People’s participation in joint forest management in higher hills of Himachal Pradesh

Joint Forest Management (JFM) is an effort which involved people to participate for the protection, conservation and rehabilitation of forests whilst safeguarding the rights of forest dwellers. Women and other marginalized sections of the community need to be empowered to ensure their participation in JFM (Aggarwal and Chauhan, 2015). Such programmes while ensuring the conservation of flora and fauna, also provided stability for the agriculture, horticulture, animal husbandry, and local cottage industries and thus, help in all round economic development (Bhatia, 2000). The present study analysed the people’s participation in different stages of JFM programmes in the higher hills of Himachal Pradesh (Sundernagar and Kullu forest division). The results showed that people of age group 40-60 years participated most in the JFM programme. The participation of the general category people was found highest followed by scheduled caste, other backward class and scheduled tribe. The literacy rate of the respondents was found to be 98.51 percent while the literacy index was found to be 2.51 representing level of education in between middle class and higher secondary. In both the regions participation of people was found maximum during maintenance stage followed by planning stage and implementation stage. The overall participation index was found to be 61.91 per cent. The capacity building through training and awareness can help in safeguarding livelihood and conservation efforts of JFM

Prevalence and etiology of hearing impairment in urban area of Shimla, Himachal Pradesh, India: a cross sectional observational study

Background: The ear is a marvelously complex and sensitive organ. Disease of the ear have profound effect on the health and quality of life of millions of people around the globe. Data regarding the magnitude of hearing impairment in our country is limited and the literature search revealed that no such studies have been conducted in this region.Methods: A community based cross sectional observational study was carried out among the 306 individuals in urban area of Shimla, Himachal Pradesh, India. Information was obtained by a structured questionnaire, clinical ENT examination and audiological tests after obtaining informed consent.Results: The study group had 48.4% males and 51.6% females. Maximum 29.4% of individuals were in the age group of 31-45 years. Mean age was 32.22±20.15. The prevalence of hearing impairment was 13.1%. Among individuals with hearing loss, maximum 57.5% were in the age group of ≥60 years. Sensorineural hearing loss was found in 70%, maximum 55% had mild hearing loss. Among majority of individuals with hearing loss cause was presbyacusis 57.5% followed by infectious ear disease 27.5%. Among majority of individuals with hearing loss 37.5% required no further action at the time of study.Conclusions: In the present study, prevalence of hearing loss was found to be 13.1% and predominantly mild sensorineural or conductive type of hearing loss. An early intervention and quality patient education was necessary for prevention of hearing impairment in majority of cases

Expression and Characterization of Chandipura Virus Proteins

Chandipura virus (CHPV) has recently emerged as an extremely lethal human pathogen in the family Rhabdoviridae and is linked to significant encephalitis outbreaks in different parts of India. The biology of CHPV remains less studied to date and the availability of reagents such as purified proteins can enhance research in this direction. In this study, we have overexpressed four of the CHPV proteins namely Nucleoprotein (N), Phosphoprotein (P), Matrix protein (M) and Glycoprotein (G) using three  distinct tags in bacterial system and with changes in inducer concentration, growth and solubilisation conditions successfully purified M and G proteins for the first time along with N and P. Furthermore, the interactions of CHPV M protein with other viral proteins (G, N and P) was investigated using ELISA and GST pull down assays to show the utility of olubilised proteins. The results of both the assays demonstrated that M protein interacts with both G and N proteins, while it does not interact with P protein, in a similar  manner as reported for Vesicular Stomatitis Virus

Evaluating substance use in an urbanizing town of mid hills of Northern India

Background: Substance use is emerging as a major cause of morbidity and mortality across the world. Solan, a fast urbanizing town of India has witnessed mushrooming of industries and educational institutes. A surge in the persons booked under the Narcotic Drug and Psychoactive Substance Act 1985 led us to look into the determinants of the substance use in this region.Methods: We undertook a cross sectional study of one year secondary data analysis of 750 substance users screened at the de-addiction centre of Solan Hospital. The data mining was done by the cluster analysis technique. SPSS 16 and STATA 13 software were employed.Results: Mean age of users was 31 years with dominance of males (89.20 %), two third of total users were married, 75% were unemployed, 42% had upper school level education. About 60 and 38% were using cannabis and chitta (a synthetic opioid) respectively. Only 2% were consuming tobacco and alcohol. 62% of substance users had the fear of legal action and 44% had no family history of substance use. 39% had only single parent, 54% had started substance use under peer pressure and duration of use varied between 6 to 24 months.  Alcohol and cannabis were used more in urban and rural areas respectively. 63 and 70% had family history and experience of peer pressure respectively.Conclusions: Cluster analysis has generated substance specific socio-demographic determinants of substance use which would help in planning appropriate substance use alleviation strategies.

Domestic cooking fuel and lung functions in healthy non-smoking women

Objective: The objective of this study was to compare the pulmonary functions in healthy non-smoking women who used either biomass or liquified petroleum gas (LPG) as their sole cooking fuel. The effects of passive smoking, ventilation, over crowding and cooking index were also taken into account. Methodology: The study was conducted over a period of two years from January 1994. One hundred healthy non-smoking women were included 50 cooked solely with biomass and 50 cooked with LPG. A standardised respiratory symptoms questionnaire was administered to all the subjects and spirometry was carried out. Results: Passive smoking showed no significant difference between the two groups. No statistically significant differences was found in lung functions in the two groups except for the PEFR, which was significantly lower (P < 0.01) in women using biomass. No correlation was observed between different variables and pulmonary functions. The step-wise multivariate linear regression analysis showed no correlation between cooking fuel and the pulmonary functions. Conclusion: The absence of the expected adverse effects of biomass on pulmonary functions was possibly due to better ventilation in the kitchens of subjects in the biomass group compared to previous studies