Indo-Myanmar Border Research Articles

Self-Administered Tuberculosis Treatment Outcomes in a Tribal Population on the Indo-Myanmar Border, Nagaland, India

BackgroundMultiple strategies are being adopted by national tuberculosis (TB) programmes to achieve universal coverage of tuberculosis treatment. However, populations living in ‘hard-to-reach’ areas of north-east India have poor access to health services. Our study aimed to detail treatment outcomes in TB program supported by Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) and using an alternative model of TB treatment delivery in Mon district, Nagaland, India.MethodsThis was a retrospective cohort study of TB patients, initiated on self-administered therapy (SAT) through Mon District Hospital, Nagaland, India between April 2012 and March 2013.ResultsA total of 238 tuberculosis patients had final TB treatment outcomes during the study period, including 82 and 156 from semi-urban and rural areas respectively. The majority of patients (62%, 147/238) were suffering from pulmonary, smear-positive tuberculosis. Overall, 74% of patients (175/238) had successful outcomes, being cured or having completed their treatment. Females (81%), pulmonary TB patients (75%) and those on a Category I regimen (79%) had better treatment success rates than males (67%), extra-pulmonary TB patients (62%) and patients on a Category II regimen (61%). The univariate and bivariate analyses found age, sex and TB treatment regimen significantly associated with unsuccessful TB treatment outcomes (defined as death, loss-to-follow-up and failure). However, only older age showed significance in a multivariate binary logistic regression model.ConclusionOur study suggests that self-administered TB treatment is feasible for patients living in areas with limited or no access to health services. The relatively low number of patients with adverse outcomes suggests that SAT models are safe; other advantages include the need for fewer resources and less frequent movements by patients. National TB programmes should consider allowing SAT strategies for delivery of TB treatment to ‘hard-to-reach’ populations, which could in turn help to achieve universal coverage and contribute to global TB elimination by 2050.

Dumping Potential and Intensity: A Case Study of Indo-Myanmar Border Trade

The wave of globalization had started winding since the late 1980’s in many countries of the world. This led to a structural change in different sectors of economy in different parts of the world. One of such sectors is external sector which was kept closed for many years. It is now open in the globalized economy. Many countries have adopted export as engine for economic growth, and, import as to acquire technological know-how and capital goods for promoting export sector. India’s economy which was under the License Raj for almost four decades, however, by the turn of 1990s, India started to adopt the new wave of globalization. As a part of project globalization, India adopted “Look East Policy” to open up its economy to those neighboring South East Asian countries. Under this policy, India signed the Indo-Myanmar Border Trade agreement on 21st January, 1994 with Myanmar in view of the needs and demand of the people of the North East India. However, border trade along the Indo-Myanmar border has been being witnessed trading of both formal and informal goods simultaneously. Therefore, this paper examines exclusively the items under informal trade; the institutional factors behind this informal trade; and also to study commodity wise dumping potential which induce such tendency for informal trade and dumping intensity.

Trade Induced Employment Function and Employment Multiplier: A Case Study in Indo-Myanmar Border Trade

The wave of globalization had started winding since the late 1980’s in many countries of the world. This led to a structural change in different sectors of economy in different parts of the world. One of such sectors is external sector which remained closed in many countries specially socialist countries for many decades. Many countries have started adopting export as engine of economic growth, and, import as means to acquire technological know-how and capital goods for promoting export sector. India’s economy which had been under the License Raj for almost four decades, however, by the turn of 1990s, India had been in the new wave of globalization. As a part of project globalization, India adopted “Look East Policy” for opening up its economy to those neighbouring South East Asian countries. Under this policy, India signed the Indo-Myanmar Border Trade agreement on 21st January, 1994 with Myanmar in view of the needs and demand of the people of the North East India. However, border trade along the Indo-Myanmar border has been being witnessed trading of both formal and informal goods simultaneously. Therefore, this paper examines exclusively the items under informal trade; the institutional factors behind this informal trade; methodologies; employment function and employment multiplier.

Molecular surveillance for drug-resistant Plasmodium falciparum in clinical and subclinical populations from three border regions of Burma/Myanmar: cross-sectional data and a systematic review of resistance studies.

