The Tribune, Chandigarh, India

Obama keeps his word
US troops to pull out from Afghanistan

As President Barack Obama had promised after taking up the reins of power, he has announced that 10,000 US troops will leave Afghanistan this year, beginning next month. An additional 20,000 troops will be back to the US in 2012. This means that he will try his luck for a second presidential term when nearly 70,000 members of the US armed forces will be there in the Afghan battlefield. The complete withdrawal will have to wait till 2014. Will the US voters accept this? There is a strong feeling among the US public that the pullout of the US forces should be as quick as possible. People do not want the US to remain bogged down in as dangerous a place as Afghanistan, where billions of dollars are being spent without the intended result being in sight — taming of the Taliban.

The US has encouraged President Hamid Karzai to hold negotiations with what are being described as the “good” Taliban for their induction in the Afghanistan government. The idea is that it is better to win over those Taliban factions who agree to lay down their arms. Achieving military victory over them is just not possible. The efforts to hunt down the key Taliban figures like Mullah Omar will continue, but maintaining law and order will be the task of Afghanistan’s own security forces.

If the US public wants the American forces to be flown back home, the Afghans too will be happy with this development. But will the US really leave Afghanistan to its own fate? This is unthinkable at this stage. The US has made a huge investment in terms of money and human capital to achieve its objectives in the Afghanistan-Pakistan area. It is believed that the US presence will remain there for a long time to come so that extremist forces never feel easy in this most dangerous part of the world. However, the US dependence on Pakistan for the purpose is not in the interest of peace and stability in the region. Islamabad can use the opportunity to meddle in the Afghan affairs with the help of pro-Pakistan extremist forces. The cause of peace demands that no third country’s involvement should be allowed in Afghanistan after the US troop pullout.

CWG stadia in disuse
Neglect and apathy of officials

A common defence for the poor showing of Indian athletes in international events, especially the Olympics, is the lack of facilities where they can train. As reported in the columns of this newspaper, even when we spend thousands of crores of rupees of public funds on these facilities, we still make them unavailable to the very segment of people they are built for — sportsmen. While the UPA government is still reeling in a season of scams that started with the Commonwealth Games scam, another one would just be an additional number, were it not for the fact that this time, money is not being made, it is being lost, through neglect and apathy on the part of officials concerned.

Stadia are not built for one-time use. At a time when the stadia should have been buzzing with activity, they are closed down. Not only are they deserted, in the absence of proper maintenance, they are also quickly going to seed. When you see debris in a swimming pool, garbage in stadia, and grime everywhere, the high price that the nation is paying for this apathy becomes all-too-apparent. Maintenance is seldom a priority in such institutions, but the speed at which these facilities have deteriorated is distressing. The only way to keep stadia alive is by hosting events that bring people to them.

A mindset issue, as regards the facilities for sportsmen, also needs to be resolved. Just as for many years, computers issued to government schools were ‘safely’ kept under lock and key and the students were not allowed to touch them, lest they ‘soil’ them, similarly, sports facilities built by for the CWG are not kept open to athletes. Crores of rupees in public funds were not spent on them so that they would be accessible only during VIP visits and for auditors. They should be used to ignite young minds and attract them towards sports, and the officials concerned must not only be flexible in their thinking, they must come up with fresh ideas to revitalise the stadia and make them hubs of sporting activity in the nation, rather than visible symbols of waste that they have become.

Thought for the Day

A man cannot be comfortable without his own approval. — Mark Twain

ARTICLE

No way to treat the PM
Digvijaya’s uncalled for statement
by Inder Malhotra

DYSFUNCTIONAL the Congress and its government have been for quite a long time. Now they seem to be becoming dangerously chaotic, if not self-destructive. There can be no other explanation for senior Congress leader and the AICC general secretary Digvijaya Singh’s utterly uncalled for statement that it “was time Rahul Gandhi became Prime Minister”. To be sure, the former Chief Minister of Madhya Pradesh, to whom the Congress high command seems to have outsourced the task of speaking on the party’s behalf, has been extolling the duly designated heir’s qualifications to head the government for a while. On young Mr Gandhi’s 41st birthday on Sunday, however, Mr Singh’s tone implied that Rahul should take over here and now.

