Agent Vinod

Mumbai: Saif Ali Khan-Kareena Kapoor starrer Agent Vinod may not have got a bumper opening at the box office but the makers say they have to recover only Rs 30 crore which is an achievable target.

Directed by Sriram Raghavan, Agent Vinod, an action-spy film, had Saif playing the role of a RAW agent and Kareena as a spy. The film released yesterday to mixed reviews.

“The film has been made for Rs 50 crores and 12 crores went for marketing totalling to 62 crores. Out of which we have already recovered 50 percent as music and satellite rights have been sold for around 30 crores,” producer Dinesh Vijan, told PTI.

Reuters

“The task ahead is to make around Rs 30 crores which is a very achievable figure,” he said. Vijan along with Saif launched a production company Illuminati Films, and this is their second film for the banner.

Agent Vinod has been the biggest from our production house. Love Aaj Kal was our first film and we shot it in three continents. On the other hand, this has been filmed in 12 countries and each schedule came with its own set of problems. The possibility of things going wrong in a love story compared to an action story is 1:10. We are proud of the final product that Sriram has delivered,” Vijan said.

“The opening of the film is very critical and they are usually backed by huge promotions. The first three days it is a producer’s film. From Monday onwards, the film becomes a director’s film,” he said.

Even before the release of the film, Saif was keen on making it into a franchise, provided it does well at the box office.

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Time to take urgent measures to control drug resistant TB

New Delhi, Sat, 24 Mar 2012NI Wire

One day before the World Tuberculosis Day on Friday, the members of civil society called for urgent measures to act on regulation of tuberculosis (TB) drugs in the private market and growing number of drug-resistant TB. World TB day is observed on 24th March of every year.

"It's painfully clear that DR-TB infections are on the rise in India. The conditions for emergence of drug resistance are undeniably prevalent, in both the public programme and the private health sector," said Amit Sengupta from Peoples' Health Movement.

Deligates from Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF), Peoples' Health Movement, Stop TB Partnership and Delhi Network of Positive People (DNP+) said on Friday that that the Revised National TB Control Program (RNTCP) pretends a higher risk of miss doses to the patients that is a major concern that induces the need to create drug-resistant strains of TB.

It is to be noted that through The Revised National TB Control Program (RNTCP), the patients of Tb are provided alternate day treatment which does not includes any investment in the treatment counseling that can enhance the fidelity of treatment.

"The Direct Observed Treatment (DOT) model implemented by RNTCP is paternalistic, and fails to empower and support patients through TB treatment serving up a perfect recipe for treatment interruptions. This has implications not only for the patients treated but also on the development of drug resistance," said Hari Shankar, of the DNP+.

Tuberculosis in India results in the death over 3 million people every year with two deaths every three minutes, According to the health ministry's TB Control India statistics.

Tb is an airborne bacterial disease caused by the bacteria Mycobacterium tuberculosis, which affects the lungs severely. The symptoms of the disease includes producing bloody or discoloured sputum, night sweats, fever, fatigue and weakness, pain in the chest, loss of appetite, and pain in breathing or coughing that can last for a period of three weeks or longer.

"The proliferation of TB formulations in the private market coupled with the casual over-the-counter sale of antibiotics, of which some are used for DR TB treatment, is fuelling the development of drug resistance," said Piero Gandini, MSF's Head of Mission in India.

"There is an urgent need for regulatory control of sale and administration of TB drugs in the private sector in order to address the growing incidence of severe forms of DR-TB in India," Gandini added.

WHO consensus: Don’t use TDR-TB label

VARANASI: When the world would come together to observe World Tuberculosis (TB) Day on Saturday (March 24), the district health administration would be looking for ways to eliminate multi-drug resistant TB cases, in line with the slogan and theme of the day that calls for a world free of TB. While the task looks daunting with over 6,000 TB patients registered under various directly observed treatment short-course (DOTS) centres in the district, it has also emerged as a challenge for health authorities looking to curb TB cases in the region.

"We have already identified about 250 suspected resistant TB cases in the district that are going to be covered under DOTS Plus project. A number of these cases are also HIV positive, requiring special focus and attention under the project. The appraisal has been approved by the state government and after the appraisal of the Central government, it would be known as problematic management of resistant TB (PMRT) to specifically target resistant TB cases," said Dr UK Verma, district TB officer (DTO) while talking to TOI on Friday.

It may be mentioned here that a state-of-art anti-retroviral therapy (ART) centre has been running at Banaras Hindu University for detection and treatment of HIV positive cases. The centre has registered over 14,000 HIV positive cases in the last seven years with some of the cases also witnessing resistant TB to aggravate the conditions.

As per reports of district TB centre (DTC), about 6,500 TB patients are presently registered at various DOTS centres with nearly 250 suspected resistant TB cases. There are a total of seven TB units with as many as 43 microscopic and DOTS centres equipped with facilities of sputum examination for detection and treatment of TB cases under DOTS programme in the district. The programme ensures proper and regular medication lasting between six to nine months under the supervision of doctors for eliminating TB in the region.

According to Prof SC Matah, chest department (TB and respiratory diseases), BHU, (TB) is often not considered as a possible diagnosis and therefore goes undetected in children. This has made it difficult to assess the scope of the childhood TB epidemic. There is a need to come up with cheap and rapid tests that identifies TB in children who are at high risk. Similarly, a fully effective vaccine that protects children (and adults), including those living with HIV, against all forms of TB needs to be developed for creating a world free of TB. "But above all that, community knowledge and advocacy to create awareness about TB is needed to tackle the problem at grass root level," he added.

WHO consensus: Don’t use TDR-TB label

MUMBAI: It's not yet time to use the label of totally drug-resistant tuberculosis.

This is the consensus that emerged on Friday at the World Health Organization's (WHO) special meeting in Geneva to discuss a new nomenclature for the new, severely drug-resistant TB forms emerging in parts of the world.

The consensus, a day before World TB Day, also called for clinical trials of 'salvage drugs' (or compassionate drugs) which are a last-ditch therapy for patients now.

Hinduja Hospital reported 12 cases of TDR-TB in January, triggering a worldwide debate on whether the TB bacillus had become deadlier and immune to known drugs. The hospital's research team, led by Dr Zarir Udwadia, published a letter in the 'Clinical Infectious Diseases' journal highlighting the plight of four patients who were on salvage therapy after TB drugs failed. The media then reported eight other cases, three of whom died.

Dr Udwadia was invited to present his data at the WHO meeting, but the conclusion was categorical. "There is currently insufficient evidence to adopt new case definitions for drug-resistant TB,'' said the WHO press release.

Dr Udwadia told TOI on Friday that the very fact WHO has recognized that these new virtually untreatable types of TB exist is a step forward. "Changing terminology and introducing a new term from MDR and then XDR to now TDR is a hugely difficult undertaking and has great implications at programmatic levels across the globe,'' he said.

He added that many committee members felt, for various reasons--political and psycho-social--that TDR carried too many negative associations, was too final a descriptor, and carried a sense of hopelessness.