Sixty per cent of people living in India do not have access to toilets, and hence are forced to defecate in the open. In actual numbers, sixty per cent translates to 626 million. This makes India the number one country in the world where open defecation is practised. Indonesia with 63 million is a far second!

At 949 million in 2010 worldwide, vast majority of people practising open defecation live in rural areas. Though the number of rural people practising open defecation has reduced by 234 million in 2010 than in 1990, “those that continue to do so tend to be concentrated in a few countries, including India,” notes the 2012 update report of UNICEF and the World Health Organisation (WHO).

Five persons died and over 100 others have been taken ill due to viral fever in the northern Sirdibas VDC in the district.

NEW YORK, 8 JUNE: Scaling up simple interventions to control diarrhoea and pneumonia can save more than two million children in poor and developing countries, including India where over six lakh ki

MUMBAI: The Vidarbha region, which lost many a farmer to agrarian crisis, is now staring at a bigger demon: Drought.

BHUBANESWAR: Even as Odisha battles with high incidence of diarrhoea among children, the Indian Medical Association (IMA) is all set to launch an extensive programme on ‘Management and prevention o

Millions of Indians are facing a new health risk. Increasing water scarcity is forcing farmers to grow vegetables and fodder using untreated sewage waste water across urban and rural cities.

The Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FAAI) has in the past issued several warnings on pesticide residues and crop contaminants, including aflatoxins, patulin and ochratoxin in Indian fruit and vegetables. These pesticides are known to adversely effect the nervous system and can result in lung damage and cancer

BHUBANESWAR: Experts have called for inculcation of proper sanitary and personal hygiene habits among children right from their early age to tackle the menace of enteric diseases.

Two ICDDR,B doctors, also experts in cholera management, returned home Wednesday after a two-week visit to the Horn of African countries —Somalia and Kenya — where they trained more than 50 health

MADURAI: A week-long inspection by the Food Safety and Drug Administration Department at the hostel inside the Government Rajaji Hospital (GRH) revealed that unhygienic living conditions, poor main

Study claims more than half of them died in the first 28 days of their life

More than 16.8 lakh children under five years died of infectious, but preventable, diseases in India in 2010 and more than half of them could not complete the first month of their life, a new study has claimed. Of the total deaths, 52 per cent, or about 0.875 million, were among the children who died in the first 28 days of their life, according to the study published in The Lancet on Thursday.