Yet, when asked by the media whether he was advocating a changeover, he replied laconically: “No”. This only underscores that hypocrisy is as much a part of Congress culture as sycophancy. Curiously, Mr Singh also used the occasion to advise young Mr Gandhi on a purely personal matter when he told him to get married. Why? Will a married man be more acceptable as Prime Minister than a bachelor? The Congress has had several successful bachelor chief ministers in the past: P. C. Ghosh, B. C. Roy, and P. C. Sen in West Bengal and K. Kamaraj in Tamil Nadu.

The pertinent point is that no one in the country believes that Mr Singh was simply shooting his mouth. The general belief is that he had at least tacit encouragement from top leadership. Whatever the facts, perceptions do matter. It is also known that many of his ceaseless pronouncements, of which some at least were unbecoming, have been at the leadership’s express behest. Remarkably, no one has yet rebuked the errant Mr Singh though he himself did try disingenuously to backtrack a day later. On the same day, in a damage-limitation exercise, the Congress spokesperson, Ms Jayanthi Natarajan, declared: “Our Prime Minister has done an excellent job… for the last seven years. Manmohan Singh is our PM and he continues to be that”.

Without beating about the bush, let it be said that Mr Digvijaya Singh-led Rahul-for-PM-now chorus is offensive and unfair to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. He is doubtless beleaguered and has had a bad time lately. But the fault is not his alone. Congress president Sonia Gandhi and the party as a whole must share the blame. For all his limitations, the Prime Minister is a man personifying decency, diligence, ability and impeccable integrity. Even his staunch critics respect him. Of course, he is no politician. But then everyone knew this when Mrs Gandhi, wisely reluctant to be Prime Minister in 2004, chose him for the tough assignment.

At a press conference immediately after returning to power with a much stronger mandate in 2009, Dr Singh had declared that since he had a lot more to do, he was not thinking of retiring. But he had clearly added that whenever Mr Rahul Gandhi was ready to be Prime Minister, he would happily vacate his office.

In view of this, if it were felt in appropriate quarters that the time has come for Mr Gandhi to take over, a polite and private hint to the good doctor would have done. Why should Mr Digvijaya Singh and some others be allowed publicly to undermine the Prime Minister’s authority and prestige?

This is by no means all. Also in Mr Digvijaya Singh’s line of fire are the two most senior ministers in the Manmohan Singh Cabinet — Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee and Home Minister P. Chidambaram. He called on Mr Mukherjee to “protest” against the visit to the airport of four ministers to greet Baba Ramdev on arrival. He then repeated this criticism publicly. Mr Chidambaram has been Mr Digvijaya Singh’s target for long. At one time, he accused the Home Minister of being “intellectually arrogant”, and since then has never missed an opportunity to take pot shots at him. What is the purpose? Is the idea that all three top leaders of the government should be replaced in one go?

The horror of horrors is that the Congress - which is no longer the mere core of the ruling United Progressive Alliance in its second tenure (UPA-II), but solely in charge of the government because of the ignominious collapse of the Dravid Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) ministry in Tamil Nadu and Ms Mamata Banerjee’s triumphant march from Rail Bhavan in New Delhi to Writers’ Building in Kolkata - is in a crisis far deeper than could have been thought possible in the heady month of May 2009. Indeed, it is no exaggeration to say both the government and the party are paralyzed, with catastrophic consequences, economically, politically and even in the spheres of foreign policy and security, which surely is not the best time for Mr Gandhi’s coronation.

With rates of growth and industrial production going down and inflation on the increase, a 30 per cent drop in foreign direct investment and the stock exchange tumbling every third day, it is becoming embarrassing to talk of Rising India. The flip-flop in the government’s relationship with the leader of the civil society activists, Anna Hazare, and to an extent even with Baba Ramdev, whose close association with the Rashtriya Swyamsevak Sangh (RSS) was never a secret, speaks for itself. Despite all the tall talk, the armed forces are in a mess and the much-touted military infrastructure on the China border remains vastly below par, and so on. In this connection the failure of the bureaucratic leadership is even worse than the woeful performance of the political leadership.

