baum, PhD, of Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New York City, and colleagues in JAMA Network Open.

6.The Food and Drug Administration announced Friday that it is lifting an import alert that stopped genetically engineered salmon from entering the US.

7.Cultured meat is meat as per new US regulations. It is produced by in vitro cultivation of animal cells, instead of from slaughtered animals. It is a form of cellular agriculture. Cultured meat is produced using many of the same tissue engineering techniques traditionally used in regenerative medicine. March 7, when the Department of Agriculture (USDA) and the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announced that they’d established a framework for regulating cell-based meat and poultry.

Banning use of plastic material for campaigning? NGT directs EC and Govt to hold a meeting to decide on Eco-friendly move

Medical conferences will have implications.

Advocate Ira Gupta

The National Green Tribunal has directed the Election Commission, the Centre and the Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) to convene a meeting to consider whether to ban the use of campaigning material made of plastic during elections.

A bench headed by NGT Chairperson Justice Adarsh Kumar Goel directed the Election Commission, Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change (MoEF&CC) and CPCB to convene a meeting at the earliest, preferably within one week.

The tribunal passed the directions on a petition seeking a direction to the MoEF&CC and the states to prohibit the use of short-life PVC (polyvinyl chloride), synthetic plastic polymer and chlorinated plastic which includes banners, hoarding, etc for promotion and advertising during the poll campaign.

The petition claimed that campaigning material made of plastic are used during election and later discarded as waste, which was detrimental to the environment.

The above has implications on medical conferences.

(Source: Latestlaws.com)