“Untouchable” woman dies after refused treatment

An “untouchable” woman who gave birth outside an Indian hospital because doctors would not treat her died Thursday, a day after her baby, officials admitted.

The newborn boy of Maya Devi, 28, died Wednesday due to lack of medical help minutes after being born outside the maternity wing of Kanpur Medical College in northern Uttar Pradesh state.

Devi was only put in intensive care after giving birth but she died of a heart attack early Thursday morning.

Several doctors, including the hospital’s chief medical superintendent, had refused to touch her or provide medical care as she delivered her baby, the Press Trust of India reported. (story)

Chinese man dies after taking Power 1 Walnut sex drug

The illegal sexual-enhancement drug Power 1 Walnut has claimed its first fatality.

He was among the patients who developed serious adverse reactions after taking the made-in-China drug, said the Health Sciences Authority (HSA) on Monday.

The middle-aged local Chinese man was taken to hospital in a coma state in early March. Investigations found that he had taken Power 1 Walnut.

‘The patient did not regain consciousness and eventually succumbed to pneumonia,’ said HSA in a statement.

The case is pending the coroner’s investigation.

‘There are also other patients who developed serious adverse drug reactions of seizures and unconsciousness with just a single ingestion of half a tablet of Power 1 Walnut. This demonstrates the highly toxic effects of this product,’ warned HSA. (story)

Medishield insurance gets improvements

For $10 more a month, most people will no longer have to pay huge out-of-pocket payments for big hospital bills.

Now, the Medishield insurance scheme pays only about 55 per cent of big bills in the subsidised B2 and C class wards. This means that a patient with a $10,000 a bill has to fork out $4,500.

Health Minister Khaw Boon Wan wants the patient’s share to be lower, at about 20 per cent. So he is almost doubling the maximum payouts, making the announcement after launching the job fair for the Khoo Teck Puat Hospital in Yishun on Thursday.

Premiums will go up by less than $5 a month for those younger than 60 years, and by less than $10 for people aged 60 to 80.

Dr Fatima Lateef, who is on the Government Parliamentary Committee (GPC) for Health, said the increase in premiums was ‘very reasonable’ and the ‘reduction in out of pocket payment would be a great welcome.’ (story)

Police search for 2 suspects in shopping complex attack

The police are searching for two men who sprayed a male Chinese victim with an unknown substance at the Golden Landmark Shopping Complex at around 4 pm yesterday.

One man is described as wearing a white cap with a dark top and jeans, and has a scar on his right cheek. The other is plump with tattoos on both hands. He was wearing a light-coloured, short-sleeved top with dark pants.

“The male Chinese victim was sprayed with an unknown substance by two unknown persons who subsequently fled the scene,” a police spokesman said.

He was spotted near the entrance outside the building, groggy and behaving aggressively. He was foaming at his mouth with saliva and mucus was dripping from his nose onto his T-shirt.

The victim was sent to Singapore General Hospital, where he received outpatient treatment. (link)

Flu deaths estimated at 600 per year

About 600 people die from influenza in Singapore every year, and many of these lives could have been saved, experts say. The majority of them are 65 years and older. They rarely die of the flu virus, but from complications arising from a bad flu bout.

Doctors say that flu vaccine can cut the risk of death among the elderly by as much as 80 per cent.

A study on the flu deaths here between 1996 and 2003, released by the Ministry of Health and Singapore General Hospital in 2006, found that people over 65 are more than 11 times as likely to die of the flu than younger adults.

Many die because they also get a bacterial infection on top of the flu, and develop pneumonia, the third most common cause of deaths here.

The team concluded that these 600 deaths could have been prevented either through annual vaccinations or good treatment with antiviral medicine like Tamiflu or Relenza. (story)

2 students develop early blindness detecting software

2 polytechnic students have successfully developed a software that helps doctors detect blindness early. The pair from Ngee Ann Polytechnic were among six winning teams which walked away with $500 each at the Polytechnic Student Research Programme on Tuesday.

Miss Melissa Tan and teammate Gracielynne Flores, both 20, based their research on 200 retinal scans from patients at the National University of Hospital.

The software automatically identifies and classifies various stages of the progressive disease - from mild to prolific, the most severe stage - allowing clinicians to give a more accurate diagnosis.

Further trials may be carried out at the hospital soon.

It took three months of intensive reading to prepare for the project said team member, said Miss Flores.

‘We didn’t know anything about it in the beginning, but that’s where the challenge lies,’ she said.

Diabetic retinopathy is a condition where the retina, which functions in a similar fashion to film in a camera, is damaged due to fluid leaking from blood vessels. In extreme cases, the patient will become blind. (story)

Ring swallowing thief gets 1.5 years in jail

An odd job worker thought he had hit on the ideal way to swipe a diamond ring from a jeweller: he swallowed it, price tag and all. But Mohamad Azman Abdullah, 48, was caught right away, and handed to the police, who took him to hospital.

At Tan Tock Seng Hospital, doctors inserted a long flexible tube down his throat and into his tummy, using instruments at the end to fish out the $2,689 sparkler and its gold setting.

He had to stomach this uncomfortable procedure, called an endoscopy, which is usually done without anaesthesia.

In court on Wednesday, Azman pleaded guilty to the theft and was jailed 1 1/2 years. (story)

Teenager slashed by hoodlums

A 19 year old youth was left with a deep gash on his left forearm after a gang of young boys set upon him with choppers and parangs last Saturday night.

He is currently recuperating in Changi General Hospital (CGH).

The victim who only wanted to be known as Bob said he and two friends, also 19, were walking back from a friend’s house at Block 263 in Tampines Street 21 at about 11.45pm when they passed a group of about seven to nine other boys.

The group then followed Bob and his friends for the next two to three minutes. (story)

Ren Ci continues without CEO

The longtime chief of Ren Ci has stepped aside as a probe deepened this week into an accounting scandal that has dogged the Buddhist charity since November. Venerable Ming Yi, the charity’s chief executive officer, went on leave Monday, the day white-collar crime investigators began pouring over Ren Ci’s books.

The monk’s decision was welcomed on Tuesday by Health Minister Khaw Boon Wan, who called it ‘a professional response.’

Mr Khaw brought in investigators from the police’s Commercial Affairs Department (CAD) on Monday to investigate several million dollars in questionable loans made by Ren Ci.

Some of the firms that received money had strong links to the Venerable Ming Yi, also an abbot at a Geylang Monastery.

His decision to step aside should ‘facilitate the CAD investigation’, Mr Khaw said. (story)

Bird flu kills man in Vietnam

Bird flu has killed a man in northern Vietnam, marking the country’s first human case this year, health officials said Wednesday.The 32-year-old man from Tuyen Quang province, about 80 kilometres northwest of Hanoi, died last week, two days after being admitted to the national tropical disease hospital in Hanoi, said To Doan Hong of the provincial Preventive Medicine Centre.

Test results later came back positive for the H5N1 strain of the virus, he said. It was the country’s 48th death reported since the virus began raging across Asia in late 2003. (story)