International Big Cat Alliance

• The Indian Government has proposed to head a massive International Alliance to Safeguard Big Cats, and it has pledged support for the initiative over a five-year period with a financing commitment of USD $100 million (over Rs 800 crore).

About

• The proposed International Big Cat Alliance (IBCA) will aim to protect and conserve the seven main big cats, including the tiger, lion, leopard, snow leopard, puma, jaguar, and cheetah.
• The alliance will be open to membership for 97 "range" countries, which house the large cat species' original habitat, as well as other interested countries, international organisations, etc.
• The coalition is scheduled to debut in India the following month, according to a suggested schedule.
• The cooperation was "motivated by the entrance of cheetahs" last year from Namibia, according to authorities in the Environment Ministry.

Purpose

• Documents suggest that the alliance's objective is to provide a platform for "dissemination of information on benchmarked practises, capacity building, resources repository, research and development, awareness creation", etc., on the preservation and conservation of big cats.
• It will focus on "advocacy, partnership, knowledge e-portal, capacity building, eco-tourism, partnerships between expert groups, and fund tapping," among other things.

Structure

• The IBCA's governing body will be composed of a UN General Assembly made up of representatives from all member nations, a council made up of at least seven but no more than 15 member nations chosen by the General Assembly for a term of five years, and a Secretariat.
• The General Assembly will choose the IBCA Secretary General for a particular term on the Council's suggestion.
• The IBCA is anticipated to survive on membership fees, contributions from bilateral and multilateral organisations, and the private sector beyond the first five years, which will be supported by India's "total grant assistance" of $100 million.

Criticism

• Building yet another platform won't help conservation if there isn't the political will to carry out what we know has to be done.
• The amount of money committed (to IBCA) exceeds what India can reportedly afford to spend on 22 species that are in danger of going extinct.
• Lack of financing has caused several important landscapes and species recovery programmes to stagnate.
• Big cat experts are concerned that a number of important habitats and programmes for the recovery of endangered species are suffering from a lack of funding.

About Big Cat

• There are seven main big cats, including the tiger, lion, leopard, snow leopard, puma, jaguar, and cheetah, as was previously mentioned.
• Tiger, Lion, Leopard, Snow Leopard, and Cheetah are among the five great cats that call India home.
• Royal Bengal Tiger - The number of tigers in India has climbed to 2967, according to the most recent Tiger Census, which was done in 2018–19.
• Nowadays, India is home to 70% of the world's tigers.
• The final habitat for the world's remaining population of Asiatic lions in Gujarat's Gir National Park.
• There are now 674 (Census 2020)Asiatic Lions, up from less than 200 in the late 1960s.
• Leopard - Among all the subspecies in Asia, there are thought to be 12,000–14,000 leopards living there, and their population is the most genetically diversified and outbred.
• Native to the alpine areas of Central and South Asia is the snow leopard.
• In India, a significant portion of the western Himalayas, as well as the states of Jammu and Kashmir, Ladakh, Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Sikkim, and Arunachal Pradesh in the eastern Himalayas, are within their geographic range.
• Around 7,500 snow leopards will still be alive in 2021, and 500 of them will be in India.
• Since 1952, the cheetah has been extinct in India.

As a result of the importation of 8 cheetahs from Namibia in September 2022, cheetahs have been reintroduced to the wild in India.

Read Also: Tiger Reserves in India

Coronary Heart Disease

• Researchers are particularly concerned about coronary heart disease because it is the primary cause of death worldwide from cardiovascular illnesses.

About Coronary Heart Disease

• Coronary heart disease (CHD) is a condition where the blood channels that bring oxygen-rich blood to the heart become constricted as a result of the accumulation of fatty deposits (plaques) inside the arteries.
• The arteries may stiffen and constrict as a result of these deposits over time, limiting the amount of blood getting to the heart.
• The main causes of coronary heart disease are unhealthy lifestyles, poor diets, physical inactivity, cigarette use, and excessive alcohol intake.
• The only way to repair damaged cardiac tissue in people is through a heart transplant, which has its own set of difficulties.

Latest Research

• A team of scientists has developed a technique that uses specific proteins to turn healthy adult skin cells into cardiac cells.
• Cellular reprogramming—the process of changing a cell's form—involves particular proteins called transcription factors that modify a cell's gene expression and instruct it to adopt a new cellular identity.

Challenges

• Lack of a targeted policy towards NCDs, especially CVDs, and poorer availability, accessibility, and affordability of effective and efficient treatment are the main difficulties facing cardiac care in India.

