Samatha Mathew (She/her)

PhD| Scicomm. Consultant @IAVI
Past: @Sci_Rio @igibsocial @IITKgp @MohandasCollege @KVS_HQ

[Samatha Mathew (She/her) @Samatha_Mathew]

Glad to have been the project lead on putting together this report, which gave me the feel of how to look at country wide data and tell a compelling story with a cascading impact.

Thanks to the @Sci_Rio team, especially @ChampakSuchitha and @smarter_INDIANS for closing this 🎉

[Dr Jitendra Singh @DrJitendraSingh]

Dedicated the #UMMID (Unique Methods of Management of Inherited Disorders) Programme for Rare Genetic Disorders/ Diseases to the Nation. Possibly the first of it's kind, the programme has been designed by the Department of Biotechnology, Ministry of Science & Technology.

My Address Takeaways:
"India is steadily entering an era where healthcare, diagnosis and treatment will increasingly become genome-based, precision-driven and individualized according to the genetic profile of every patient.

Inherited Rare Genetic Disorders or Diseases remained neglected for decades because diagnosis itself was difficult, treatment inaccessible and medicines either unavailable or prohibitively expensive, making it essential to build a coordinated national mechanism to make diagnosis and management feasible, affordable and accessible for all families. 

Rare Genetic Disorders represent a silent but deeply challenging public health burden, where families often spend years moving from one hospital to another in search of diagnosis and treatment. Despite affecting comparatively smaller populations, these disorders impose enormous emotional, social and financial hardship on affected families.

UMMID is a major step towards mitigation of the ordeal of families affected by Rare Genetic Disorders , and in general also towards the future of precision medicine in India, the Minister said the initiative would also prepare the country’s healthcare ecosystem for the next generation of gene and genome-based medical care".

[Samatha Mathew (She/her) @Samatha_Mathew]

@LabRajeev @anoopanjukunnu @KUFOS1 @MolBioEvol @FishInTheNews Congratulations 👏🏼

[Maheshwer Peri @maheshperi]

India is waging a war against its own researchers:

In Careers360’s Research Summit, Prof. Ram Gopal Rao, Vice Chancellor of BITS Pilani described India’s lack of investment in research beautifully. He said “India’s Higher Education is described as African Budgets, American ambitions, Russian methods, Chinese opacity and Indian Bureaucracy.
In the past decade, we have seen a slide in scientific temper and investments in research.
1. Non-NET fellowship are stuck at ₹8,000 a month since 2012, for 16,270 scholars in 45 central universities.
2. JRF stipend: In 2014, the JRF was Rs.25,000 per month. In 2019, it was revised to Rs.31m000. it is ₹37,000 PM. The hrowth hasn’t even kept pace with inflation and in real terms, it has FALLEN. IISc scholars even went on a hunger strike demanding an increase.
3. Maulana Azad fellowship: where more than 1,400 scholars have had stipends stalled since January 2025.
4. OBC fellowships: lists for three NET cycles in 2024-25 were held back, which the social justice ministry put down to insufficient funds.
5. INSPIRE: fellows have their stipends unpaid for 3 to 9 months. The schemes now under Vigyan Dhara fell 67.5% between 2016 and 2025.
6. KVPY: scrapped in 2022, after nearly two lakh students a year had taken its test.
7. JRF bottleneck: only 5,108 of 7,35,614 candidates (0.7%) got JRF in December 2025. Minister Sukanta Majumdar gave no year-wise data when asked.
8. The University of Hyderabad stopped Rohit Vemula’s ₹25,000 stipend in July 2015, and his last letter said he hadn’t been paid for seven months. He later committed suicide.
9. India’s R&D spending: fell from 0.82% of GDP in 2009-10 to 0.64% in 2020-21. PMRF spending was revised to ₹290 crore, less than half its ₹600 crore outlay.
10. SC fellowships: fell 61%, from 4,841 to 1,872, between 2020-21 and 2022-23.
If India indeed wants to be a Vishwa Guru, India should be investing in research, in creating quality Higher-Ed institutions. We cannot be cutting down on stipends, not paying our researchers, holding back payments, scrapping scholarships, not increasing fellowship amounts even to match inflation and still expect students to choose research.

