Current Affairs 19 October 2022 – IAS Current Affairs

Current Affairs 19 October 2022 focuses on Prelims-Mains perspective. Major events are :

One Health Concept

Source: DTE
GS II: Policies and Developmental Studies

What is discussed under One Health Concept?

1. One Health Joint Plan of Action
2. One Health Concept

Why in News?

• The Quadripartite launched a new five-year One Health Joint Action Plan on October 17, 2022.
• The Quadripartite include:
  • The Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO)
  • The United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP)
  • The World Health Organization (WHO)
  • The World Organization for Animal Health (WOAH, founded as OIE)

One Health Joint Plan of Action

• One Health is an integrated, unified approach to balancing and optimising the health of humans, animals, plants, and ecosystems.
• It is the fundamental strategy for solving our society’s complex health concerns, such as ecological degradation, food system failures, infectious illnesses, and antimicrobial resistance.
• The notion of One Health acknowledges that the health of humans, domestic and wild animals, plants, and the larger environment (including ecosystems) are all closely intertwined and interdependent.
• Efforts from a single sector or speciality will not be sufficient to prevent or eliminate infectious illness and other complex challenges to One Health.

Vision Developed India: Opportunities and Expectations of MNC Report

Source: Hindu
GS III: Indian Economy

What is discussed under the Vision Developed India: Opportunities and Expectations of MNC Report?

1. Key Highlights from the Report

Why in News?

• According to a report by the Confederation of Indian Industries (CII) and EY, India has the potential to attract $475 billion in Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) flows over the next five years due to a focus on reforms and economic growth.
• The report is named ‘Vision—Developed India: Opportunities and Expectations of MNCs.

Key Highlights from the Report

• Foreign Direct Investment into India has been steadily increasing over the previous decade, with FY 2021-22 getting $84.8 billion in FDI.

  

  • This is despite the impact of the COVID-19 epidemic and geopolitical developments on investor sentiment.
• India is viewed as a developing manufacturing hub in global value chains, a rapidly growing consumer market, and a centre for the continuous digital revolution.
• In a continuously shifting geopolitical context, multinational companies value India’s big and stable democracy and persistent reform actions.
• 71% of MNCs operating in India see India as a significant location for global expansion.
• Optimism comes from both short-term and long-term possibilities.
• The majority of MNCs believe that the Indian economy will perform much better in the next 3-5 years.
• 96% of respondents are optimistic about India’s total potential.
• The report’s optimism about India’s potential originates from strong consumer patterns, digitization, and a developing services sector, as well as the government’s strong focus on infrastructure and manufacturing.
• The Indian government’s constant attempts to decrease regulatory barriers are also contributing to MNCs’ favourable view.
• Over 60% of MNCs in the report claimed that the business environment has improved in the previous three years.
• As the business environment continues to improve, MNCs would like to see increased efficacy of the national single window for approvals and clearances, better tax certainty, and a stronger contract enforcement system, among other measures.

Reserve Bank Report of Big Tech

Source: ET
GS II:  Policies and Developmental Studies

What is discussed under the Reserve Bank Report of Big Tech?

1. About Big Techs
2. The Big Tech Risks
3. Regulators Cautious

Why in News?

The Reserve Bank has once again raised concerns about the impact of big tech’s supremacy in financial services saying it can undermine financial stability.

About Big Techs

• Big Tech refers to the most powerful and largest technological corporations in their respective industries.
• Their products and services are utilised internationally and are extensively depended on by enterprises and consumers alike.

  

• Several massive companies are commonly referred to as Big Tech.
• They are frequently combined and referred to using acronyms.
• Amazon, Apple, Facebook, Google, and Microsoft are among the technology behemoths.
• Each of the major technology corporations dominates its relevant field.
• Big tech firms keep their market capitalization, operate across several sectors, and influence people across platforms.
• Each of the major technology corporations serves as a hub for other internet services and activities.

