In order to cater to the health problems of North East India for the benefit of people and public health welfare, the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) will soon begin research on communicable diseases including vector borne diseases, viral diseases, HIV/AIDS and drug abuses, bacterial infections, diarrhoeal diseases and parasitology.
The initiative taken by the ICMR in this regard is significant as the north-east India shares international borders with neighbouring countries like Bhutan, China, Myanmar and Bangladesh, and being a gateway to South East Asia, attains a specific importance to various problems due to various well established, emerging and re-emerging communicable diseases and cross border transmission.
The focus of this research projects is primarily to conduct translational research so as to cater to the health problems of North East India for the benefit of people and public health welfare. The principal investigator for this research programme must be from the north-east region of India.
Epidemiology and Communicable Disease Division of the ICMR has invited concept proposals in communicable disease research in North East from scientists on priority areas of research in north-east India which may be developed into full adhoc proposals on approvals. The last date for submission of concept proposals is July 15, 2013.
Under the vector borne diseases the focus of the research will be diseases like malaria, filaraisis, Japanese encephalitis (JE), dengue, chikungunya, West Nile Virus (WNV) and kala azar as these are the most important mosquito borne parasitic and viral diseases prevalent in the north-eastern states.
The research programme is also focusing on viral diseases as Arunachal Pradesh is hyper-endemic for hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection with C, D and A and I circulating genotypes. High prevalence of Hepatitis C infection among injecting drug users in Manipur, Mizoram and Nagaland states has also been reported. In addition to hepatitis, among the viral diseases, sexually transmitted and respiratory infections are also very common in this part of the country.
The programme will also focus on HIV/AIDS and drug abuse as it is largely concentrated in six states in the industrialized South and West, and the North Eastern tip in the country. This epidemic in north-eastern states particularly Manipur, Mizoram and Nagaland is mainly spread by intravenous drug-users (IDUs).
Unlike parasitic and viral diseases, not many bacterial diseases are peculiar to North East Region. Mycobacterium tuberculosis is an impoltant public health concern in northeastern region of India and anecdotal reports indicate high frequency of multi-drug resistant (MDR) TB in this region. Problems and issues are not very much dissimilar from the rest of the country. In fact, these should be very much on the pattern of what is seen in the states of West Bengal and Odisha.
Diarrhoeal diseases also come under focus of this programme as occurrence of epidemics of diarrhoeal diseases resulting in heavy causalities is a regular feature in Assam, especially in tea garden populations. Unhygienic living conditions and foecal contamination of drinking water sources have invariably been identified as the precipitating factors for the epidemics of diarrhoeal diseases. Rotaviruses, Vibrio cholerae 01 El Tor Ogawa have been isolated in many instances. These diseases need to be researched in terms of risk factors, molecular pathogenecity and virulence markers.