Uncontrolled medical treatment in Asia and Africa costs lives and money. David Peters and Gerald Bloom call for governments, firms and citizen groups to get involved.

The Central Drugs Standard Control Organisation is expected to protect the citizen from the marketing of harmful pharmaceuticals. The fi ndings of the 59th report of the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Health and Family Welfare are an expose of the shockingly lax standards followed by this so-called standards organisation, the casual approach taken in certifying drugs for sale, and the unethical and illegal steps taken by some pharmaceutical companies and medical practitioners in pushing for the introduction of certain drugs in the market. Can and will the government act?

We are writing this letter in the context of the apology recently deman­ded by the Indian Medical Association (IMA) from actor Aamir Khan, regarding the episode on 27 May 2012 of his show Satyamev Jayate (SJ) dealing with certain practices of the medical profession. We very much appreciate that the IMA wants to uphold the dignity of the medical profession. However, we feel that minimising the importance of the issues raised by this show and demanding an apology from Aamir Khan is definitely not the most appropriate way of upholding the dignity of doctors.

Premature birth is the biggest cause of infant mortality worldwide, yet most of those deaths could be readily prevented, according to a 2 May report from the World Health Organization (WHO) and child-health advocacy groups. The report summarizes the results of a comprehensive survey of the problem, and says that pre-term births are on the rise —a worrying trend — but that low-income countries could reduce deaths among these infants by introducing a few affordable key health-care practices.

Present trends suggest that many of the poorest countries in the world, including many in sub-Saharan Africa, will not meet the health-related Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), especially MDG 4 (reducing under-five mortality) and MDG 5 (reducing maternal mortality). Even in those countries that are on track to meet health MDGs, striking inequities exist among countries and among socioeconomic groups within them, despite effective and cost-effective interventions being available to improve population health, including that of vulnerable groups.

As both a doctor and a public health professional, I am transfixed by one compelling question: Why are public health issues and debates so often limited to just doctors and those with abbreviations like MBBS, MD, MS or MPH added to their names? Does the ambit of health not extend to other areas of specialization and expertise?

A draconian new law aims to toughen France's relaxed approach to conflicts of interest for scientists who advise the government on pharmaceuticals.

Over the past 15 years, performance-based financing has been implemented in an increasing number of developing countries,
particularly in Africa, as a means of improving health worker performance. Scaling up to national implementation in Burundi and
Rwanda has encouraged proponents of performance-based financing to view it as more than a financing mechanism, but increasingly
as a strategic tool to reform the health sector. We resist such a notion on the grounds that results-based and economically driven