Rimi

Translator, public health researcher, stray-carer. Since 2010, acute climate-change worrier. Currently at IIT Bombay.

[Rimi @circustownsloth]

I remember reading a story very similar to this while at school. In that late 20th c. textbook, the story had been given a distinct "Girls can, too!" flavour. But the ability of 'bagdi' women to wield combat-sticks ('lathi dhora') was far more common than it suggested.

[Tirthankar Roy @RoyHistory1]

Indians of my generation are familiar with ‘lathi’, a bamboo truncheon the police carry. Lathi-charge is the name of a chaotic plan to disperse an angry protesting mob, by beating as many people as possible with lathi (see picture). Nowadays, other methods are more popular.

[Rimi @circustownsloth]

This is a charming demonstration of daring, resourcefulness and agency... but also of how easy it is to brainwash a culturally diverse community into blind obedience. K-Pop is amazing and awesome, but these stan-powered artforms do feel like consent-manufacturing experiments.

[Swati Moitra @swatiatrest]

3 schoolgirls from Murshidabad had hoped to travel to Korea to meet BTS! I'm glad they're home and safe but also, amazing. At their age I frequently considered running away but never quite managed.

[Rimi @circustownsloth]

Looking internationally at Covid19 data, we still mostly know what we know because of the UK investing in early patient tracking & research. Our culture of public health lacks both the funding and the scientific temper to systematically implement that. More's the pity.

[TheLiverDoc™ @theliverdoc]

Let me refresh your memory:

#COVID19 is still here and it's kicking our kids health in school setups and they are bringing it home to everyone. We have forgotten about masks and about providing novel vaccine boosters and the Indian Government is busy serving obnoxious vegetarian food to meat-eating foreign Nationals in silver and gold cutlery.

We don't know what the new Covid strain will do to our childrens health and ours in the future, because long Covid is pretty much terrible. And there seems to be no data and no special groups working here looking at that.

People are falling sick, I'm still getting liver disease patients getting beat up with Covid and other seasonal viral infections such as RSV and Influenza. The latter two have vaccinations available.

Covid itself has made us vulnerable to other infections. Every family has one or two members affected with some infection every 2 weeks. It's just unbearable.

There is some weird but debilitating infection going on now where people including children are landing up in OPD and ER with severe abdominal cramps, high grade fever, severe fatigue and sometimes explosive watery diarrhea. And no one seems to bother.

There is no proper promotion for seasonal flu vaccination guidelines in this circus of a country where politics and divisive religious discourse is all over the news and inside people smooth brains.

Someone from the health regulatory body please start caring for public health; and design, promote and produce vaccination guidelines including Covid specific novel guidelines that will help prevent infection, productivity loss and help maintain normalcy during this time.

**End of rant**

[Rimi @circustownsloth]

@girishdaswani Looking forward to this piece. Local researchers working in Indian public health often encounter similar misrepresentation and nuance-stripping in international representations of their sphere. I hope you'll share the link to the future piece here.

[Rimi @circustownsloth]

@SaibBilaval Thank you very much. Appreciate it!

[Rimi @circustownsloth]

"The Indian government paid the WHO $250 million to set up a Centre for Traditional Medicine on Gujarat" (TheLiverDoc, August 2023).

That's the equivalent of 250 million USD in Indian tax-payer's money, spent w/o any data/evidentiary support. That's #publichealth in New India.

[TheLiverDoc™ @theliverdoc]

Please read this no-nonsense, firing on all cylinders take on The World Health Organization and its promotion of quackery with its new-found love for "pseudoscience-embracing," "scientifically-regressive," "ready-to-waste-people's-money" partner, India.
Read: The World Health Organization promotes quackery yet again
https://t.co/laK9aUZgtq

The Indian Government PAID the World Health Organization $250 million (20,65,25,12,500 Indian Rupee) to set up the Global Centre for Traditional Medicine, Gujarat and conduct the First WHO Traditional Medicine Global Summit last week.

That is 20,65,25,12,500 Indian Rupee from public funds made from taxation of hard earned money of citizens of India.

The Union Minister for Health, Dr. Mansukh Mandaviya said: By embracing ancient wisdom and modern science, we can collectively work towards achieving the health-related Sustainable Development Goals.