About the overall state of Indian polity, the less said the better. The principal Opposition party, the BJP, is far more divided and dysfunctional than even the Congress. Moreover, it is ill-served by the leader the RSS has saddled it with. No party leader likes him but no one dares protest against the head of the Sangh parivar. In the department of corruption too the BJP’s government in Karnataka can hold its own in relation to the Rajas of this country. The intensely hostile relations between the Congress and the BJP make even minimum cooperation between the two mainstream parties virtually impossible.

All this said, the point must be made that given the foul atmosphere created by the likes of Mr Digvijaya Singh, without ever being disciplined by the Congress high command, Dr Manmohan Singh should also ponder whether continuance in office is worth it.

MIDDLE

Available for employment
by Shriniwas Joshi

Engineer RSS Chauhan sends me interesting e-mails. Recently he sent me one in which 75- year-old Kenneth Way had applied in a different way to Wal-Mart and got selected. That has stimulated me to say “I am available for employment”. If there is any employer looking out for a 75-year young, here is my bio-data:

Name: Shriniwas Joshi (People call me-Sattar-bahattariya fuddduddy)

Sex: I agree with former Samajwadi leader Amar Singh telling Bipasha Basu, “Age matters. But between the legs.

Education: It gives knowledge: knowledge is power and power corrupts. Yes, I am educated.

Desired position: Deserve to be the Chief Executive Officer but that post is for catty, cunning, cut-throat competitor, so any post other than that.

Desired salary: ?ofty $alary: $uper-duper accommodation: ?amborghini Murcielago car: €fficient $ervants or else you recommend; I accept.

Last position held: Do not know because after my retirement, the court decided a long pending case and informed me that the position that I held was deemed to have been held as if I did not hold that.

Most notable achievement: An incredible collection of Himachali caps and woollen mufflers that were presented to me whenever I climbed the stage as Chief Guest, etc. Reasons for leaving: Blame the Pay Commission; it did not consider government service as STD (Service till Death).

Hours of work: In government, de-facto office hours are from 1.30 to 2.30 with an hour off for lunch.

Do you have special skills?: I cannot disclose those: reserved for intimate settings.

Do you have any physical shortcoming that may hamper your job? : I am a little blind and deaf. But they say:’ “Be a little blind to your juniors and a little deaf to your seniors: you will pull on well anywhere.”

Have you ever won an award or recognition?: Government service and awards? It is an “ID Ten T I See” question. Never heard of this expression? Write it like ID IO T IC and improve vocabulary.

What would you like to be doing after five years? Shaking hands with Mr. God.

Nearest relative: 7730 miles or 12437.57 km. away as the Boeing flies.

Do you certify that the above is true and complete to the best of your knowledge? Yes, if I am not suffering from an attack of dementia."

OPED

The present E. coli outbreak originating from Germany is considered as the third largest in history involving this bacterium and may be the deadliest one. The WHO has thus been notified about the outbreak, under the International Health Regulations (IHR), as a potential public health event of worldwide concern. In view of the impending threat, the recent Government of India notification regarding the Food Safety and Standard Rules, 2011, assumes significance
Death in a food bowl
Jagdish Chander

There is an ongoing outbreak of an unusual strain of a common bacterium, Escherichia coli, with some mutational changes, in the European continent, particularly involving Germany, affecting over 3500 persons with fatal consequences, as per the European Centre for Disease Control (ECDC). This bacterium is popularly known as E. coli. Most of the patients are suffering from blood-tinged diarrhoea with renal damage. This outbreak has taken a serious proportion and is being debated not only in European Parliament but also the world over, as it has serious financial implications as well, in addition to the usual health concerns.

Clinical features

The patients suffer from a life-threatening complication known as hemolytic-uremic syndrome (HUS). The onset of the symptoms may take 3-4 days after the exposure, as the incubation period ranges from 2-10 days. The diarrhoea begins, the red blood cells suddenly disintegrate, blood-clotting stops working and the kidneys start failing. In many cases, the patients need dialysis. This bacterial strain causes bloody diarrhoea along with abdominal pain. The outbreak is unusual in that it has developed very rapidly and an unusually high number of cases are affecting adults, particularly women, instead of the normal high-risk groups, which are young children and the elderly. Treatment with anti-diarrhoeal products or antibiotics is not usually recommended, as these may worsen the situation. The antimicrobial resistance pattern of this isolate is also quite unusual. This could reflect the use of antimicrobial agents in the feed of the original host animals. It should be stated, however, that antimicrobials should not be empirically used in VTEC infections since the use increases the risk of HUS. It has not been stated if antimicrobial use was a factor in the prominent risk of HUS in this outbreak.

