Diarrhoea kills nearly 1,000 children below the age of five everyday in India, but washing hands with soap and water can save the lives of at least 400 of these kids, a UN agency said Thursday on the occasion of Global Handwashing Day.

'In India, diarrhoea is a major killer with about 1,000 children below 5 years dying every day due to diarrhoea alone. Handwashing with soap can reduce diarrhoeal deaths in children by 40 percent and is one of the most inexpensive ways to prevent diarrhoeal disease,' the Unicef said.

The agency said that proper handling and safe storage of water reduces incidences of diarrhoea by nearly half.

'Toilet use can reduce presence of diarrhoea causing agents but toilet usage in India is still very low. In 2006, toilet usage in India was 28 percent but this is showing an upward trend because of the government of India's flagship programme - Total Sanitation Campaign. Nirmal Gram Purashkar has led to more than 18,020 Panchayats being declared free of open defecation,' Unicef said.

'Yet, despite its life-saving potential, handwashing with soap is seldom practised and is not always easy to promote,' the agency added.

The UN agency said every one can make a difference in the 'Clean hands save lives' campaign. Each year, diarrhoeal diseases and acute respiratory infections are responsible for the deaths of more than 3.5 million children under the age of five.

The second annual Global Handwashing Day, being celebrated Thursday, puts the spotlight on the importance of washing hands with soap and water as one of the most effective and affordable health interventions.

A Michigan study states that all those severely down with the H1N1 influenza, swine flu, are at a higher risk of developing blood clots in their lungs.

A blood clot in lungs is usually called pulmonary [pertains to lungs and respiratory system] embolism, a condition that occurs when one or more arteries in the lungs gets blocked.

The findings of the study suggested that in the wake of H1N1 virus's potential complications, medical practitioners, especially the radiologists, will have to be more aware to look closely for the risks of pulmonary embolism in severely sick patients.

Experts say that a blood clot in lung can also cause low oxygen levels in the blood and damage vital organs in the body because of lack of oxygen. The patient can feel light headed or chest pain and can also die as a result. However, they say that blood-thinning drugs can reduce the risk of death in such conditions.

Study and its findings
Researchers based at the University of Michigan, U.S., examined the medical condition
of 66 patients diagnosed with the H1N1 swine flu. Of these, 14 patients were severely ill with the H1N1 infection. Due to their severe medical condition, they had to be admitted to the intensive-care unit.

In order to identify the risk caused by the lethal H1N1 virus, all 66 patients underwent CT [a non-invasive procedure that takes cross-sectional images of the brain or other internal organs; to detect any abnormalities that may not show up on an ordinary x-ray.] scans--medical imaging method using computer processing--to look for any complications caused by the pandemic flu.

Reports of the CT scans detected pulmonary embolisms in five of the 14 intensive-care unit patients. However, the researchers maintained that initial standard chest X-rays were normal in more than half of the patients with H1N1 infections.

"These findings indicate that imaging studies would have to be repeated in severely ill patients to monitor disease progression," said study co-author Dr. Ella Kazerooni, director of the University of Michigan's division of cardiothoracic radiology. "It's important to heighten awareness not only among the radiologists, but also among the referring clinicians."

The researchers noted that more sophisticated CT scans are needed to diagnose the potentially fatal condition since the standard chest X-rays cannot effectively scan the lungs.

A report by World Health Organisation (WHO) also warns that the H1N1 might return for a second strike in winters in a more mutated form, infecting the lungs deeper this time.

Despite the existence of inexpensive and efficient means of treatment, diarrhoea kills more children than AIDS, malaria and measles combined, according to a report issued here Wednesday by the UN Children's Fund (UNICEF) and the World Health Organization (WHO).

The report, titled "Diarrhoea: Why Children Are Still Dying and What Can Be Done," includes information on the causes of diarrhoea,data on access to means of prevention and treatment, and a seven-point plan to reduce diarrhoea deaths.

"It is a tragedy that diarrhoea, which is little more than an inconvenience in the developed world, kills an estimated 1.5 million children each year," said UNICEF Executive Director, Ann M.Veneman. "Inexpensive and effective treatments for diarrhoea exist, but in developing countries only 39 per cent of children with diarrhoea receive the recommended treatment."

Margaret Chan, Director-General of WHO, said: "We know where children are dying of diarrhoea. We know what must be done to prevent those deaths. We must work with governments and partners to put this seven-point plan into action."

Diarrhoea is a common symptom of gastrointestinal infection, which can have a variety of sources. However just a handful of organisms are responsible for most acute cases of diarrhoea and one, Rotavirus, is responsible for more than 40 per cent of all diarrhoea-related hospital admissions of children under five. A new vaccine for Rotavirus has been found to be safe and effective but is still largely unavailable in most developing countries.

Though most episodes of childhood diarrhoea are mild, acute cases can lead to significant fluid loss and dehydration. This dehydration can lead to death unless fluids are quickly replaced.

Oral rehydration therapy is the cornerstone of fluid replacement and the new low-osmolarity formula of oral rehydrationsalts (ORS) is a simple, inexpensive and life-saving remedy that prevents dehydration in children suffering diarrhoea.

Some 88 percent of diarrhoeal deaths worldwide are attributable to unsafe water, inadequate sanitation and poor hygiene. As of 2006, an estimated 2.5 billion people around the world were not using adequate sanitation facilities, and about 1 in 4 people in developing countries practised open defecation.

