5 ms·

India Virtually Eliminates Tetanus as a Killer

84 points by Garbage 11y ago

middleclick 11y ago
This news and polio eradication is good news from India.
hackuser 11y ago
> The program succeeded despite corruption. The Times of India recently reported that an audit had found clearly fraudulent payments — including some to a 60-year-old woman registered as having been pregnant five times in 10 months. I'm uncomfortable with the meme of corruption in public welfare programs (and I may be overreacting to the author's implication, but I still think my point applies more generally). There is corruption in every program and institution, from private business to religion to government to little league baseball. If you have thousands or millions of people involved, some will behave badly; it's the nature of humanity. We can't wait to do things until the institution or the people it services are saints. Not all corruption is equal, and absolutely we should find ways to minimize it (which usually involves looking in the mirror and making systemic changes, not complaining about the inevitable, well-established consquences of our current system). But considering the string of massive corruption scandals on Wall Street, for example, I'm surprised when people think government and welfare programs are particularly corrupt.
- merpnderp 11y ago
  In the US there have been recent papers discussing how roughly 10% of the medicare budget goes to people who live less than a year, with the implication that perhaps we shouldn't be spending so much on people with so little time. It is a well established fact by the CBO (Congressional Budget Office) that roughly 10% of the medicare budget is wasted on fraudulent claims (even though their rejection claim rate is roughly 1000 times that of most private insurance). So there are some cases where the status quo is untenable, fraud is blatantly obvious, and people could die untreated do to a lack or resources. Yes, fraud and corruption should always make the headlines and should always be a priority to eradicate. [EDIT for typo of medicaid instead of medicare]
  - akashya 11y ago
    Sources?
  - sophacles 11y ago
    Fraud should be a concern, however at some points, the attempts to eliminate it outweigh (in terms of cost and effort) the effect of its existence. At that point it becomes a morality issue rather than a practical one. For comparison, I wonder if the CBO was given full investigatory power into private insurance, would they discover a higher or lower fraud percentage? It would not surprise me if they were higher, and that at some point they just accepted that fraudulent claims would be cheaper to ignore than to uncover, based on dollar amounts and so on. It similarly of course wouldn't surprise me if they were lower being able to deny more people at the outset, or were able to use more information to find high risk claims (that privacy concerns prevent the government from using for the exact same purpose).
    - th0waway 11y ago
      I would expect it to be the reverse: there is no incentive for government programs to root out fraud, if they fall short, they just raise taxes. For private companies - if they are being defrauded, it directly affects their bottom line, and the bottom line of their executives (who would be VERY interested to make sure bonuses increase). If we are talking about fraud within the company/government, I would expect the same - less in the company than in the government. Not zero, but less overall.
      - deleted 11y ago
        [deleted]
      - afarrell 11y ago
        The people in charge of trying to root out fraud don't have the power to raise taxes. They aren't congresscritters. That doesn't imply that they aren't demoralized, ineffective, or hamstrung, but still.
      - th0waway 11y ago
- aussieindian 11y ago
  >> I'm uncomfortable with the meme of corruption in public welfare programs Its a story about a developing country.. it would be a brave editor who approves a piece without the story sticking to the dominant narrative about the country. Not sure if there are any Journo's who can comment on my insinuation but that is how i see many media pieces. not sure if it is forced by editor or comes from a journo's own biases.
rm_-rf_slash 11y ago
>India has reduced cases to less than one per 1,000 live births, which the W.H.O. considers “elimination as a public health problem." One in one thousand of over a billion is still a rather large number. Shouldn't the WHO use proportional statistics for populations over, say, 100 million?
- GFK_of_xmaspast 11y ago
  "One billion" is not the live birth rate.
  - rm_-rf_slash 11y ago
    At the risk of being further downvoted: no shit.
    - trextrex 11y ago
      I'm not sure if you're implying that the population growth rate of India is very high, but if you are that's not true anymore. It's actually very close to replacement levels with parts of India where it's actually below replacement levels [1] [1] http://qz.com/317518/finally-indias-population-growth-is-slowing-down/ http://qz.com/317518/finally-indias-population-growth-is-slo...
PhearTheCeal 11y ago
Now if only they could eliminate defecating in the streets. [1] In India, nearly half of the population - more than 590m people - relieve themselves in the open [1] http://www.bbc.com/news/health-33980904 http://www.bbc.com/news/health-33980904
- GFK_of_xmaspast 11y ago
  People say the same thing about California.
  - neduma 11y ago
    You mean homeless peoples urinating in SF..
  - adventured 11y ago
    No people don't say the same thing about California. In California it's a rare occurrence among the 38 million people that live there, caused by a tiny fraction of the population - almost exclusively a subset of the homeless. In India, it's ~45% of 1.2 billion people.
    - jessaustin 11y ago
      ...almost exclusively a subset of the homeless. And late-night alcohol drinkers! Maybe you've never done it, but lots of people, of both genders, have.
      - praneshp 11y ago
        Yes. I live in downtown San Jose, and well-dressed folks (ie clearly not homeless) do it outside the apartment community I live in. I've taken pictures a couple of times, but never sent them to the cops for fear of ruining their lives. (I've heard of people getting charged with "lewd" behavior and being put on sex offenders lists)
        11y ago
univalent 11y ago
This is very cool. I remember as a kid every time I had a cut or scrape my parents would rack their brains for the date of the last 'booster shot'. I was also told cautionary tales of tetanus seizures (?) that could break major bones because of the stress of the convulsion.