The European Union has given the case definition for diarrhoea and HUS caused by the epidemic strain Shiga toxin 2-producing E. coli (STEC) O104:H4. The result was that customers who ate sprouts were found to be almost nine times more likely to be infected than other diners. It was this trail, from hospital beds to restaurants, that led health inspectors back along the food chain to an organic farm at Bienenbuttel, southeast of Hamburg, where the sprouts originated. The farm has been shut down and is no longer delivering vegetables to the market.

The outbreak

The epicentre of the present outbreak is in northern Germany, in Hamburg and its vicinity, with hundreds of other suspected cases. It had found the first direct E. coli link to the organic farm in the neighbouring state of Lower Saxony, near the small town of Bienenbuettel. Such cases have also been reported from 10 other European countries like France, Sweden, Denmark, Britain, Switzerland, Austria, Czech Republic, Poland, Spain, Greece, Luxemburg, Norway and The Netherlands. The present outbreak is considered as the third largest involving E. coli in history and it may be the deadliest one. Twelve persons died in a 1996 Japanese outbreak that reportedly sickened more than 12,000 persons and seven died in a 2000 Canadian outbreak. However, those were due to different strains of this bacterium, not be the present one.

The German authorities have notified WHO about the outbreak, under the International Health Regulations (IHR), as a potential public health event of worldwide concern. Therefore, the WHO is sharing information with health authorities in other countries. The WHO has also offered technical assistance and stands ready to facilitate collaboration between laboratories to assist countries without the capacity to detect the unusual E. coli Sero-group O104.

The diagnostic laboratories are requested to send STEC isolates to the National Reference Centre for Salmonella and other Bacterial Enteric Pathogens in Germany for the epidemiological investigations. The Protection Against Infection Act of 2001 renders both the laboratory confirmation of an STEC infection and the clinical diagnosis of HUS or suspected HUS notifiable to the local health department.

The WHO is not making any new recommendations for treatment however; normal hygiene measures should be observed like hand washing after toilet use and before food preparation or consumption, particularly for people who care for small children or are immunocompromised, as the bacterium can be passed from person to person, as well as through food, water and direct contact with animals. Anyone who develops bloody diarrhoea and abdominal pain and who has had contact recently with northern Germany should seek medical advice urgently. Physicians are advised to initiate STEC stool diagnostics for these patients and to closely monitor them for the development of HUS.

The authorities from the Robert Koch-Institute (RKI), the Federal Institute for Risk Assessment (BfR) and the Federal Office of Consumer Protection and Food Safety (BVL) jointly stated that mounting epidemiological and food-chain evidence indicated that bean and seed sprouts (including fenugreek, moong beans, lentils, adzuki beans and alfalfa) are the vehicle of the outbreak in Germany, caused by the unusual enteroaggregative verocytotoxin-producing Escherichia coli (EAggEC VTEC) O104:H4 bacterium.

The outbreak remains primarily centred in Germany, hence the authorities now recommend that people in Germany should not eat raw bean and seed sprouts of any origin. The households, caterers and restaurants should dispose of any bean and seed sprouts that they have and any food items that might have been in contact with them, until further notice. The recommendation not to eat cucumbers, tomatoes, and leafy salads in northern Germany has been cancelled as the Spanish cucumber was blamed in the beginning, which could, however, not be substantiated on detailed investigations. They recommend withdrawal from the market of all food products from a farm in Lower Saxony, where the implicated bean and seed sprouts originated. Numerous investigations continue, including into delivery chains. So far, there is no evidence that bean and seed sprouts from the farm have been exported beyond Germany. The authorities recommend strict adherence to general hygiene advice when handling food items, after using the toilet and when health professionals are in contact with patients.

