Zika: Don’t panic, says Lankan doc
Tiny it may be but it has become the bane of men, women and children as it fires virus-shots through its bite. Zika is the latest and is part of the ‘arsenal’ of diseases this insect-vector, lets loose from time to time including dengue, chikungunya, West Nile virus and yellow fever. The Zika virus was [...]
Berry full of all things good
Did you know that Strawberries are the only fruits that wear their seeds on the outside? The average berry is adorned with some 200 of them. No wonder it only takes one bite to get seeds stuck in your teeth. Strawberries have grown wild for millennia throughout the world. Today, there are over 600 varieties [...]
‘Don’t deprive epileptic children of their childhood’
It was thought to come about due to a blow from the devil (yaka gahala), but fortunately even people in remote villages have moved away from this assumption in recent times. Now they know that it is an illness like any other, but there is a strong need to sear into their minds the importance [...]
Allergies: The known and the little known culprits
Annasi, thakkali and isso are the first culprits that come to mind when focusing on allergies which are aplenty these days. No one imagines that there can be an allergic reaction to humble sarana, murunga (drumstick) and even thala (sesame). “This is the real picture,” says Immunologist Prof. Neelika Malavige who runs the Allergy Clinic [...]
Talking to children about the ABCs of sex
Dr. Elspeth Hulse from the University of Edinburgh spent a number of weeks in December and January, volunteering at general and sexual health education talks with schoolchildren and at factories in Kandy, Nuwara Eliya and Kurunegala. Here MediScene asks her some all important questions about what parents should be telling their kids about sex. How [...]
Recipe to happiness:A life rich in relationships
Robert Waldinger of Harvard University is probably now the most famous psychiatrist in the world. The TED talk he gave in November 2015 has over four and a half million viewers and the numbers are growing every day. Why did his talk touch the hearts of so many, in such a short time? Waldinger is [...]