HEALTH

Shortage of blood major cause for concern: expert
Neelam Sharma
Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, September 20
Despite nearly 5 million blood units donated each year, more than one lakh licensed blood donation banks in the country still find it hard to meet the country's requirements which stand at a staggering 9 million units of blood.

The shortage of 4 million units of blood each year has become a cause of concern for the blood banks in the country.

“In all 1,85000 blood banks in the country do not contribute more than 5 million units of blood each year.

This shows the lack of motivation among the public to donate blood voluntarily,” said Dr R. N. Makroo, Director of Transfusion Medicine at Apollo Hospital, Delhi and Secretary-General of Indian Society of Blood Transfusion.

What compounds the shortage of blood in the country is the fact that the donated blood is not optimally utilised as the blood is used as a whole product rather than breaking it down into the different components, including Red Blood Cells (RBC), White Blood Cells( WBC) and platelets.

" It is another sorry state of affairs that merely 10 per cent of the total blood donated in the country is used as blood component.

The advantages of using blood as different components make it possible to meet the requirement of two to three patients with the same blood count as one patient may require only component.

It also filters the entry of the unnecessary components of the blood to the patient's body,'' said Dr Makroo while speaking on the sidelights of the CME on Blood transfusion organised at the PGI. .

While the technique of leukoreduction is gaining popularity in separating the blood components, the expert from Delhi said that its reach was only limited to the major Indian cities but did not reach all the blood banks.

'This process reduces infections and makes the blood safe. But its reach is limited in India so far,'' he said.

Another cause of concern for the doctors remained the dominance of the professional donors over the voluntary donors in the country.

"India still grapples with the burden of as many as 55 per cent of the blood units donated by the professional donors.

This load is very high in the Indian context. That is also the reason why we have more chances of blood transfusion- related infections as compared to those in the western countries,'' added Dr Makroo.

The doctor highlighted another disturbing fact that incidents of infections of HIV, Hepatitis B and C, malaria and syphilis are higher in India vis-a-vis the developed countries.

"In India, three persons per thousand get the HIV infection through blood transfusion, six per thousand persons get the Hepatitis C infections, as many as 1.5 per cent persons get infected by the hepatitis B infections through the blood transfusion each year.

In fact, India falls in the epidemic zone for the Hepatitis B infections,'' added the expert.

Chandigarh, September 20
Government Model Senior Secondary School, Sector 35, in girls section and Sanjay Public School, Sector 44, in boys won the Six-a-side Football Tournament for St Xavier’s Trophy played here today at the St Xavier’s School, Sector 44. While in the girls section, GMSSS-35 downed Government Model Senior Secondary School, Sector 23, Sanjay Public School defeated St Xavier’s Senior Secondary School, Sector 44.

The Chandigarh Cricket Association, affiliated to the Haryana Cricket Association will hold selection trials on September 22 to select Chandigarh team for the Pataudi Trophy. The trials will be held at Government Senior Secondary School, Sector 19, at 2.30 pm. This was stated by Mr Surinder Singh ‘Baijee’, secretary of the association.

Chandigarh, September 20
The UT Administration has made elaborate arrangements for smooth conduct of India Pakistan hockey test match scheduled to be held on October 6 at Hockey Stadium, Sector 42, Chandigarh.

Several Committees have been constituted for smooth conduct of the event under the Chairmanship of the Adviser to the Administrator, UT, Chandigarh, Mr Lalit Sharma. Overall coordination will be looked after by Deputy Commissioner, Arun Kumar and Senior Superintendent of Police (City) Mr Gaurav Yadav. Chandigarh tie will be one of the eight match series to be played between India and Pakistan. The four hockey test matches will be played at Pakistan, beginning from September 22 and Pakistan team will visit India on a reciprocal tour to play the rest of the four matches.

The Deputy Commissioner, UT, Chandigarh has also convened a meeting tomorrow to draw up the other formalities to conduct the match and also to review the arrangement process at Sector 42, Hockey Stadium.