In addition to the identification of strains done by the German institutes, this has been confirmed by the WHO Collaborating Centre for Reference and Research on Escherichia and Klebsiella i.e. the Statens Serum Institute, Denmark. The molecular and genetic features of this pathogen are important in helping authorities to identify cases in other countries that could be associated with the outbreak in Germany and to identify the source of the current outbreak.

Prevention

It is recommended that washing hands regularly to prevent person-to-person spread of the bacterium and washing vegetables before consumption will also help to remove bacterium from the surface as well as peeling or cooking.

The bacterium, Escherichia coli, being a coliform, is the indicator organism for checking the microbiological status of potable water as far as its safety is concerned by performing the presumptive coliform count. If the most probable number (MPN) is found to be beyond 3-4, then the water is not considered to be worth drinking.

The writer is Professor & Head, Department of Microbiology, Govt. Medical College Hospital, Sector 32,Chandigarh

Indian context

In the developing countries, like India, Escherichia coli is taken as a normal commensal of the intestine, hence not seriously considered as a pathogenic organism among adults. Moreover, other pathogenic bacteria like Vibrio cholera, protozoa like Entamoeba histolytica and viruses like Rotavirus are found to be prominent agents of gastrointestinal infections. Moreover, if at all a small fraction of infections caused be E. coli do exist, they go undetected as sero-grouping of this bacterium is not done in most of the laboratories across the country as a routine practice because it is considered as commensal.

The Food Safety and Standard Authority of India (FSSA) has the mandate of laying down scientific standards for articles of food and to regulate their manufacture, storage, distribution, sale and import, to ensure availability of safe and wholesome food for human consumption, as per the provisions of the Food Safety and Standards Act, 2006. The FSSA intends to engage a multi-skilled consultancy agency of national/international repute for the preparation of a blueprint and to assist in structuring and operationalising the Food Authority. Recently, on May 5, 2011, it was notified in the Gazette of India, vide GSR 362 (E), that the Union Government proposes to make draft Food Safety and Standards Rules, 2011, in the exercise of the powers conferred by Section 91 of the Food Safety and Standards Act, 2006.

The outbreak being faced by Germany and other European countries may take place in our country as well. During the past one year, the common bacteria producing certain enzymes, like the New Delhi Metallo-beta-lactamases-1 (NDM-1), hit the headlines in our country. However, this time it is not any developing country rather the most advanced country of Europe that has been affected. The National Institute of Cholera and Enteric Disease (NICED), Kolkata, and the National Centre of Disease Control (NCDC), Delhi, look after all diagnostic and therapeutic guidelines about such matters. These institutes have full-fledged infrastructure and technical know-how in handling such situations. The rules and regulations dealing with eatables should be implemented in letter and sprit in case of any such outbreak.

What is E. coli

The name to this bacterium, Escherichia coli, was given after its discoverer, a German-Austrian bacteriologist and pediatrician, Theodor Escherich, in the year 1885. This is classified as a member of the family Enterobacteriaceae, where other common bacterial pathogens like Salmonella and Shigella are placed. A total of about 170 serogroups under this genus, Escherichia, have been divided in five categories i.e. enteropathogenic E. coli (EPEC), enterotoxigenic E. coli (ETEC), enteroinvasive E. coli (EIEC), enterohemorrhagic E. coli (EHEC), enteroaggregative E. coli (EAEC). These are considered as normal commensals of the colon flora and hence called as coliform bacterium. However, it may rarely cause urinary tract infections, sepsis, wound infections, diarrhoea as well as dysentery associated with some of the systemic manifestations. The present outbreak, originating in the first week of May 2011 from Hamburg, northern Germany, is due to an unusual strain of enterohemorrhagic E. coli (EHEC) [O104:H4].

harmful strain

While most of E. coli strains are harmless, the sero-group EHEC can produce toxins, known as Shiga toxins or verotoxins, which damage blood cells and the kidneys. Hence, the EHEC strains that produce these toxins are known as Shiga toxin-producing E. coli (STEC) or vero-cytotoxin-producing E. coli (VTEC), respectively. In the past, most of such outbreaks have been caused by another strain i.e. E. coli O157:H7. The other strains involved in the outbreaks with similar features are called as non-O157:H7 and the present one is E. coli O104:H4, which has rarely been implicated in human infections.