October 22, 2008 at 2:41 am · Filed under Events, Health Hazard, West Punjab and tagged: ‘Carbonated soft drinks, Dow University of Health Sciences, Dr Amanullah Mangi, fragile bones, junk food cause osteoporosis at an early age’, KARACHI, osteoporosis prevention, World Health Organization (WHO), World Osteoporosis Day
Irfan Aligi
KARACHI: Dow University of Health Sciences Prof. of Anatomy and research scholar on osteoporosis Dr Amanullah Mangi told Daily Times in an exclusive interview that osteoporosis is a disease that should be treated with food, not drugs.
The youth of Pakistan from age groups of 15 to 25 are at the brink of ruin and they are at a risk of many health problems especially osteoporosis after the age of 35 because of an unhealthy diet consisting mostly of carbonated soft drinks and fast food “I can say on the basis of my research that carbonated beverages and fast food destroy bones. I have data on side effects of cold drinks and fast food, which I collected after a study on a group of 10 boys from the age group of 18 to 25, who drank carbonated drinks and ate burgers,” claimed Mangi. The BMD results were below the normal limit in all volunteers.
The use of carbonated drinks and fast food makes the bones fragile. I strongly recommend that the fast food and soft drink culture should be eliminated from our society so that we can save our youth, added Mangi.
Efforts for the creation of awareness about osteoporosis can only be successful if common and easy-to-understand terminology is used, said Mangi. It is in line of directives of the World Health Organization (WHO) that doctors should treat the root causes of the diseases rather than focusing on the symptoms. Those who treat the symptoms are quacks, commented Mangi.
It is pertinent to mention that World Osteoporosis Day is celebrated on October 20 across the globe every year. This day serves as a focal point for the international community to inform and educate the public and policy makers about the importance of osteoporosis prevention, diagnosis and treatment.
Osteoporosis affects around one in three women and one in five men around the world. Pakistan has a high prevalence of osteoporosis, with 97 percent of women, aged 75 to 84 years, and 55 percent of women aged 45 to 54 years suffering from it.
dailytimes.com.pk
October 17, 2008 at 6:42 pm · Filed under Environment, Events, Health Hazard, Pressure Points and tagged: 000 children die of diarrhea in Pakistan each year, 250, amebiasis, Avian Flu, campylobacteriosis, common cold, cytomegalovirus, Dr M. Rafiq Khanani, enterovirus, Epstein-Barr virus, giardiasis, Global Hand-washing Day, hepatitis A and E, influenza, KARACHI, nfection Control Society Pakistan, PAKISTAN, pneumonia, respiratory syncytial virus, salmonellosis, SARS, shigellosis, staphylococcal organisms, Streptococcus, typhoid, World Health Organization (WHO)
Khadijah Shah
KARACHI, PAKISTAN: Proper hand washing with soap can reduce deathsarising out of diarrhea and other diseases significantly, said Dr M. Rafiq Khanani, President Infection Control Society Pakistan.
According to World Health Organization (WHO), diarrhea and pneumonia kill more than four million children under five in developing countries every year, making these the leading killer of children
worldwide. In Pakistan diarrhea is rated as the number one killer of children accounting for about 250,000 deaths and unimaginable morbidity.
Estimated number of diarrhea episodes in the country is more than 20 million annually. Proper hand washing with soap and water can reduce deaths from diarrhea by almost half and deaths from acute respiratory infections (including influenza, Streptococcus, respiratory syncytial virus, common cold, SARS and Avian Flu) by one-quarter, he believes.
Khanani assumed that hand washing with soap and water can also decrease incidence of salmonellosis, shigellosis, hepatitis A and E, giardiasis, enterovirus, amebiasis, campylobacteriosis,
cytomegalovirus, typhoid, staphylococcal organisms, and Epstein – Barr virus.
A study in Pakistan found that hand washing condensed the number of pneumonia related infections in children under the age of five by more than 50 per cent. Studies have shown that hand washing reduces the incidence of skin diseases, eye infections such as trachoma, and intestinal worms, especially ascariasis and trichuriasis.
It has been observed that although people wash their hands with water, very few wash their hands with soap at critical moments (for example, after using the toilet, while cleaning a child, and before handling food). Hence, the challenge is to transform hand washing with soap into an automatic behaviour performed in homes, schools, and rural and urban communities, he affirmed.
Turning hand washing with soap before eating and after using the toilet into an ingrained habit can save more lives than any single vaccine or medical intervention, he said. He believed that using soap
adds to the time spent washing, breaks down the grease and dirt that carry most germs by facilitating the rubbing and friction that dislodge them and leave hands smelling pleasant (which creates an incentive for soap’s use). “With proper use, all soaps are equally effective at rinsing away the germs that cause disease,” Khanani explained.
He was of the opinion that since there is no glamour involved in promoting hand washing with soap, health care professionals, communities and masses in general do not pay attention to this simple
and most effective tool to improve the health of the nation, reduce the burden of diseases and improve the socio-economic status of the communities.
Events such as the Global Hand-washing Day being commemorated on October 15 (today) for the first time puts this often overlooked hygiene challenge at the forefront of the international agenda while keeping children at the heart of each country’s national and local initiatives.
Formative research suggests that people want clean hands for reasons of comfort, to remove smells, to demonstrate their love for children and to exercise their social responsibility. In certain communities
the chief motives for hand washing is to nurture, to avoid disgust and to gain social status.
Khanani assumed that diarrhea is both preventable and treatable, yet we continue to pay the price of this disease in lost lives, missed school days, reduced resistance to infections, impaired growth,
malnutrition and poverty. He whispered that this is a vicious cycle and not by any heroic charisma but only with proper hand wash with soap, can the people break this cycle. When coupled with educational initiatives, hand washing with soap is one of the world’s most cost-effective preventive health interventions and has been proven to reduce the risk of not only diarrhea but burden of cholera and dysentery can be reduced by 48 per cent to 59 per cent.
Source:
Ferhan Mazher
Chairman (Rays of Development Organization, Sargodha, Pakistan)
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