An action plan to assess the current situation of maternal & newborn care at government health facilities in Jharkhand, India

Maternal and child health care especially safe motherhood services are an important factor in the primary health care and are the responsibility of the government and ministry of health. Consolidating and strengthening health network and quality of primary health care is one of the priority issues of the state and the health department for providing good health care and protection to the population. Since, long government health facilities, in spite of being the main source of health care services for majority of people, especially for those having low income; has very poor condition. Therefore, it’s important to improve the quality of services in the government facility, which can be achieved by stressing on the context of care provided. Situational analyses or facility audit are tools which use various approaches to identify the gaps in the structure and Process of the facility, in order to determine the best intervention to improve the performance. This study proposes an ‘Action Plan’ to assess the current quality of care in Govt health facilities in Ranchi, Jharkhand concerning Maternal and newborn care. By using Qualitative and quantitative study Methods like Site assessment, exit interview and focused group discussion. The method aims to identify together with major gaps; the entire minor gaps in the health system responsible for maternal and newborn mortality and morbidity that could be solved at the local level without the involvement of additional resources. The results obtained could be used to frame interventions to strengthen Maternal and newborn care system of Jharkhand.Jharkhand Health Policy Development Economics Adivasi Tribal Ranchi Santali Munda Oraon

ASSESSMENT OF IMPACT OF COVID-19 LOCKDOWN ON AIR QUALITY IN NATIONAL CAPITAL REGION OF NEW DELHI, INDIA

After the World Health Organization declared COVID-19 as pandemic on 11th March 2020, the Indian government adopted a complete phased lockdown strategy starting from 23rd March until 31st May 2020. During this period, road/rail/air traffic, industrial operations and offices were completely restricted except for the essential services. Here, an attempt was made to assess the effect of the lockdown period on five pollutants: PM10, PM2.5, SO2, NOx, and ozone at three sites, Jahangirpuri in North Delhi and Sonipat and Panipat townships located along the national highway leading to north India. These pollutants, except ozone, decreased at all sites during lockdown phase 1 compared to before lockdown. PM2.5 load reduced by 28.1, 33.5, and 40.8 % at Jahangirpuri, Sonipat and Panipat, respectively. PM10 remained either close to or higher than National Ambient Air Quality Standards (NAAQS) due to prevailing high-speed winds. NO2, a precursor for formation of O3 decreased consistently at all sites, except an increase in phase 3 at Panipat whereas O3 consistently increased. This was a paradoxical situation as O3 is formed by photochemical reactions among NOx and volatile organic compounds, which require further detailed studies. These observations indicate that air pollutants decreased specific to the site(s) and pollutant(s). Such restriction can be applied in the future to control air pollution in this region

Quantitative Assessment of TV White Space in India

Licensed but unutilized television (TV) band spectrum is called as TV white space in the literature. Ultra high frequency (UHF) TV band spectrum has very good wireless radio propagation characteristics. The amount of TV white space in the UHF TV band in India is of interest. Comprehensive quantitative assessment and estimates for the TV white space in the 470-590MHz band for four zones of India (all except north) are presented in this work. This is the first effort in India to estimate TV white spaces in a comprehensive manner. The average available TV white space per unit area in these four zones is calculated using two methods: (i) the primary (licensed) user and secondary (unlicensed) user point of view; and, (ii) the regulations of Federal Communications Commission in the United States. By both methods, the average available TV white space in the UHF TV band is shown to be more than 100MHz! A TV transmitter frequency-reassignment algorithm is also described. Based on spatial-reuse ideas, a TV channel allocation scheme is presented which results in insignicant interference to the TV receivers while using the least number of TV channels for transmission across the four zones. Based on this reassignment, it is found that four TV band channels (or 32MHz) are sufficient to provide the existing UHF TV band coverage in India