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Time of India
13 hours ago
- Health
- Time of India
Hepatitis services must be scaled up, included in essential health packages: WHO official
New Delhi: Hepatitis testing and treatment services must be scaled up and decentralised to primary care, and services related to the infection should be embedded within essential health packages, Dr Catharina Boehme, Officer-in-Charge of WHO South-East Asia, said on Monday. Speaking on World Hepatitis Day , which is observed on July 28 every year, Boehme said hepatitis must prioritise responses with maternal and child health, among others, and work towards reducing the toll of liver cancer due to hepatitis B and hepatitis C . "We have the tools to prevent these infections: safe and effective hepatitis B vaccines, affordable diagnostics, highly effective hepatitis B medicines, and the game-changing hepatitis C direct-acting antiviral (DAA) medicines that cure the infection," she said. "However, problems persist with the complexity and fragmentation in service delivery, lack of services at primary healthcare clinics, poor uptake of services, out-of-pocket expenses, limited awareness, and stigma," Boehme added. World Hepatitis Day raises awareness of viral hepatitis, an inflammation of the liver that causes severe liver disease and liver cancer. It is observed on the birthday of Nobel Prize-winning scientist Dr Baruch Blumberg, who discovered the hepatitis B virus (HBV) and developed a diagnostic test and vaccine for the virus. This year, the theme 'Hepatitis: Let's Break It Down' calls for urgent action to dismantle the financial, social and systemic barriers, including the stigma attached to the infection, that stand in the way of hepatitis elimination and liver cancer prevention . Boehme said, "In our WHO South-East Asia region, viral hepatitis continues to cause needless suffering, silently leading to liver disease, cancer, and hundreds of thousands of preventable deaths each year." Across the region, an estimated 61 million people live with hepatitis B, and 9 million with hepatitis C. "Our region bears one of the highest burdens of chronic viral hepatitis globally, yet most people living with the disease remain undiagnosed and untreated," she said. She said every year, over 2,60,000 lives are lost, many due to preventable complications of hepatitis and one of the most devastating outcomes is liver cancer, because of untreated hepatitis B and C infections. "With limited access to early diagnosis and treatment, most liver cancer cases in our region are detected late, when curative options are no longer viable," Boehme said. She said hepatitis testing and treatment services must be "scaled up, decentralised to primary care", and guidelines simplified, to reduce the toll of liver cancer due to hepatitis B and C. "We must embed hepatitis services within essential health packages, leverage primary health care platforms, and align responses with maternal and child health, HIV, STIs, TB, non-communicable diseases, blood safety, infection prevention and control, occupational health and universal health coverage efforts. "We have to prioritise hepatitis B birth-dose and completion of the vaccination schedule, integrated safe motherhood services, harm reduction services, and community-based outreach to close the equity gap," she said. Boehme said progress was possible and countries across our region are innovating, including adopting simplified testing and treatment service models, integrating hepatitis as part of essential services and under social health insurance coverage. "These efforts need to be scaled and sustained with strong political will and investment. Together, let's break it down by removing the complexity, ending the silence, and delivering on our promise to eliminate hepatitis by 2030," she said.
