Issue 62 Vol III, April 30, 2008

C O M M E N T

Jailed rights activist wins award

A well known Indian doctor and a human rights activist now in jail in Chhattisgarh has been awarded the prestigious Jonathan Mann Award for Global Health and Human Rights.

The Global Health Council said Dr Binayak Sen was chosen for his services to poor and tribal communities. He was also chosen for what the council called his unwavering commitment to civil liberties and human rights.

Dr Sen is in prison accused of links to Maoist rebels and is held without trial for nearly a year. There had been strong protests by the civil society. Dr Binayak has denied all charges.

Dr Sen is also the vice president of an important human rights group, People's Union for Civil Liberties.

In a statement, the Global Health Council said it was  pleased to announce that the winner of the 2008 Jonathan Mann Award for Global Health and Human Rights is Dr. Binayak Sen.

Sen, a physician who helped establish a hospital serving poor mine workers in the region, is an officer of the Peoples Union for Civil Liberties (PUCL), a leading human rights organization in India. He has been imprisoned in Raipur for nearly a year without trial as a result of allegations that he violated state antiterrorism laws. Sen denies committing any crime.

The Global Health Council and several prominent global health organizations have issued a statement of support for Sen requesting that Indian authorities assure the restoration of due process, and find the means to allow the doctor to receive his award in person in Washington, DC on May 29th, 2008, at the 35th Annual International Conference on Global Health.

This 58-year-old pediatrician was selected by an international jury of public health professionals for this prestigious award because of his years of service to poor and tribal communities in India, his effective leadership in establishing self-sustaining health care services where none existed, and his unwavering commitment to civil liberties and human rights. In addition to working with the PUCL, Sen and his wife, Dr. Ilina Sen, are the founders of Rupantar, a community-based nongovernmental organization that has trained, deployed and monitored the work of community health workers spread throughout 20 villages. Rupantars activities include initiatives to counter alcohol abuse and violence against women, and to promote food security.

Dr. Sen's accomplishments speak volumes about what can be achieved in very poor areas when health practitioners are also committed community leaders, said Dr. Nils Daulaire, president of the Global Health Council. He staffed a hospital created by and funded by impoverished mine workers, and he has spent his lifetime educating people about health practices and civil liberties -- providing information that has saved lives and improved conditions for thousands of people. His good works need to be recognized as a major contribution to India and to global health; they are certainly not a threat to state security.

Large areas of Chhattisgarh are embroiled in an armed conflict involving rebels, the state government and law enforcement, and armed civilian militias. Sen was detained on May 14, 2007, and accused of passing notes from a rebel leader he was treating in jail to someone outside the prison. Sen denies committing any crime and says his activities in the jail were supervised by prison authorities.

Many organizations and prominent persons have protested Sens arrest and his long imprisonment without trial. He was recently released from a period of solitary confinement and has reportedly suffered health problems resulting from his nearly year-long imprisonment.

The Mann Award is presented annually at the Global Health Councils international conference to a practitioner who makes significant contributions toward practical work in the field and in difficult circumstances; highlights the linkage of health with human rights; works predominantly in developing countries and with marginalized people; and demonstrates serious and long-term commitment.

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Vitamins 'do us no good and may be harmful'

HERE is a shocking news for those who make millions of dollars worldwide by manufacturing  and selling vitamins. They do us little good. In fact, vitamins could be harmful.

Sensible doctors at major hospitals across the world no longer prescribe these health supplements and emphasize on good dietary habits. A doctor once told an attendant of a patient at the Chandigarh’s PGI Nehru hospital, “ vitamins only help you produce costly urine.” Still consumption of vitamins and other such health supplements continues to grow enormously.

According to Jeremy Laurance, Health Editor of the Independent , a respected British daily, “We swallow them by the bucket load at great expense but there is no evidence vitamin supplements do us any good, and they may even be doing us harm, scientists have concluded. In a blow to the multimillion pound dietary supplement industry, a review of 67 randomised trials of vitamin pills has found that far from prolonging life, they may actually shorten it.

There is "no convincing evidence" that antioxidant supplements cut the risk of dying prematurely and some of the commonest ones may increase the risk of early death, according to the review, published by The Cochrane Collaboration.

Millions of people swallow vitamin pills to ward off disease and to gain strength. Doctors love prescribing these as patients’ have unlimited faith in vitamins curative and energy qualities. Despite several studies warning of potential dangers, the industry continues to thrive.

The latest review, one of the largest involving 232,000 participants, compared those taking the supplements with those who took a placebo or received no treatment. The supplements studied were beta-carotene (a precursor of vitamin A that is converted into the vitamin in the body), vitamin A, vitamin C, vitamin E and selenium.

According to Independent Goran Bjelakovich, the visiting researcher who led the systematic review at Copenhagen University, said: "We could find no evidence to support taking antioxidant supplements to reduce the risk of dying earlier in healthy people or patients with various diseases."

"The findings show that, if anything, people in trial groups given beta-carotene, vitamin A and vitamin E showed increased rates of mortality. There was no indication that vitamin C and selenium may have positive or negative effects; we need more data [on these]."

The researchers separated out the 47 trials with a low risk of bias and in these they found a significantly increased death rate. When taken separately, vitamin A was associated with a 16 per cent increased mortality, beta-carotene with a 7 per cent increase and vitamin E with a 4 per cent increase. For vitamin C and selenium there was no significant increase or decrease in the death rate.

Dr Bjelakovich said: "The bottom line is that current evidence does not support the use of antioxidant supplements in the general healthy population." The researchers were unable to explain their findings but said "excessive antioxidants can adversely affect key physiological processes".

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