[Samatha Mathew (She/her) @Samatha_Mathew]

@abhijit_MLab Best AQI full form till date 😂😭😂

[Samatha Mathew (She/her) @Samatha_Mathew]

@Sci_Lipi @emboreports So lovely 🤩 Congratulations 👏🏼🎉

[Lipi Thukral @Sci_Lipi]

The cover is out! The lotus (LC3), floating on lily pads (PI lipids) comes together!

@emboreports
https://t.co/Qg4so3g85T

[Samatha Mathew (She/her) @Samatha_Mathew]

@adittyachaudhu1 @iiscbangalore @mkjolly15 Congratulations 👏🏼

[Soumitra 🌻 সৌমিত্র சௌமித்ரா سومترہ @netshrink]

"India is still taking its first steps in original research and breakthrough innovation."

Ask a refund from your medical college. They short changed you!

Here are 10 breakthrough medical innovations from India (& there are more)

1. Aum Voice Life (Artificial Voice Box)..1/n

[Samatha Mathew (She/her) @Samatha_Mathew]

@_KarishmaK

[Samatha Mathew (She/her) @Samatha_Mathew]

A good read for the long weekend 🧭

[Sambit Dash, PhD @sambit_dash]

2 cents on the Temple topic:
Generally:
- In a free market if a regulator has allowed a product it can be sold.
- If there is no or poor regulation it is a regulatory failure.
- Product claims can be questioned by anyone
About the Temple:
- Anatomically inaccurate in claims 1/

[Anurag Agrawal @AnuragAgrawalMD]

1/n. I refuse to pay for twitter / X blue tick so this will be a long post. Bear with me. Over the last couple of weeks, it has been interesting to see that my science views are unlike many outstanding clinician scientists who I know. I do not actually practice medicine anymore

[Samatha Mathew (She/her) @Samatha_Mathew]

@ViditaVaidya @PraachiTiwari @TIFRScience @tifr_alumni Congratulations 👏🏽

[Samatha Mathew (She/her) @Samatha_Mathew]

@_KarishmaK

[Samatha Mathew (She/her) @Samatha_Mathew]

7 yrs ago, I started posting on Twitter.

Without an inkling of how many people I would get to know, and they, me.

Through my many phases.

And that one will remember to send me a thoughtful 'surprise' for Diwali 🪔

Ever grateful to have crossed paths with @_KarishmaK ❤️😇

[Samatha Mathew (She/her) @Samatha_Mathew]

@Ishwariya13 @CommsBio @netrakrish @AnishaSumith @DhruvaKesireddy @manoj290991 Congratulations 🎉

[Samatha Mathew (She/her) @Samatha_Mathew]

@abandopa @Nams_India @NITIAayog @ICMRDELHI @CDSCO_INDIA_INF @IAVI Noted :)

[Samatha Mathew (She/her) @Samatha_Mathew]

It was quite a horizon-expanding workshop on "Regulatory Pathways, Strategies & Experiential Learning for Development of Therapeutics & Vaccine Technologies" held today at the @Nams_India, put together by the teams of Dr. Suchita Markan and Dr. Taruna Madan Gupta.

[Samatha Mathew (She/her) @Samatha_Mathew]

@Nams_India @NITIAayog @ICMRDELHI @CDSCO_INDIA_INF Special mention to sessions by Dr. Mukesh Gupta and Dr. Nivedita Gupta which opened up practical aspects of vaccine evaluation and approval.

Glad to have attended the sessions with stellar colleagues Dr Shweta Chatrath and Jessy Joseph, MD from @IAVI India.

[Samatha Mathew (She/her) @Samatha_Mathew]

@Nams_India The workshop was held under the banner of Medtech Mitra, a joint initiative of @NITIAayog, @ICMRDELHI and @CDSCO_INDIA_INF.

Addresses by Dr. Rajeev Raghuvanshi (DCGI CDSCO), Dr. Rajiv Bahl (Sec DHR & DG ICMR) and Aman Sharma (Joint Sec DoP) set the stage for event.