BackgroundConfirmation of artemisinin-delayed parasite clearance in Plasmodium falciparum along the Thai-Myanmar border has inspired a global response to contain and monitor drug resistance to avert the disastrous consequences of a potential spread to Africa. However, resistance data from Myanmar are sparse, particularly from high-risk areas where limited health services and decades of displacement create conditions for resistance to spread. Subclinical infections may represent an important reservoir for resistance genes that confer a fitness disadvantage relative to wild-type alleles. This study estimates the prevalence of resistance genotypes in three previously unstudied remote populations in Myanmar and tests the a priori hypothesis that resistance gene prevalence would be higher among isolates collected from subclinical infections than isolates collected from febrile clinical patients. A systematic review of resistance studies is provided for context.MethodsCommunity health workers in Karen and Kachin States and an area spanning the Indo-Myanmar border collected dried blood spots from 988 febrile clinical patients and 4,591 villagers with subclinical infection participating in routine prevalence surveys. Samples positive for P. falciparum 18 s ribosomal RNA by real-time PCR were genotyped for P. falciparum multidrug resistance protein (pfmdr1) copy number and the pfcrt K76T polymorphism using multiplex real-time PCR.ResultsPfmdr1 copy number increase and the pfcrt K76 polymorphism were determined for 173 and 269 isolates, respectively. Mean pfmdr1 copy number was 1.2 (range: 0.7 to 3.7). Pfmdr1 copy number increase was present in 17.5%, 9.6% and 11.1% of isolates from Karen and Kachin States and the Indo-Myanmar border, respectively. Pfmdr1 amplification was more prevalent in subclinical isolates (20.3%) than clinical isolates (6.4%, odds ratio 3.7, 95% confidence interval 1.1 - 12.5). Pfcrt K76T prevalence ranged from 90-100%.ConclusionsCommunity health workers can contribute to molecular surveillance of drug resistance in remote areas of Myanmar. Marginal and displaced populations under-represented among previous resistance investigations can and should be included in resistance surveillance efforts, particularly once genetic markers of artemisinin-delayed parasite clearance are identified. Subclinical infections may contribute to the epidemiology of drug resistance, but determination of gene amplification from desiccated filter samples requires further validation when DNA concentration is low.

THE OTHER SIKHS

In the last 100 years, Sikhs have travelled to different countries in the West and beyond. There is a significant amount of scholarly writing about the presence of Sikhs across the globe. However, their experience in migration and settlement in different parts of India beyond Punjab remains a comparatively neglected area of Sikh studies. Its history goes back to the medieval days and includes a larger numbers of Sikhs than that exist in the Western diaspora. These Sikh sites are numerous and scattered across India. They communicate the message of home in poly-vocalic voices and point to the surfacing of another Sikh diaspora within India beyond Punjab. This article seeks to outline a small part of it with reference to the Sikh past in Manipur. Manipur is located along the Indo-Myanmar border and seeks to emphasize the local Sikh community's distinctiveness and plurality.

Dumping Potential and Intensity in the Case of Indo-Myanmar Border Trade

The wave of globalization had started winding since the late 1980’s in many countries of the world. This led to a structural change in different sectors of economy in different parts of the world. One of such sectors is external sector which was kept closed for many years. It is now open in the globalized economy. Many countries have adopted export as engine for economic growth, and, import as to acquire technological know-how and capital goods for promoting export sector. India’s economy which was under the License Raj for almost four decades, however, by the turn of 1990s, India started to adopt the new wave of globalization. As a part of project globalization, India adopted “Look East Policy” to open up its economy to those neighboring South East Asian countries. Under this policy, India signed the Indo-Myanmar Border Trade agreement on 21st January, 1994 with Myanmar in view of the needs and demand of the people of the North East India. However, border trade along the Indo-Myanmar border has been being witnessed trading of both formal and informal goods simultaneously. Therefore, this paper examines exclusively the items under informal trade; the institutional factors behind this informal trade; and also to study commodity wise dumping potential which induce such tendency for informal trade and dumping intensity.

Negotiating Transnational Identities on Indo-Myanmar Border

The identity of the people in the Indo-Myanmar border in Northeast India is that they belong to the Indo-Mongoloid racial stock and speak languages belonging to the Tibeto-Burman group. Most of these groups trace their origin to some part of Southeast Asia. The historical routes both constrain and empower movements across borders and cultures. But traffic across borders has been controlled by the articulation of homelands or safe spaces assigned to a group of a particular identity. Inspite of political division, the ethnically and culturally similar people inhabiting both sides of the international border have maintained constant cross-border movements. It is a shared landscape divided politically. This people with lives on both sides of the international border often find themselves victimised for crimes against the state. For this people besides the territorial road, there is also an extraterritorial road to the other side of the political border. This is a reality which is the basis of their identity. This article proposes a framework for international trade between ‘local border points’ in the Indo-Myanmar border, where only the residents in immediately neighbouring provinces/states can cross borders and trade freely. It is a hope that this will negotiate the conversion of a common shared space to a transnational space in this globalised world.