IOL News
a day ago
- Science
- IOL News
The Subconscious Revealed: Navigating Joseph Murphy's Insights
Murphy doesn't treat the subconscious as a mystical black box. Instead, he frames it as a living system of belief and response, one that like soil requires conscious planting and nurturing. What makes this particularly relevant today is how closely it mirrors modern neuroscience. Murphy's premise is simple but powerful; the subconscious accepts whatever we repeatedly believe or emotionally internalise, whether helpful or harmful. Once accepted, those beliefs begin to shape our habits, emotional reactions, and even physical health. That idea may have seemed abstract decades ago. Today, science backs it up. When I first picked it up, I expected the usual motivational tone. Instead, I was met with something deeper: a quiet but firm reminder that the stories we believe, especially the ones we don't realise we're telling ourselves, shape our lives more than we dare admit. And those stories live not in the conscious mind, but in the subconscious. Joseph Murphy's work wasn't just a book. It was a reorientation. A reframing of reality. A deep breath in the noise of modern life. I didn't finish The Power of the Subconscious Mind in one sitting. I wasn't supposed to. Some books feel like conversations that unfold slowly, over days or even weeks. Neuroscience confirms that our brain is constantly processing information beneath the level of conscious awareness. According to Dr. Bruce Lipton, a developmental biologist, 95% of our behaviour is driven by subconscious programming. His work suggests that these deep patterns are largely formed in childhood and continue to run in the background like silent software. Psychologist Dr. Daniel Kahneman, in his Nobel Prize-winning work Thinking, Fast and Slow, distinguishes between 'System 1' (fast, automatic, subconscious thinking) and 'System 2' (slow, deliberate, conscious reasoning). His research shows that most of our daily decisions are made by System 1. In other words, we're often not thinking. We're reacting from deep programming. When I realised this, it became deeply personal. I saw how my own reactions to hesitation, people-pleasing, fear of visibility wasn't flaws. They were well-practised patterns that lived in my subconscious, quietly protecting me from outdated threats. Reading Murphy's work alongside contemporary research helped me bridge the spiritual and the scientific. Esther Hicks and the teachings of the Law of Attraction add yet another layer, emphasising emotional resonance. According to that perspective, our emotions are feedback indicators of whether our dominant vibration (or subconscious belief) is aligned with what we want. If fear, lack, or worry dominate, then we attract more of that experience not as punishment, but as reflection. In practice, I started combining Murphy's affirmations with visualisation techniques and emotional awareness. I'd picture myself already calm, successful, and free. Then pause and notice how my body responded. Did it tighten? Did a voice say 'you don't deserve that'? That was the subconscious speaking. Instead of overriding it, I began to gently reframe it. This practice wasn't about toxic positivity or wishful thinking. It was about consciously choosing what I feed my subconscious, day by day. Neuroscience calls this neuroplasticity, the brain's ability to rewire through repetition and experience. Over time, those small shifts created space for different choices, clearer boundaries and deeper trust in myself. Why is this still relevant? Because we live in a world flooded with information but starving for integration. We learn more, scroll more, achieve more and yet often feel disconnected, scattered and unsure. The subconscious doesn't speak at speed or noise. It responds to clarity, emotion and presence. Most of us are out of sync with that. Murphy's work reminds me that healing and transformation don't come from pushing harder, but from returning inward with intention. The subconscious isn't a mystery to be feared. It's a powerful ally, waiting for clearer instructions. 'Change your thoughts, and you change your destiny'—Murphy wrote that long before it became a social media quote. Now I understand what he meant. It's not about forcing thoughts. It's about gently replanting them, watering them with emotion and letting the deeper mind take root. Some books ask to be read. Others ask to be lived. This one? It asked me to pause, to rewire and to re-meet myself at the level where real change begins.
AU Financial Review
2 days ago
- Business
- AU Financial Review
How AI risks repeating the IT productivity paradox
'You can see the computer age everywhere but in the productivity statistics.' This now-famous observation by Nobel Prize-winning economist Robert Solow, made in 1987 in response to the so-called IT productivity paradox, captured one of the most perplexing economic puzzles of the late 20th century. Despite billions invested in IT and computers throughout the 1970s and 1980s, no aggregate productivity effects had shown up in national accounts. Today, artificial intelligence is everywhere, and the world is again investing (many) billions. As Treasurer Jim Chalmers sets out to host an economic reform roundtable focused on rekindling sluggish productivity growth, with AI firmly on the agenda, we had better learn from history.