84 points by Garbage 11y ago

This news and polio eradication is good news from India.

> The program succeeded despite corruption. The Times of India recently reported that an audit had found clearly fraudulent payments — including some to a 60-year-old woman registered as having been pregnant five times in 10 months. I'm uncomfortable with the meme of corruption in public welfare programs (and I may be overreacting to the author's implication, but I still think my point applies more generally). There is corruption in every program and institution, from private business to religion to government to little league baseball. If you have thousands or millions of people involved, some will behave badly; it's the nature of humanity. We can't wait to do things until the institution or the people it services are saints. Not all corruption is equal, and absolutely we should find ways to minimize it (which usually involves looking in the mirror and making systemic changes, not complaining about the inevitable, well-established consquences of our current system). But considering the string of massive corruption scandals on Wall Street, for example, I'm surprised when people think government and welfare programs are particularly corrupt.

merpnderp 11y ago
In the US there have been recent papers discussing how roughly 10% of the medicare budget goes to people who live less than a year, with the implication that perhaps we shouldn't be spending so much on people with so little time. It is a well established fact by the CBO (Congressional Budget Office) that roughly 10% of the medicare budget is wasted on fraudulent claims (even though their rejection claim rate is roughly 1000 times that of most private insurance). So there are some cases where the status quo is untenable, fraud is blatantly obvious, and people could die untreated do to a lack or resources. Yes, fraud and corruption should always make the headlines and should always be a priority to eradicate. [EDIT for typo of medicaid instead of medicare]
- akashya 11y ago
  Sources?
- sophacles 11y ago
  Fraud should be a concern, however at some points, the attempts to eliminate it outweigh (in terms of cost and effort) the effect of its existence. At that point it becomes a morality issue rather than a practical one. For comparison, I wonder if the CBO was given full investigatory power into private insurance, would they discover a higher or lower fraud percentage? It would not surprise me if they were higher, and that at some point they just accepted that fraudulent claims would be cheaper to ignore than to uncover, based on dollar amounts and so on. It similarly of course wouldn't surprise me if they were lower being able to deny more people at the outset, or were able to use more information to find high risk claims (that privacy concerns prevent the government from using for the exact same purpose).
  - th0waway 11y ago
    I would expect it to be the reverse: there is no incentive for government programs to root out fraud, if they fall short, they just raise taxes. For private companies - if they are being defrauded, it directly affects their bottom line, and the bottom line of their executives (who would be VERY interested to make sure bonuses increase). If we are talking about fraud within the company/government, I would expect the same - less in the company than in the government. Not zero, but less overall.
    - deleted 11y ago
      [deleted]
    - afarrell 11y ago
      The people in charge of trying to root out fraud don't have the power to raise taxes. They aren't congresscritters. That doesn't imply that they aren't demoralized, ineffective, or hamstrung, but still.
    - th0waway 11y ago
aussieindian 11y ago
>> I'm uncomfortable with the meme of corruption in public welfare programs Its a story about a developing country.. it would be a brave editor who approves a piece without the story sticking to the dominant narrative about the country. Not sure if there are any Journo's who can comment on my insinuation but that is how i see many media pieces. not sure if it is forced by editor or comes from a journo's own biases.

rm_-rf_slash 11y ago

>India has reduced cases to less than one per 1,000 live births, which the W.H.O. considers “elimination as a public health problem." One in one thousand of over a billion is still a rather large number. Shouldn't the WHO use proportional statistics for populations over, say, 100 million?

GFK_of_xmaspast 11y ago
"One billion" is not the live birth rate.
- rm_-rf_slash 11y ago
  At the risk of being further downvoted: no shit.
  - trextrex 11y ago
    I'm not sure if you're implying that the population growth rate of India is very high, but if you are that's not true anymore. It's actually very close to replacement levels with parts of India where it's actually below replacement levels [1] [1] http://qz.com/317518/finally-indias-population-growth-is-slowing-down/ http://qz.com/317518/finally-indias-population-growth-is-slo...

PhearTheCeal 11y ago

Now if only they could eliminate defecating in the streets. [1] In India, nearly half of the population - more than 590m people - relieve themselves in the open [1] http://www.bbc.com/news/health-33980904 http://www.bbc.com/news/health-33980904

GFK_of_xmaspast 11y ago
People say the same thing about California.
- neduma 11y ago
  You mean homeless peoples urinating in SF..
- adventured 11y ago
  No people don't say the same thing about California. In California it's a rare occurrence among the 38 million people that live there, caused by a tiny fraction of the population - almost exclusively a subset of the homeless. In India, it's ~45% of 1.2 billion people.
  - jessaustin 11y ago
    ...almost exclusively a subset of the homeless. And late-night alcohol drinkers! Maybe you've never done it, but lots of people, of both genders, have.
    - praneshp 11y ago
      Yes. I live in downtown San Jose, and well-dressed folks (ie clearly not homeless) do it outside the apartment community I live in. I've taken pictures a couple of times, but never sent them to the cops for fear of ruining their lives. (I've heard of people getting charged with "lewd" behavior and being put on sex offenders lists)
      - 11y ago

univalent 11y ago

This is very cool. I remember as a kid every time I had a cut or scrape my parents would rack their brains for the date of the last 'booster shot'. I was also told cautionary tales of tetanus seizures (?) that could break major bones because of the stress of the convulsion.