Low Accessibility

• In terms of affordable and effective service delivery infrastructure, there is low availability. Affordable preventive and curative cardiac treatment is not widely available nationwide.

Minimal Accessibility

• Access to healthcare has not always been equal.
• The Indian Healthcare System has a major problem. Cardiology public healthcare infrastructure is also ineffective and insufficient. Only 30% of the population is served by the 60% of hospitals in India that are found in metropolitan regions. Less than 10% of the rural population and just 13% of its inhabitants have access to primary healthcare facilities.

Low Affordability

• The majority of the population is quite concerned about the cost of quality care, both for preventative checkups and treatment.
• Large hospitals are frequently fueled by the utilisation of cutting-edge medical equipment, which raises the cost of care in Tier I cities. The low prevalence of Health Insurance in India further exacerbates the affordability issue.

Government Initiative

• Under the National Health Mission, the National Programme for Prevention and Control of Cancer, Diabetes, Cardiovascular Diseases, and Stroke (NPCDCS) is now being implemented (NHM).
• The Strengthening of Tertiary Care Cancer Facilities Scheme is being implemented by the Central Government to assist in the establishment of State Cancer Institutes (SCI) and Tertiary Care Centers (TCCC) in various regions of the nation.
• Under the Pradhan Mantri Swasthya Suraksha Yojana, oncology is a focus for the new AIIMS and several upgraded institutions (PMSSY).
• The Affordable Medications and Reliable Implants for Treatment (AMRIT) Deendayal outlets have been established in 159 institutions/hospitals to provide patients with cancer and cardiovascular disease medications and implants at reduced costs.
• The Department of Pharmaceuticals established Jan Aushadhi outlets to offer generic medications at fair costs.
• Project on ST-Elevation Myocardial Infarction (STEMI): To enable quick identification of heart illness, the Maharashtra government introduced the STEMI programme recognised by NHM in 2021.
• ST-Elevation Myocardial Infarction (STEMI) is a situation when one of the heart’s primary arteries, providing oxygen-rich blood to the heart muscle, gets completely blocked.

Way Forward

• The risk of cardiovascular disease is decreased by quitting smoking, reducing salt intake, increasing fruit and vegetable consumption, engaging in regular physical activity, and abstaining from alcohol.
• National Health Policies that foster environments where healthy options are both affordable and accessible are crucial for encouraging people to adopt and maintain healthy behaviours.

Premature deaths can be avoided by determining who is most vulnerable to CVDs and making sure they receive the right care.

Read Also: Cardiovascular Diseases

Megha-Tropiques-1 Satellite

• The Controlled Re-Entry Experiment for the decommissioned Megha-Tropiques-1 (MT-1) satellite was recently completed successfully by the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO).
• The Pacific Ocean's uninhabited region between latitudes 5°S and 14°S and 119°W and 100°W was chosen as the MT1 re-entry zone's target.

About Megha-Tropiques-1

• An Indo-French Joint Satellite Mission called Megha-Tropiques was created to examine the water cycle and energy exchanges in the tropics.
• Understanding the life cycle of convective systems, their impact on the energy and moisture budget of the atmosphere in tropical regions, and how they affect tropical weather and climate are the main goals of this study.
• It includes information on condensed water in clouds, atmospheric water vapour, precipitation, and evaporation, as well as scientific data on the water cycle's impact on the tropical atmosphere.
• The Megha-Tropiques is a unique satellite for climate research with a circular orbit inclined 20 degrees to the equator that should also help researchers working to improve forecasting models.

What does "Controlled Re-entry" Mean?

• De-orbiting to extremely low altitudes is required for controlled re-entries to make sure the crash takes place within a predetermined safe zone.
• To reduce the risk of ground casualties, large satellites or rocket bodies that are likely to survive aero-thermal fragmentation during re-entry undergo controlled re-entry.
• Aero-Thermal Fragmentation is the process by which an item moving quickly through the Earth's atmosphere gets broken apart or fragmented by intense heat and pressure.
• All of these satellites are made to perform a controlled re-entry at the end of their useful lives.

The Following Four Payloads are Carried by Megha-Tropiques

• The Imaging Radiometer Microwave Analysis and Detection of Rain and Atmospheric Structures (MADRAS), created by CNES and ISRO, is a Sounder for Probing Vertical Profiles of Humidity (SAPHIR) from CNES.
• From CNES, ScaRaB, a scanner for radiation budget.

ROSA, a radio occultation sensor for vertical temperature and humidity profiling, was imported from Italy.

Read Also: Space Related Facts and Data