Fungal taxa from the Miocene sediments of Mizoram, northeast India

The fungal elements comprising 33 dispersed genera and 35 species were recovered from an exposure near the Tlangsam village on the Indo-Myanmar border from the Dulte Formation (Miocene), near Champhai, eastern Mizoram, India. The fungal spores are most common and represented by 20 genera and 20 species comprising the amerospores, didymospores, phragmospores, dictyospores, scolecospores, helicospores and staurospores. The microthyriaceous ascostromata contribute 4 genera and 4 species and those of the hemisphaerials 2 genera and 2 species to the assemblage; the remaining 7 genera and 9 species belong to the other fungal entities. The assemblage has 14 new genera and 19 new species. Endomycorrhizal, aquatic fungi and other hyphomycetes are frequently found. Most of the fungal elements indicate a warm, humid, tropical subtropical climate during the time of deposition, though a few have temperate affiliation.

Evaluation of chloroquine (CQ) and sulphadoxine/pyrimethamine (SP) therapy in uncomplicated falciparum malaria in Indo‐Myanmar border areas

Chloroquine (CQ) and sulphadoxine/pyrimethamine (SP) are two first-line antimalarials used under the existing Indian National Drug Policy in the north-eastern region of India bordering several countries including Myanmar. Although widespread resistance to antimalarials in Plasmodium falciparum has been reported from western Myanmar, information from the Indian side of the border is scarce. We studied the therapeutic response to CQ and SP at four sites in Changlang and Lohit, two administrative districts of Arunachal Pradesh bordering Myanmar. We monitored uncomplicated falciparum malaria patients after treatment with standard regimens of CQ and SP for 28 days following the revised in-vivo protocol of the World Health Organization. A total of 236 patients, 95 in the CQ group and 141 in the SP group, participated. We recorded 23.8% early treatment failures to CQ and 14.1% to SP; late clinical failures of 14.3 and 12.6%; late parasitological failures of 10.7 and 8.1% and adequate clinical and parasitological responses of 51.2 and 65.2%, respectively. The significantly different treatment failure rates seen in Chowkham (furthest from Indo-Myanmar border) and Jairampur/Nampong (nearest to Indo-Myanmar border) for chloroquine (Cox proportion hazard ratio 9.1, P<0.0001) and SP (Cox proportion hazard ratio 7.35, P=0.001) denote a non-response gradient to the two antimalarials extending from the international border. The gradient is probably indicative of the direction of movement of the drug-resistant P. falciparum parasite. The utility of chloroquine as the first-line drug under the present National Drug Policy in these areas needs reconsideration.

Impact of Slash and Burning on Microbial Biomass in Semi-Evergreen Tropical Deciduous Forest of Manipur, North-East India

The impact of slash and burning on microbial biomass C, N and P in soils of semi-evergreen tropical deciduous forest were studied from February 1999 to January 2000. The experimental sites were located near Moreh town in the Chandel district of Manipur state (India) along the Indo-Myanmar border between 23° 49' N-24°28'N latitude and 93°45'E-94°16'E longitude. Microbial biomass C ranged from 319.50 ㎍ g/sup -1/ 905.50㎍ g/sup -1/ in the slash and burnt site and from 209.50 ㎍ g/sup -1/ to 708.80 ㎍ g/sup -1/ soil in the forest site. Microbial N ranged from 19.30 ㎍ g/sup -1/ to 99.45 ㎍ g/sup -1/ in the slash and burnt site and from 16.08㎍ g/sup -1/ to 88.90 ㎍ g/sup -1/ in the forest site. Microbial P varied from 10.90 ㎍ g/sup -1/ to 32.21 ㎍ g/sup -1/ in the slash and burnt site and from 2.50 ㎍ g/sup -1/ to 17.60 ㎍ g/sup -1/ in the forest site in different months throughout the year. Microbial biomass C, N and P were recorded to be higher in the slash and burnt site compared to the forest site The conversion of forest into slash and burnt site for agriculture - the traditional shilling cultivation practiced by tribal people in the north- eastern India leads to addition of large amount of organic matter in the soil thereby exhibiting higher values of microbial biomass C, N and P in the recent slash and burnt site than that of the forest site. Relationship between the soil moisture, soil organic C and microbial biomass C, N and P were found to be correlated significantly in both the sites.