India Amidst COVID-19 Crisis: The Good, The Bad and The Ugly

Beating the statistics: With a population of over a billion, high population density with overcrowding especially in metropolis and underdeveloped health infrastructure, the projections for corona virus disease (COVID-19) pandemic were not in favour of India. Most statistical models had predicted over 5 lakh cases and more than 38,000 deaths and warned that India must prepare for a tsunami of COVID-19 cases. The situation appeared to be grimmer given that the incidence of diabetes, hypertension and respiratory diseases due to tuberculosis andair pollution is higher amongst Indians which are known risk factors for severe disease and death due to COVID-19

Ectopic pregnancy and unsupervised abortion pills: the hidden truth

Background: Aim of the study was the indiscriminate use of self-consumption of abortion pills and its association with complication like ectopic pregnancy reporting to a tertiary care center.Methods: The study was a prospective observational study conducted in the department of obstetrics and gynecology, Kamla Nehru State hospital for mother and child, Indira Gandhi medical college Shimla w.e.f. 1st July 2018 to 30th June 2019. A total of 27 women reported to the hospital who were diagnosed of having ectopic pregnancy after intake of abortion pills.Results: A total of 27 cases presented to the hospital who were diagnosed to have ectopic pregnancy. Maximum 18 (67%) cases were in 21-30 years of age group. Married women constituted 21 (77%) cases. The 14 (52%) belonged to rural area while 13 (48%) belonged to urban area. The chemist was found to be source of procurement in 19 (70%) cases, private practitioner in 6 (22%) cases and only two consumed pills after consultation with registered doctor.Conclusions: This study shows urgent need for legislation and restriction of drugs used for medical termination of pregnancy. Drugs should be made available via health care facilities under supervision to reduce maternal mortality and morbidity due to indiscriminate use of these pills.

Mutational characterization of Omicron SARS-CoV-2 lineages circulating in Chhattisgarh, a central state of India

IntroductionThe emergence of the Omicron SARS-CoV-2 variant from various states of India in early 2022 has caused fear of its rapid spread. The lack of such reports from Chhattisgarh (CG), a central state in India, has prompted us to identify the Omicron circulating lineages and their mutational dynamics.Materials and methodsWhole-genome sequencing (WGS) of SARS-CoV-2 was performed in 108 SARS-CoV-2 positive combined samples of nasopharyngeal and oropharyngeal swabs obtained from an equal number of patients.ResultsAll 108 SARS-CoV-2 sequences belonged to Omicron of clade 21L (84%), 22B (11%), and 22D (5%). BA.2 and its sub-lineages were predominantly found in 93.5% of patients, BA.5.2 and its sub-lineage BA.5.2.1 in 4.6% of patients, and B.1.1.529 in 2% of patients. Various BA.2 sub-lineages identified were BA.2 (38%), BA.2.38 (32%), BA.2.75 (9.25%), BA.2.56, BA.2.76, and BA.5.2.1 (5% each), BA.2.74 (4.6%), BA.5.2.1 (3.7%), BA.2.43 and B.1.1.529 (1.8% each), and BA.5.2 (0.9%). Maximum mutations were noticed in the spike (46), followed by the nucleocapsid (5), membrane (3), and envelope (2) genes. Mutations detected in the spike gene of different Omicron variants were BA.1.1.529 (32), BA.2 (44), BA.2.38 (37), BA.2.43 (38), BA.2.56 (30), BA.2.74 (31), BA.2.75 (37), BA.2.76 (32), BA.5.2, and BA.5.2.1 (38 similar mutations). The spike gene showed the signature mutations of T19I and V213G in the N-terminal domain (NTD), S373P, S375F, T376A, and D405N in receptor-binding domain (RBD), D614G, H655Y, N679K, and P681H at the furin cleavage site, N764K and D796K in fusion peptide, and Q954H and N969K in heptapeptide repeat sequence (HR)1. Notably, BA.2.43 exhibited a novel mutation of E1202Q in the C terminal. Other sites included ORF1a harboring 13 mutations followed by ORF1b (6), ORF3a (2), and ORF6 and ORF8 (1 mutation each).ConclusionBA.2 followed by BA.2.38 was the predominant Omicron lineage circulating in Chhattisgarh. BA.2.75 could supersede other Omicron due to its mutational consortium advantage. The periodical genomic monitoring of Omicron variants is thus required for real-time assessment of circulating strains and their mutational-induced severity

Traditional knowledge for dairy animals in Una district of Himachal Pradesh

662-668Traditional knowledge (TK), also known as indigenous knowledge (IK) or local knowledge (LK) generally refers to the matured long-standing traditions and practices of certain regional, indigenous, or local communities. India stands at number 1 in milk production as dairy master across the world. However, due to large number of animal population, distant/remote location, shortage of veterinary staff, some time, veterinary aids are not available to the farmers. In such instances, it is the traditional knowledge of the people which guides them to mitigate the sufferings of the animals. In this article, some of the ITKs are described based on oral communication with the people

Traditional knowledge for dairy animals in Una district of Himachal Pradesh

Traditional knowledge (TK), also known as indigenous knowledge (IK) or local knowledge (LK) generally refers to the matured long-standing traditions and practices of certain regional, indigenous, or local communities. India stands at number 1 in milk production as dairy master across the world. However, due to large number of animal population, distant/remote location, shortage of veterinary staff, some time, veterinary aids are not available to the farmers. In such instances, it is the traditional knowledge of the people which guides them to mitigate the sufferings of the animals. In this article, some of the ITKs are described based on oral communication with the people

Yoga-Based Cardiac Rehabilitation After Acute Myocardial Infarction: A Randomized Trial.

