Hindu Notes from General Studies-02

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SC Constitution Bench holds passive euthanasia, living wills permissible

News

In a historic decision, the Supreme Court declared passive euthanasia and the right of persons, including the terminally ill, to give advance directives to refuse medical treatment permissible.

Beyond News

A Constitution Bench upheld that the fundamental right to life and dignity includes right to refuse treatment and die with dignity.

The fundamental right to a “meaningful existence” includes a person’s choice to die without suffering, it held.

The court said it was time to dispense with such shared suffering and sense of guilt and face the reality. Doctors who attended on the terminally ill were under pressure and dithered in letting the patient go, apprehending criminal liability and fear of being drawn into the “vortex” of a possible family struggle for inheritance.

Justices, said though religion, morality, philosophy, law and society shared equally strong and conflicting opinions about whether right to life included right to death, they all agreed that a person should die with dignity.

The Chief Justice’s judgment includes specific guidelines to test the validity of a living will, by whom it should be certified, when and how it should come into effect, etc. The guidelines also cover a situation where there is no living will and how to approach a plea for passive euthanasia.

The issue of death and when to die transcended the boundaries of law, but the court had intervened because it also concerned the liberty and autonomy of the individual.

WHO launches plan for cheaper TB drugs

News

The World Health Organisation (WHO), invited pharmaceutical companies around the world to submit proposals to manufacture affordable versions of newer medicines for treatment of drug resistant tuberculosis.

Beyond News

Competition among Indian drug producers had then brought down the price of HIV medicines by 99% from $15,000 per patient per year to less than a dollar a day.

WHO has now requested drug makers to submit an Expression of Interest (EoI) for Bedaquiline and Delaminid, two new-generation drugs, recommended for drug resistant-TB. Under WHO norms, drugs submitted upon such requests and complying with its standards are included in a list for procurement by the UN and other organisations.

India has nearly 1.3 lakh DR-TB patients, the most in the world, but the Health Ministry gets only 10,000 doses of Bedaquiline and 400 doses of Delaminid. The medicines are obtained as donations from Janssen (US) and Otsuka Pharmaceuticals (Japan), the respective manufacturers.

One of the aims of pre qualification is to ensure that a greater number of manufacturers are supplying quality medicines, which in turn means a more competitive market and more affordable prices.

Cheaper drugs to treat HIV became possible at the time as the Indian Patents Act did not provide for product patents on pharmaceutical products, until required by the Trade Related Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) framework of the World Trade Organization (WTO). India became TRIPS compliant with pharma product patents in 2005.

Hindu Notes from General Studies-03

Trump threatens to impose “reciprocal tax” on India, China

News

United S President Donald Trump threatened to impose “reciprocal tax” on countries like China and India if they do not match America’s tariff.

Reciprocal tax

A reciprocal agreement, also called reciprocity, is an agreement between two states that allows residents of one state to request exemption from tax withholding in the other (reciprocal) state.

Beyond News

Mr. Trump has, in recent days, spoken a number of times about the 50 per cent duty that India levies on high-end motorbikes that Harley-Davidson, an American company, sells in India. He has repeatedly insisted that the US levies “zero” duty or “nothing” on motorbikes imported from India.

• The US President said the stage for the imposition of reciprocal tax has been set in the first year of his administration.
• China charged 25 per cent duty on American cars whereas it was just 2.5 per cent on import of Chinese cars into the US.
• Mr. Trump also said the “reciprocal tax” programme would ensure “fair trade deals” for the US.

Mumbai ranks 47th on wealth index

News

India has the potential to the become the third-largest contributor in Asia with respect to wealthy population after China and Japan, according to the Knight Frank Wealth Report 2018.

Findings in the Report.

Report said that,at 54%, India has recorded one of the fastest growths in its super prime population (individuals with net worth of over $50 million) between 2012 and 2017, and will add more than 2,000 such individuals at a higher growth rate of 71% by 2022.

As per the report, which was unveiled globally , Mumbai ranked 47th on the city wealth index among 314 global cities.

Mumbai also figures among the top 20 costliest global cities, where $1 million can buy only 92 square metres of real estate.

The report said Mumbai and Delhi would be among the top 10 markets to witness the highest addition in households earning more than $250,000 annually between 2017 and 2022.

In terms of wealth alone, wherein the index measures the number of the ultra-high net worth individuals (UHNWIs), high net worth individuals (HNWIs) and rate of wealth generation in a city, Mumbai ranks in the top 20 with Delhi coming in 22nd and Bengaluru 26th .

As per the findings property investment was amongst the lowest (17%) contributing factors that led to increase in wealth amongst Indians, compared to 30% for Asia and 50% globally.

The investment allocation into property in India (36%) was lower than Asia (39%) and globally (43%).

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