There is no ancient wisdom - it is ancient superstition.
Read: Ayurveda: Ancient Superstition, Not Science
https://t.co/VQ6JogXsmM

If you mix superstition with modern science, you'll end up like China and what Chairman Mao did to medicine in China - he basically destroyed it in and out, so much that "New Chinese Medicine" (like New India's Integrated Medicine) is the worst medical practice in the world today. Traditional Chinese Medicine is generally ineffective, occasionally poisonous, and driving numerous species to the brink of extinction.
Read: Why Traditional Chinese Medicine is the worst alternative “medicine”
https://t.co/nALGI3QkrN

The WHO also played a central role in destoying China's name in the field of science-based medicine, VERY SIMILAR to what they are doing to India now.
Read: The World Health Organization is now promoting unproved traditional Chinese medicine
https://t.co/wmblqUdd5n

The WHO is a political organization. It received funds. And in the process uplifted India'a position in the world to another "pseudoscience capital" akin to China. The WHO does nothing when Chinese medicine’s use of animals is a threat to entire world.
Read: ‘Chinese medicine’s use of animals a threat to entire world’
https://t.co/LsYHsIq2WU

We need a new and better authoritative global healthcare body that is deep rooted in science and rationality and one that is not spineless and politically motivated...probably wishful thinking.

[Rimi @circustownsloth]

In my short life, I've had three near-death experiences (all needing emergency medical intervention). This has naturally made my anxiety worse, and makes me worry about a shortened lifespan. This study brings me an odd sort of an comfort. Mind over matter, indeed.

[TheLiverDoc™ @theliverdoc]

I am a Hepatologist.

Arguably, I care for the sickest group of patients in medical practice – end stage liver disease.

I see death almost every day in my ICU.

Some are natural deaths, leading to multiple organ failure triggered by a failing liver.

Some are decided. The family decided to pull the plug. They decide it was time to let go.

And every time, I see the heart rate drop, the blood pressure fall and the electrocardiogram go flat.

And I wonder. What goes on inside a dying brain?
Was it a small black hole, that gets bigger and bigger and then engulfs the field in darkness as the heart shuts down taking the brain away with it?

Or was it just all light at the end of the tunnel and then darkness, once the destination had reached?

A group of doctors did something strange. Something unimaginable.

And it led to them witnessing something melancholic, but beautiful.

They went inside an ICU. Saw that four patients were unconscious.

They were not clinically dead, yet. And not brain-dead. But were comatose.
They were kept alive by a machine that pumped oxygen into their lungs.
Three had brain injury due to cardiac arrest. One had haemorrhaged into the brain.

All were unresponsive for a very long time and sadly, the family decided to pull the plug on them.
To let them go away, peacefully.

But before they did that, the loving family did something bittersweet. They signed a document which was made by the group of doctors, allowing them to study their beloveds’ dying brain.

The group was led by Dr Jimo Borjigin of the Department of Molecular and Integrative Physiology, University of Michigan School of Medicine, Ann Arbor at Michigan.

The doctors fitted machines to the heart and brain of the dying patients and then withdrew their life support by removing the breathing tube.

Immediately after the tube was removed, the brain activity did not show anything different.
But as the brain got closer to death, about 300 seconds before death, a power surge. And it occurred in the regions of the brain which was associated with conscious experience. Like the dying was suddenly yearning to live.

And make no mistake, these were not “some bursts” of electrical activity that happens when the brain cells withered away without oxygen. This was a special kind of activity.

These power surges increased connectivity in a region in the brain called posterior cortical “hot zone” – an area crucial for conscious perception – when it came to just before dying, the brain cells were having a cross-talk, not dying away into oblivion.

They were passing final messages to each other within the regions of the brain, while the physical body lay, limp and motionless.

And the doctors were heartbroken – because the final electrical pattern of surge that the dying brain was showing was the similar to those seen in dreaming humans.

All the patients in the study died.
But before they died, they taught us something.
That even in death, our minds are resilient.
That we clutch at only everything that is good.

What were they dreaming of?
A husband, about his loving wife?
A mother, her children?
Children, their parents?
Or maybe a scene from a movie that changed you?
Or a song under a starry sky?
Or a pet who loved you unconditionally?
We will never know.

But know this, even in death, the mind conquers – with dreams and love, not nightmares and hate.

Remember, nothing perfect lasts forever, except in our memories.

Make good memories while living, so that we can re-live them in death.

Go hug you family, take your children for an ice cream. Walk your dog into the sunset.

Sources:
➡️"Surprising brain activity moments before death" by Dr. F Perry Wilson @fperrywilson via https://t.co/g2NmWlMrAs

➡️Research Article: Surge of neurophysiological coupling and connectivity of gamma oscillations in the dying human brain from @PNASNews https://t.co/YqvZIlDaxN

[Rimi @circustownsloth]

@RemaNagarajan I don't believe that the GOP doesn't know this (look at the catering contracts for their high-profile donor events), I believe they've realised that hating/persecuting the destitute is what motivates their religio-nut base. Following this for two decades now, consistent pattern.