Qatar Tribune
2 days ago
- Business
- Qatar Tribune
China calls for global consensus on balancing AI development
Agencies China's Premier Li Qiang cautioned on Saturday that artificial intelligence development must be weighed against the security risks, saying global consensus was urgently needed even as the tech race between Beijing and Washington shows no sign of abating. His remarks came just days after U.S. President Donald Trump unveiled an aggressive low-regulation strategy aimed at cementing U.S. dominance in the fast-moving field, promising to 'remove red tape and onerous regulation' that could hinder private sector AI development. Opening the World AI Conference (WAIC) in Shanghai on Saturday, Li emphasized the need for governance and open-source development, announcing the establishment of a Chinese-led body for international AI cooperation. 'The risks and challenges brought by artificial intelligence have drawn widespread attention ... How to find a balance between development and security urgently requires further consensus from the entire society,' the premier said. He gave no further details about the newly announced organization, though state media later reported 'the preliminary consideration' was that it would be headquartered in Shanghai. The organization would 'promote global governance featuring extensive consultation, joint contribution and shared benefits,' Xinhua News Agency reported, without elaborating on its set-up or mechanisms. At a time when AI is being integrated across virtually all industries, its uses have raised major questions, including about the spread of misinformation, its impact on employment and the potential loss of technological control. In a speech at WAIC on Saturday, Nobel Prize-winning physicist Geoffrey Hinton compared the situation to keeping 'a very cute tiger cub as a pet.' To survive, he said, you need to ensure you can train it not to kill you when it grows up. The enormous strides AI technology has made in recent years have seen it move to the forefront of the U.S.-China rivalry. Premier Li said China would 'actively promote' the development of open-source AI, adding Beijing was willing to share advances with other countries, particularly developing ones. 'If we engage in technological monopolies, controls and blockage, artificial intelligence will become the preserve of a few countries and a few enterprises,' he said. Vice Foreign Minister Ma Zhaoxu warned against 'unilateralism and protectionism' at a later meeting. Washington has expanded its efforts in recent years to curb exports of state-of-the-art chips to China, concerned that they can be used to advance Beijing's military systems and erode U.S. tech dominance. Li, in his speech, highlighted 'insufficient supply of computing power and chips' as a bottleneck to AI progress. China has made AI a pillar of its plans for technological self-reliance, with the government pledging a raft of measures to boost the sector. In January, Chinese startup DeepSeek unveiled an AI model that performed as well as top US systems despite using less powerful chips. In a video message played at the WAIC opening ceremony, U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said AI governance would be 'a defining test of international cooperation.' The ceremony saw the French president's AI envoy, Anne Bouverot, underscore 'an urgent need' for global action and for the U.N. to play a 'leading role.' Bouverot called for a framework 'that is open, transparent and effective, giving each and everyone an opportunity to have their views taken into account.' Li's speech 'posed a clear contrast to the Trump administration's 'America First' view on AI' and the U.S. measures announced this week, said WAIC attendee George Chen, a partner at Washington-based policy consultancy The Asia Group. 'The world is now clearly divided into at least three camps: the United States and its allies, China (and perhaps many Belt and Road or Global South countries), and the EU, which prefers regulating AI through legislation, like the EU AI Act,' Chen told Agence France-Presse (AFP).
Express Tribune
3 days ago
- Business
- Express Tribune
China urges consensus on AI development
Listen to article China's Premier Li Qiang warned Saturday that artificial intelligence development must be weighed against the security risks, saying global consensus was urgently needed even as the tech race between Beijing and Washington shows no sign of abating. His remarks came just days after US President Donald Trump unveiled an aggressive low-regulation strategy aimed at cementing US dominance in the fast-moving field, promising to "remove red tape and onerous regulation" that could hinder private sector AI development. Opening the World AI Conference (WAIC) in Shanghai on Saturday, Li emphasised the need for governance and open-source development, announcing the establishment of a Chinese-led body for international AI cooperation. "The risks and challenges brought by artificial intelligence have drawn widespread attention... How to find a balance between development and security urgently requires further consensus from the entire society," the premier said. He gave no further details about the newly announced organisation, though state media later reported "the preliminary consideration" was that it would be headquartered in Shanghai. The organisation would "promote global governance featuring extensive consultation, joint contribution and shared benefits", state news agency Xinhua reported, without elaborating on its set-up or mechanisms. At a time when AI is being integrated across virtually all industries, its uses have raised major questions, including about the spread of misinformation, its impact on employment and the potential loss of technological control. In a speech at WAIC on Saturday, Nobel Prize-winning physicist Geoffrey Hinton compared the situation to keeping "a very cute tiger cub as a pet". To survive, he said, you need to ensure you can train it not to kill you when it grows up. The enormous strides AI technology has made in recent years have seen it move to the forefront of the US-China rivalry. Premier Li said China would "actively promote" the development of open-source AI, adding Beijing was willing to share advances with other countries, particularly developing ones. "If we engage in technological monopolies, controls and blockage, artificial intelligence will become the preserve of a few countries and a few enterprises," he said. Vice Foreign Minister Ma Zhaoxu warned against "unilateralism and protectionism" at a later meeting. Washington has expanded its efforts in recent years to curb exports of state-of-the-art chips to China, concerned that they can be used to advance Beijing's military systems and erode US tech dominance. Li, in his speech, highlighted "insufficient supply of computing power and chips" as a bottleneck to AI progress.