Access to clean water and good hygiene practices are extremely effective in preventing childhood diarrhoea. Hand washing with soap has been shown to reduce the incidence of diarrhoeal disease by over 40 percent, making it one of the most cost-effective interventions for reducing child deaths caused by this neglected killer. Thursday October 15 is annual Global Handwashing Day when millions of children and adults in over 80 countries will take part in activities to highlight this key intervention.

The overall health and nutrition of children is also critical to their susceptibility to diarrhoea and the damage it can cause. Undernourished children are at higher risk of suffering more frequent, severe and prolonged episodes of diarrhoea, and repeated bouts of diarrhoea also place children at greater risk of worsening nutritional status.

The seven point plan to save the lives of children stricken by diarrhoea includes two treatment and five prevention elements.

The two treatment elements are:

1. fluid replacement to prevent dehydration; and

2. zinc treatments, which decrease the severity and duration ofthe attack.

The five prevention elements are:

1. immunization against rotavirus and measles;

2. early and exclusive breastfeeding and vitamin A supplementation;

3. handwashing with soap;

4. improved water supply quantity and quality; and

5. promoting community-wide sanitation.

Campaigns targeting childhood diarrhoea in the 1970s and 1980s achieved success by educating caregivers and scaling up oral rehydration therapy to prevent dehydration.

The campaigns delivered promising results but following that success, focus shifted to other health problems. There is now an urgent need to shift attention and resources back to treating and preventing diarrhoea, UNICEF officials said.

Feeling lighter now that you have been gymming for a week? Convinced the pounds have started melting, improving your looks? It's all in your mind.

It's the exercise and not higher levels of fitness that is improving your body image, says a study by Heather Hausenblas, an exercise psychologist from the University of Florida, and her student Anna Campbell. After analysing 57 studies to see how physical activity impacts an individual's body image, they found even if exercise didn't improve fitness levels, it did make people feel better about themselves.

What's more, it wasn't how hard you exercises, or how much but just that you did.

One study showed no difference in body image improvement between people who exercised minimum 30 minutes a day, five days a week and those who didn't. "We would have thought that people exercising this amount would have felt better about their bodies than those who did not work out as much," Hausenblas said.

In another study, women were found to feel slightly better about their bodies than were men if they sweated it out. "We believed the gap would be much bigger, but what could be coming into play is the rise of body image issues among men. We're seeing more media portrayals of the ideal physique for men rather than the overriding emphasis on women we did in the past," Hausenblas said.

And the older you get, the better exercise impacts you psychologically perhaps because older people are more concerned about their bodies as physical activity among them is lower than younger people.

Low body image is becoming something of an epidemic across the world due to unrealistic images being flashed in the media. "Body dissatisfaction is a huge problem in our society and is related to all sorts of negative behaviour including yo-yo dieting, smoking, taking steroids and undergoing cosmetic surgery. It affects men and women and all ages, starting with kids who are as young as five years old saying they don't like how their bodies look," said Hausenblas. The analysis has been detailed in Journal of Health Psychology.

If you don't like what you see in the mirror, time to switch to the mirror in the gym. Mind matters.

Children can be taught to use their imagination to tackle frequent bouts of stomach pain, research shows.

A relaxation-type CD, asking children to imagine themselves in scenarios like floating on a cloud led to dramatic improvements in abdominal pain.

The US researchers said the technique worked particularly well in children as they have such fertile imaginations.

It has been estimated that frequent stomach pain with no identifiable cause affects up to one in five children.

The research, published in the journal Pediatrics, follows on from studies showing hypnosis is an effective treatment for a range of conditions known as functional abdominal pain, which includes things like irritable bowel syndrome.

In this study, the children had 20 minute sessions of "guided imagery" - a technique which prompts the subject to imagine things which will reduce their discomfort.

One example is letting a special shiny object melt into their hand and then placing their hand on their belly, spreading warmth and light from the hand inside the tummy to make a protective barrier inside that prevents anything from irritating the belly

The researchers, from the University of North Carolina and Duke University Medical Center, said a lack of therapists led them to the idea of using a CD to deliver the sessions.

In all 30 children aged between six and 15 years took part in the study - half of whom used the CDs daily for eight weeks and the rest of whom got normal treatment.

Among those who had used the CDs, 73.3% reported that their abdominal pain was reduced by half or more by the end of the treatment course compared with 26.7% in the standard care group.

In two-thirds of children the improvements were still apparent six months later.

Anxiety

It is not clear exactly how the technique works but studies have shown it is partly about reducing anxiety but there is also a direct effect on the pain response.

Some researchers think hypnosis-like techniques reduce "hypersensitivity" in conditions such as irritable bowel syndrome.

Study leader Dr Miranda van Tilburg said it was especially exciting that the children were able to use the technique on their own.

"Such self-administered treatment is, of course, very inexpensive and can be used in addition to other treatments, which potentially opens the door for easily enhancing treatment outcomes for a lot of children suffering from frequent stomach aches.

"Children are very good at using their imagination - when you use this in adults you have to overcome a barrier first."

Professor David Candy, a consultant paediatric gastroenterologist at Western Sussex Hospitals, said his team had tried hypnosis in a small group of children with severe abdominal pain problems and had 100% success rate.

He added they are now keen to try the guided imagery technique to see if they can replicate the US findings.

"There is really a dearth of information on how to manage children with abdominal pain and it's a very common problem which keeps children out of school."