Hoardings permitted
The Tamil Nadu government’s move to permit hoardings in urban areas with a view to increasing revenue for civic bodies is a retrograde step and also unwise (Chennai, “Government decides to permit hoardings in urban areas”, May 2).
It cannot be forgotten that many people have either been fatally or seriously injured after hoardings fell on them. The city’s existing road network is overstretched and groaning under the burden of heavy vehicular traffic. The installation of hoardings on roads will further accentuate existing problems. When there are many avenues available to the government to rake in revenue, the green light for hoardings is unjustified. Human lives should take precedence over all other matters. As done in the case of the Bill amending the Factories Act, this regressive decision, to permit the use of hoardings, needs to be rolled back.
V. Johan Dhanakumar,
Chennai
Garbage and stray dogs
It is a fact that the number of stray dog-human conflict incidents are on the rise with the root cause being poor waste management. Many areas in India now face this issue with any small space of land becoming a landfill for garbage. Mountains of waste attract packs of stray dogs which see these spots as sources of food. This in turn poses a threat to anyone walking around these areas, more so at night, and also endangering children.
In my area, for instance, there are between 10 and 15 incidents in a year where stray dogs have either bitten or scratched people. Local municipalities need to take measures that ensure the proper disposal of solid waste. Residents and residential areas cannot be in the grip of fear because of stray dogs.
Shreyal Kothapalli,
Hyderabad
The TB fight
I write this letter as a retired professor of the Department of Biotechnology, All India Institute of Medical Sciences, New Delhi. An article (Editorial page, “A new edge to the fight against tuberculosis”, April 21) asserts the elimination of tuberculosis, focusing on human tuberculosis. The diagnosis and treatment of human tuberculosis remain a formidable challenge. Hence, efforts in this regard are essential and must be sustained. However, tuberculosis is not limited to humans alone. Identical human pathogens, as well as related pathogens, infect domesticated cattle and wildlife. Current efforts to discover and formulate strategies to eradicate tuberculosis overlook this aspect of the prevalence of tuberculosis. These infectious pathogens remain in circulation among susceptible mammals, creating reservoirs of infection, potentially transmissible to humans (zoonotic tuberculosis). Besides animal-human transmission, human-animal transmission occurs (reverse zoonosis). This complex network of reservoirs and susceptibility to infection must be interrupted. Therefore, simultaneously developing effective vaccines for our domesticated cattle and wildlife to protect them against infection would minimise the spread of tuberculosis and promote its elimination.
H. Krishna Prasad,
Mysuru
