Srinivasan Ramani

International Institute of Information Technology Bangalore | IIITB

When a woman carries twins, with one male fetus and one female fetus, there seems to be a risk for female fetus. The female is often born with reduced chances of conceiving and delivering offspring herself when she grows up. This raises the question, does the sexual development of the female fetus affected by the male hormones from the sibling? Does this increase the probability of the female developing transgender issues?

Are there treatments that would reduce the chances of conceiving twins?

These questions are socially important.

Srinivasan Ramani

It would have been controversial to raise questions about the Vaccination-Vitiligo link while the Pandemic was raging. Now that the Pandemic is under control, we must seek the truth.

There are plenty of articles I could locate with Google Scholar reporting incidents that suggest there is a link. For instance,

Vitiligo is recognized as an auto-immune phenomenon. Vaccinations, in general, have been associated with auto-immune reactions.

There have been two new cases of vitiligo among my acquaintances in the last two years. In both cases, the person involved had taken Covid-19 vaccinations.

A major epidemiological study is called for. The study should also cover possible associations with gender, age, ethnicity, socio-economic factors, and nutritional factors so that we will understand conditions under which a causative phenomenon is identified.

Srinivasan Ramani, 25-11-2023

Several years ago, Scientific American asked the question "Do Dogs have mirror neurons"?

I do not know what has happened to this question over the years, but a recent video posted on Youtube settles the matter for me

YouTube Amazing Dog doing simple morning yoga https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y8he5mwPjKg

Try training a dog to do this!

Srinivasan Ramani

Please visit:

Heart Attack Deaths Drop Over Past Two Decades - American College of Cardiology (acc.org). It says "Researchers found the overall rate of death from heart attack, adjusted for age, fell from about 87 deaths per 100,000 people in 1999 to about 38 deaths per 100,000 people in 2020".

The reduction may be the result of awareness, better preventive care, obesity reduction, etc.

My question is about a simple step in health care. Has any research been done about the value of a six-monthly blood pressure check and related consultation in reducing heart attacks? A related question is a similar reduction in strokes.

Obviously, this healthcare is not available to the average resident of most developing countries.

Should it not be?

Srinivasan Ramani

A report from the prestigious CDC in the US Alcohol and Cancer Risk Fact Sheet - NCI says:

“Based on data from 2009, an estimated 3.5% of cancer deaths in the United States (about 19,500 deaths) were alcohol related”. It also says “In fact, a recent study that included data from more than 1,000 alcohol studies and data sources, as well as death and disability records from 195 countries and territories from 1990 to 2016, concluded that the optimal number of drinks to consume per day to minimize the overall risk to health is zero”.

However, the shibboleth continues to be propagated that it is safe to have “two drinks for a man, and one for a woman, per day”.

What is the increase in cancer risk for a person taking one drink every day? Believe me, it is considerable, but I will not offer a number here.

WebMD lists six types of cancer and reports the American Cancer Society’s estimates for the number of deaths due to these six types in 2022 as 341,390.

Most repetitions of the dangerous statement have a pious preamble, and read roughly as follows:

"Don't begin if you do not take alcoholic drinks, but if you choose to drink, limit yourself to two drinks a day if you are a male and one if you are female".

(This is an extract from my article

https://obvioustruths.blogspot.com/2022/10/can-you-add-years-to-your-life.html )

I lost two friends in India to Parkinson’s this year. I got reminded of the pyrrhic victory India had won against Malaria during 1950 to 1970. DDT and, later, Gammaxene had played significant roles in this. It was common in a part of that period for residential homes to be sprayed with DDT or Gammaxene so that there was a persisting deposit on the walls.

The disease has not gone away completely even now. A Government Press Release https://pib.gov.in/PressReleaseIframePage.aspx?PRID=1677601 says that there were (3,38,494 cases, 77 deaths) in the year 2019.

The question I wish to raise is this: can we statistically associate the use of these pesticides in large quantities with the occurrence of Parkinson’s disease in India? It seems that exposure to certain pesticides is a significant cause of Parkinson’s. Government data on the volume of import of these pesticides should be easily available. The number of cases of Parkinson's, year wise might be more difficult to get.

My father had been a health officer from about 1945 till about 1972 or so. Much was his work was for the “Malaria Eradication” Programme. DDT and, later, gammaxene were regularly stored in his office, and they were weighed and dissolved right there, to be filled in sprayers which his staff would take to spray peoples' homes. He died of Parkinson’s in 1999, in his eighties.

Srinivasan Ramani

Has the pandemic taught us that we are in an unsustainable state in many places on earth? Very high population densities, poor sanitation, lack of adequate and safe water supply, and poor public health facilities make it difficult to control fast spreading infectious diseases.

We can hopefully vaccinate 70% of the population against Covid-19 by year-end of 2021, but are we going to live happily ever after? Is it better to recognizable unlivable places as such and draw up major plans to rectify these problems?