BACKGROUND: Given the shortage of cardiac rehabilitation (CR) programs in India and poor uptake worldwide, there is an urgent need to find alternative models of CR that are inexpensive and may offer choice to subgroups with poor uptake (e.g., women and elderly). OBJECTIVES: This study sought to evaluate the effects of yoga-based CR (Yoga-CaRe) on major cardiovascular events and self-rated health in a multicenter randomized controlled trial. METHODS: The trial was conducted in 24 medical centers across India. This study recruited 3,959 patients with acute myocardial infarction with a median and minimum follow-up of 22 and 6 months. Patients were individually randomized to receive either a Yoga-CaRe program (n = 1,970) or enhanced standard care involving educational advice (n = 1,989). The co-primary outcomes were: 1) first occurrence of major adverse cardiovascular events (MACE) (composite of all-cause mortality, myocardial infarction, stroke, or emergency cardiovascular hospitalization); and 2) self-rated health on the European Quality of Life-5 Dimensions-5 Level visual analogue scale at 12 weeks. RESULTS: MACE occurred in 131 (6.7%) patients in the Yoga-CaRe group and 146 (7.4%) patients in the enhanced standard care group (hazard ratio with Yoga-CaRe: 0.90; 95% confidence interval [CI]: 0.71 to 1.15; p = 0.41). Self-rated health was 77 in Yoga-CaRe and 75.7 in the enhanced standard care group (baseline-adjusted mean difference in favor of Yoga-CaRe: 1.5; 95% CI: 0.5 to 2.5; p = 0.002). The Yoga-CaRe group had greater return to pre-infarct activities, but there was no difference in tobacco cessation or medication adherence between the treatment groups (secondary outcomes). CONCLUSIONS: Yoga-CaRe improved self-rated health and return to pre-infarct activities after acute myocardial infarction, but the trial lacked statistical power to show a difference in MACE. Yoga-CaRe may be an option when conventional CR is unavailable or unacceptable to individuals. (A study on effectiveness of YOGA based cardiac rehabilitation programme in India and United Kingdom; CTRI/2012/02/002408)

Integrated Electronic, Optical, and Structural Features in Pseudo-3D Mesoporous TiO_2–<i>X</i> Delivering Enhanced Dye-Sensitized Solar Cell Performance

The performance of a dye-sensitized solar cell (DSSC) is strongly affected by optical, structural, and electronic features of a photoanode. In this article, meso-TiO_2–<i>X</i> was prepared by a solution combustion method and hydrogenation at high pressure. The properties of DSSCs with meso-TiO_2–<i>X</i> photoanodes were investigated by photocurrent–voltage, incident photon-to-current conversion efficiency, and electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS) measurements. The meso-TiO_2–<i>X</i> materials exhibit new electronic states and aided to absorb in the visible region because of the narrow band gap. Facile charge transfer from the N719 dye to the TiO₂ photoanode was assisted by low-lying mid-gap states. Electrically integrated nanoparticles, with a small-channel mesoporous framework, facilitates fast charge transport across the material. Furthermore, EIS has shown that chemical capacitance, recombination resistance, and electron lifetime were affected by hydrogenation, thus indicating an effect on the photoanode material charge dynamics of DSSCs. An η of 7.2% under AM 1.5G illumination is obtained and an improvement by 75.6% over Degussa P25 titania. This is attributed to improved light harvesting and charge collection by the meso-TiO_2–<i>X</i> photoanode obtained via simple combustion synthesis

Event Detection and its Signal Characterization in PMU Data Stream

The potential application of signal processing techniques is not only to detect the event but also to characterize them according to physical disturbance. In this paper, event detection and its characterization algorithm is presented. The event detection scheme uses computation of spectral kurtosis on sum of intrinsic mode functions. The algorithm is capable of detecting the event in phasor measurement units data by comparing the maximum energy and root-mean square of energy content of present analysis segment with respect to previous segment. The statistical indices applied are capable to flag specific data and thus the timely detection of events. Further, statistical features extracted from event-related segment suggest that the transient signals from different regions are distinct and thus can be classified. The signal characterization is further represented in terms of short-term energy and group delay. The analysis on event triggered signal demonstrates the related physical phenomenon in each event type. The study suggests the most relevant signal associated with a particular type of event

Post-processing algorithmfor damped and step-change events detection in PMU signals

The study presents an algorithm using signal processing techniques to screen PMUs data for events. The algorithm can be applied on multiple PMUs data for possible events detection and their display. The algorithm analyze the each moving window frame, i.e. segment of selected samples. The signal processing technique is based on decomposition of each segment via empirical mode decomposition followed by calculation of statistical indices on sum of intrinsic mode functions (IMFs)/square-root of spectral kurtosis computed on IMFs. The maximum energy content computed for each segment of PMUs signal signifies the presence of any event of damped transient, step-change/impulse or even normal condition