Chandigarh, September 20
“I am here to revive the glory of Indian hockey, so give me at least a year to fuflil the aim”, said Grehard Rach, Chief Coach of the Indian Hockey team. Rach, who is in the city, said Indian players were more skillful than their European counterparts.

He said a few decades ago every European hockey player desired to follow hockey played by Indians. They finally succeeded in learning and overpowering the Indian players. He said that does not mean we could not improve, but what we need was to plan effectively so that we could strengthen and compete with the world with more confidence and motivation.

Rach said whatever happened in Athens should be forgotted. Now we want to start afresh and must learn from our mistakes. He quoted the comments of past Hockey Olympians from India based on what they watched on television. Rach said one should analyse any teams’ performance from what is happening in a field rather than from videos.

Rach was of the view that the IHF was determined to improve the Indian Hockey team.

Rach said Indians were good in penalty corner conversion but weak in short corner conversions which was the need of the hour. He said players were fit and able to conquer their rivals in the forthcoming India-Pakistan series.

Rach said the main focus would be on youngsters and they would be exposed to various international matches which would help boost their confidence.

Mohali, September 20
After remaining a bone of contention for years over 35 acres of prime land, reportedly in the unauthorised possession of the Radhasoami Satsang Beas Management here would be ‘returned’ to Punjab Urban Planning and Development Authority (PUDA).

It is learnt that an undertaking to this effect had been given by the management following a meeting with Minister of Urban Housing and Development Raghunath Sahai Puri to solve the issue amiably. The land would be in PUDA’s possession by October 31, and has already been planned for the construction of cooperative housing buildings and institutions.

Sources said Radhasoami Beas Management owned a large chunk of land near Sohana village before PUDA acquired the area. However as part of an internal adjustment done in 2001, PUDA granted 200 acres of land to the management at the same spot in exchange for the other pieces of land owned by the management elsewhere in Mohali.

In fact the deal was in PUDA’s favour. We exchanged 200 acres of consolidated land for almost 235 acres of unconsolidated land owned by the management in Mohali. Other than this, the management was asked to pay external development charges to the tune of over Rs 2 Crore, which they did,’’stated a source in PUDA.

However, while the management took possession of the 200 acres of land, it continued to hold on to over 35 acres of adjoining extra land that they had formally owned but did not form a part of the fresh allotment. This land fell within the boundary walls of the dera which was later constructed here and was subsequently declared encroached upon by PUDA. A number of notices were also issued to the management to shift its boundary wall and hand over the excess land to PUDA. However the management showed its inability to give the land back.

The management’s plea was also not baseless. They pointed out that almost eight acres of land out of the 200 acres allotted to them was under litigation by the original owners and following a stay order, they could not use it as planned. They also said this piece was to be used for the construction of an office complex within the dera, and since a new office complex could not be constructed, they continued to use the old office complex that fell within this 35 acres of land that they had erstwhile owned,’’explained a PUDA source.

Chandigarh, September 20
The city will host a three-day international conference on e-governance from October 18. The speakers include Union IT Minister Dayanidhi Maran. The idea of the seminar is to enable excellence in the government services.

The visiting delegates will enable government to offer high quality services to citizens and business reducing administrative costs. The seminar will address issues related to the improvement in the efficiency of inter-administration communication to harness the full potential. It will also work to assist government agencies faced with poor take-up of services and expensive implementations.

The application of IST (Information Society Technologies) to public services or e-governance, as it is known popularly, offers exciting and efficient ways of tackling the challenges of improving the quality and access of service delivery, especially to the poor.

Many government agencies have been starting e-governance projects. There is a need for a coherent pan-country approach, said Mr Vikas Kanungo, Chairman and Secretary General of the “The Society for Promotion of e-Governance (SPEG)”, which is organising the seminar.

The workshop is supported by the STPI, Mohali, and Punjab Engineering College.