Vaccination-created immunities don’t even last a year, and Covid-19 is not the last virus.

Research question: We need to identify places that are unlivable on the basis of objective criteria. What are these criteria?

Srinivasan Ramani

28-March-2021

I quote from an NCOA article:

To locate this article, do a web search for the query Falls Prevention Facts

The site is “https://www.ncoa.org/”

“Falls are the leading cause of injury-related deaths among persons aged ≥65 years, and the age-adjusted rate of deaths from falls is increasing.

Falls are the leading cause of injury-related death among adults age 65 and older, and the age-adjusted fall death rate is increasing. The age-adjusted fall death rate is 64 deaths per 100,000 older adults. Fall death rates among adults age 65 and older increased about 30% from 2009 to 2018”. WHO says “Each year an estimated 646 000 individuals die from falls globally of which over 80% are in low and middle income countries”.

I suggest research aimed at mitigating the situation. Orthopedics and other concerned specialists can try to find out what advice/training can be given to people at risk of having falls. What can be said? I offer an example. By no means do I suggest that this be used as advice till appropriate research is carried out and the real advice text is finalized.

Example of Possible Advice

1. You may sometimes feel that you are about to fall. You may get a few seconds to do something to reduce the possibility of getting badly hurt.

2. The following are points to remember and use. If your risk of a fall is high, your doctor may suggest suitable training to learn to cope with a fall.

3. If your risk of a fall is high, your doctor may suggest use of a suitable walking stick or other prosthetic device. Follow this advice.

4. If you are carrying something, drop it without hurting your toes. You may need your hands to break the fall.

5. If you can reach a chair or bench within one or two steps, use it and sit down. Remember flimsy chairs when tilted may fall themselves.

6. If you can reach a support within one or two steps, grab it.

7. If someone is accompanying you, alert them saying you are falling and ask for help.

8. If a chair or support is not available, quickly fold one leg at the knee and lower your body to the floor. Then put one hand on the floor to support you and sit down.

9. An important objective of this procedure to reduce the possibility of a head injury.

10. There might be a cardio-vascular problem behind the loss of balance. Tell any person helping you to call for advice/help to manage this possibility.

Apps on a watch or cellphone can monitor the gait of a person. Apps can be developed to display an index to show the falling-risk of the users so that they can seek preventive advice in advance. Specialists can train those at risk on a padded floor.

Srinivasan Ramani

Using safety googles to avoid infection by Covid-19 virus will no doubt be superior to wearing run of the mill eyeglasses. It might be however be worth investigating this, If it turns out the chances are more users, particularly users who are more more exposed to Covid-19 infection are more likely are likely more ltheir own eyeglasses than safety glasses.

Srinivasan Ramani

The field of alternative medicine can gain greater credibility if it publishes procedures to verify claims that are advertised for some products, and widely follows them. Let us ask what an immunity booster needs to do? Is it that testing a product makes it ineffective because you are looking for proof of its effectiveness, thereby "betraying your faith in it"? And can anyone claim something is an immunity booster because its ingredients contain a goose berry?

Is there any substance that can be mixed with the gum on postal stamps to inhibit viral growth when the stamp is made wet for sticking to an envelope? It would have to be safe for human use, knowing that in some cases people would end up licking the stamp. Adding a bitter substance (say quinine!) may be an alternative solution. Over a period of time, people would learn not to lick stamps!

Srinivasan Ramani

The other day I heard two professionals comment on vaccine development in India. One of them said that animals like hamsters, ferrets etc. usually used in Vaccine research are not available in India. This poses a problem to those who wish to do vaccine development.

I wonder if they have considered using bats. Someone has reported finding SARS-Cov-2 in bats in India.

Even if they are not accepted for approved testing of new vaccines, they could be helpful in the process of vaccine development in earlier stages.

As a first step, we could test bats for specific antibodies.

Srinivasan Ramani

Has anyone studied of SARS survivors to see if they show some immunity against Covid-19 infection? There is supposed to be considerable similarity between the two viruses. What does the serological test for Covid-19 antibodies indicate when tested on SARS survivors?

Srinivasan Ramani

Many countries have considered Taro as having some medicinal effect on malaria. There is a Brazilian publication indicating possible anti-malarial effect of a number of related plants Why should Taro offer some anti-Covid-19 potential? Hydrocholoroquine is being studied in this context. It is suspected to increase the pH value of the host environment, inhibiting the growth of Covid-19 as it is an alkaline drug. Colocasia is an alkaline vegetable. The anti-malarial effectiveness of Hydrocholoroquine is also believed to be due to its alkalinity.

Pretty thin logic! But you may not need much logic to persuade volunteers to eat taro! Try https://www.rhiansrecipes.com/crispy-taro-fritters-vegan-gf/

If NIH would let you run a clinical trial with Taro Fritters, I don't know!