[Rimi @circustownsloth]

@_kritoris Hey! I see that the call for this has now been closed, but I'd love to collab. on future projects❤️ I'm a gender-centric pubhealth researcher and a published B2E translator (Penguin Classics, HarperCollins). DMs are open 😺

[Rimi @circustownsloth]

In a public political culture obsessed with manufacturing, scrutinising, and refusing to look beyond rhetoric, this is a very refreshing take. The only metric political speeches should be assessed by are the concrete actions they produce.

[☮️ David Swanson ☮️ @davidcnswanson]

@KatrinaNation Can we eat a speech?
Pay the rent with a speech?
Sustain life on Earth with a speech?
Spare me.

[Rimi @circustownsloth]

Absolutely fascinating thread about ChatGPT generating a plausible research summary with convincingly-named citations... none of which exist. The line between reality and [deep] fake becomes blurrier every day.

[Teresa Kubacka @paniterka_ch]

Today I asked ChatGPT about the topic I wrote my PhD about. It produced reasonably sounding explanations and reasonably looking citations. So far so good – until I fact-checked the citations. And things got spooky when I asked about a physical phenomenon that doesn’t exist.

[Dr. Sonali Vaid @SonaliVaid]

I’ve probably reported 100s of covid disinformation tweets & some very vile trolls but action has never been taken by twitter.

One black woman tweets why she has disdain for the Queen -and the tweet “violates” twitter rules?!

And the label does not even mention which rule?!

[Rimi @circustownsloth]

If this isn't the epitome of "Desh ko bech dala", I don't know what is. The more crony-capitalist fascism changes, the more it remains the same thing. #History

[Samar Halarnkar @samar11]

Dakshina Kannada post offices receive thousands of defective polyester flags from Gujarat: stripes of varying proportions, wrong sizes, Ashok Chakra askew, many tattered. https://t.co/r338wu5FFz

[Rimi @circustownsloth]

My daughter is 3. She's quadralingual, very social, super happy, and prefers to dress, feed & go to the loo herself. Yet I'm still constantly exhausted, anxious, unable to fully focus. Modern parenting is backbreaking. AND bankbreaking, let's not forget.

[Hannah McCann @binarythis]

The last couple of weeks I’ve been realising that this sleep deprivation thing is probably a *years* not months thing with kids. Feels like a giant unspoken fact, even though every parent is open about it. I was not prepared 😅

[Rimi @circustownsloth]

@spkalantri In India, it's probably a matter of patient's luck, which takes them to an ICU w/ optimum mix of skills. Unlucky patients end up in ICUs with lesser skill-mix/insufficient resources. So perhaps success = luck + skills + adequate resources (which is rare in India).

[Rimi @circustownsloth]

Was in a meeting with top public health officials abt #HealthTech in "birth defect" tracking. For #autism, the clinicians mentioned every variable except father's age - statistically a very significant datapoint. Have I misunderstood the literature? Pls help. #MedTwitter

[Rimi @circustownsloth]

@swatiatrest I haven't found the time to look at numbers yet, but have been speaking to teacher-activists. Would love to take a look at the numbers soon if you have a handy link/doc.

[Rimi @circustownsloth]

On point. In addition, schools also run the mid-day meal (supplementary nutrition) programme, so a corrupt, inexpertly-run school directly impacts India's already-appalling child undernourishment. This discussion belongs in #publichealth #MedTwitter

[Swati Moitra @swatiatrest]

The appointments scam is not simply a question of stealing money. It is a steady dismantling of the state education services, denying those most reliant on the public education system the right to education enshrined in RTE 2009.

[Rimi @circustownsloth]

@spkalantri This happened to me. First, PCOD symptoms were ignored for 10 years (it's normal, get married, have a baby, etc). Then USG, thyroid panel and HbA1c were ordered every two months, and meds constantly adjusted. In the end what actually helped were stable doses + lifestyle change.

[Rimi @circustownsloth]

This is a common health scam in India. Multiple variants of it exist. On the other hand, a simple T3, T4, free TSH test in many rural areas are either not available, or break the bank for those that need it (most often, women). Health IS wealth, just not how we were taught.

[SP Kalantri @spkalantri]

Now commercial labs offer 32 tests for monsoon fevers for Rs 999. I discover that complete blood count accounts for 14 tests; urine routine for 12. Two tests converted into 26!

They might as well count the 14 components to sell a shirt—collar, sleeves, cuff, buttons and so on!