The Big Tech Risks

• The central bank report, which listed the dangers presented by big techs, or huge non-financial technology enterprises, stated that the complicated governance structure of big techs restricts the opportunity for effective monitoring and the formulation of entity-based rules.
• Because of their direct exposure to the supply of financial services, big techs can have an influence on the risk and maturity transformation functions.
• This can sometimes translate into or contribute to shadow banking operations, endangering financial stability.
• Because of their widespread acceptance as third-party service providers, big techs frequently serve as the underlying foundation for a variety of services.
• This puts big techs in a unique position to readily obtain cross-functional databases that can be used to generate novel product offers.
• Big techs usually have the financial power to withstand competition challenges.

Regulators Cautious

• Regulators throughout the world are concerned about the influence of big tech on competition and market contestability, consumer data privacy rights, and financial intermediation and stability.
• As a result, regulators are realigning their frameworks to provide a fair playing field in the fintech area while mitigating the risks associated with the growth of big techs.
• With the rising complexity of the interconnections between financial institutions and technology businesses, regulatory frameworks must keep up with innovation in order to minimise the vulnerabilities that may result from the new risk propagation channels.

Dr Dilip Mahalanabis

Source: Indian Express
GS II: Indian History

What is discussed under Dr Dilip Mahalanabis?

1. About Dr Dilip Mahalanabis
2. History Behind the ORS Discovery
3. About ORS

Why in News?

Dr. Dilip Mahalanabis, the physician who pioneered the treatment for dehydration, Oral Rehydration Solution (ORS), dead on Sunday at a Kolkata hospital (October 16).

About Dr Dilip Mahalanabis

• Dr. Mahalanabis was born in West Bengal on November 12, 1934.
• Educated in Kolkata and London before joining the Johns Hopkins University International Centre for Medical Research and Training in Kolkata in the 1960s to do research on oral rehydration treatment.
• Dr. Mahalanabis worked for WHO in cholera control in Afghanistan, Egypt, and Yemen from 1975 to 1979.
• During the 1980s, he served as a WHO consultant on bacterial disease control studies.
• Dr. Mahalanabis developed ORS while working in overcrowded refugee camps during the 1971 Bangladesh Liberation War, which the Lancet named ‘the most important medical innovation of the twentieth century’.
• Dr. Mahalanabis worked for WHO in cholera control in Afghanistan, Egypt, and Yemen from 1975 to 1979.
• During the 1980s, he served as a WHO consultant on bacterial disease control studies.
• Dr. Mahalanabis developed ORS while working in overcrowded refugee camps during the 1971 Bangladesh Liberation War, which The Lancet named “the most important medical innovation of the twentieth century.”
• Columbia University awarded Dr Dilip Mahalanabis and Dr Nathaniel F Pierce the Pollin Prize in 2002, which is considered the equivalent of Nobel in peadiatrics.

History Behind the Discovery

• When the 1971 war broke out, millions of civilians fled to India from East Pakistan.
• Clean drinking water and sanitation were issues in these refugee camps, and cholera and diarrhoea spread among weary and thirsty residents.
• Dr. Mahalanabis and his colleagues were working at one of these camps in Bongaon.
• Intravenous fluid supplies were running low, and there weren’t enough skilled workers to perform the IV therapy.
• Dr. Mahalanabis understood from his study that a sugar and salt solution that increased water absorption by the body may save lives.
• He and his colleagues then made salt and glucose solutions in water and began putting them in huge barrels where patients and their families could assist themselves.
• The death rate in Dr Mahalanabis’ camp was soon reduced to 3%, compared to 20% to 30% in camps that simply used intravenous fluids.
• Dr Dhiman Barua, WHO’s chief of the Bacterial Diseases Unit, visited Dr Mahalanabis’ camp and began popularising the ORS technique of therapy.

About ORS

• Oral Rehydration Solution (ORS) is a simple, efficient dehydration treatment that is used all over the world.
• It consists of  22 gm glucose (as commercial monohydrate), 3.5 gm sodium chloride (as table salt) and 2.5 gm sodium bicarbonate (as baking soda) per liter of water.
• It is a simple and cost-effective technique for avoiding diarrhoeal infections such as cholera, which is one of the main causes of death in newborns and young children in many underdeveloped nations, where the patient dies of dehydration.
• One of the benefits of ORS is that even untrained individuals may give it and keep the crisis under control until the patient is brought to the hospital.
• It includes electrolytes in the proper quantities and is given to newborns and adults who have diarrhoea.

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