Daily Prelims Notes 28 June 2020

June 28, 2020
Posted by: OptimizeIAS Team
Category: DPN

Table Of Contents

Subject: Economy

Context:

A study by International Labour Organization has warned that the COVID crisis has disproportionately affected young people, and could impact upon their work opportunities and career options for decades to come.

Concept:

ILO termed youths of present generation as ‘lockdown generation’ as they have been bearing social and economic impact of COVID pandemic.
The Covid-19 pandemic has caused surging unemployment worldwide, but has hit young workers especially hard; forcing more than one in six people aged under 29 to stop working.
One of the biggest blows dealt by the COVID-19 pandemic, and the consequent lockdown, has been to the livelihoods of the young working population, especially those in the lower income groups.
The report warned that young people are facing a “triple shock” from the crisis, which is not only destroying their employment but has also disrupted education and training, and has made it far more difficult to try to enter the labour market or move between jobs.
The ILO report called for an urgent and large-scale response to the crisis, including employment and training guarantee programmes for young people.
It warned that if youths’ talent and energy is sidelined by a lack of opportunity or skills it will damage future and make it much more difficult to re-build a better, post-Covid economy.

2. Type 1 and 2 diabetes

Subject: Science and tech

Context:

Diabetes remained one of the risk factors for developing severe COVID-19 and chances of COVID deaths are elevated in people with diabetes. But now there is growing evidence that novel coronavirus might actually be triggering diabetes in some people who have so far remained free of it.

Concept:

These patients typically develop type-1 diabetes.
However, more evidence is needed to conclusively prove that COVID-19 indeed causes type-1 diabetes.
It is also not clear if the acute-onset diabetes in COVID-19 patients will be permanent or transient.
Diabetes mellitus is a metabolic disease of high blood sugar (glucose) levels that result from problems with insulin secretion, its action, or both. Normally, blood glucose levels are tightly controlled by a hormone produced by the pancreas known as insulin. When blood glucose levels rise (for example, after eating food), insulin is released from the pancreas to normalize the glucose level.

Type 1 diabetes:

An absolute lack of insulin, usually due to destruction of the insulin-producing beta cells of the pancreas, is the main problem in type 1 diabetes.
It is to be due to an autoimmune process, in which the body’s immune system mistakenly targets its own tissues (islet cells in the pancreas. This tendency for the immune system to destroy the beta cells of the pancreas is likely to be, at least in part, genetically inherited, although the exact reasons that this process happens are not fully understood.

Type 2 diabetes:

People who have type 2 diabetes can still produce insulin, but do so relatively inadequately for their body’s needs.
Genetics plays a role in the development of type 2 diabetes, and having a family history and close relatives with the condition increases your risk; however, there are other risk factors, with obesity being the most significant.

3. Indi Ocean El Nino

Subject: Geography/Environment

Context:

By studying microscopic zooplankton called foraminifera, researches had published a paper which first found evidence from the past of an Indian Ocean El Nino

Concept:

Findings:

The report speaks about Last Glacial Maximum which existed about 19,000-21,000 years ago, in which ice-sheets covered North America and Eurasia, and sea-levels were much lower, with Adam’s Bridge exposed so that the Indian subcontinent and Sri Lanka were contiguous.
Researchers analysed simulations of this past climate and predicted that the ongoing climate change could reawaken an ancient climate pattern of the Indian Ocean.
They find phenomenon which could be similar to the El Niño phenomenon of the Pacific Ocean bringing more frequent and devastating floods and drought to several densely-populated countries around the Indian Ocean region.
If current warming trends continue, this new Indian Ocean El Niño could emerge as early as 2050.
Indian Ocean has the capacity to harbour much larger climate variability than observed during the last few decades or a century.
Under present-day conditions, changes in the Indian Ocean Dipole and the El Niño–Southern Oscillation strongly affect Indian Monsoon variability from year to year.
If the hypothesis emerges in the near future, it will pose another source of uncertainty in rainfall prediction and will likely amplify swings in monsoon rainfall.

4. LIGO Scientific and VIRGO Collaborations (LSC)

Subject: Science and tech

Context:

The LIGO Scientific and VIRGO Collaborations (LSC) have registered puzzling event where black hole merges with unusual compact object whose mass falls in between that of a typical black hole and a neutron star.

Concept:

LIGO

The LIGO Scientific Collaboration (LSC) is a group of scientists focused on the direct detection of gravitational waves, using them to explore the fundamental physics of gravity, and developing the emerging field of gravitational wave science as a tool of astronomical discovery.
The LSC works toward this goal through research on, and development of techniques for, gravitational wave detection; and the development, commissioning and exploitation of gravitational wave detectors.
The project operates three gravitational-wave (GW) detectors. Two are at Hanford, Washington, north-western US, and one is at Livingston in Louisiana, south-eastern US.
The proposed LIGO India project aims to move one advanced LIGO detector from Hanford to India.

VIRGO

Virgo is a giant laser interferometer designed to detect gravitational waves.
Virgo has been designed and built by a collaboration of the French Centre National de la RechercheScientifique (CNRS) and the Italian IstitutoNazionale di FisicaNucleare (INFN)
It is now operated and improved in Cascina, a small town near Pisa on the site of the European Gravitational Observatory (EGO), by an international collaboration of scientists from France, Italy, the Netherlands, Poland, and Hungary.

Working:

It consists of two 3-kilometre-long arms, which house the various machinery required to form a laser interferometer.
A beam-splitter divides a laser beam into two equal components, which are subsequently sent into the two interferometer arms.
In each arm, a two-mirror Fabry-Perot resonant cavity extends the optical length. This is because of multiple reflections that occur within each cavity and which consequently amplify the tiny distance variation caused by a gravitational wave.
The two beams of laser light that return from the two arms are recombined out of phase so that, in principle, no light reaches the so-called ‘dark fringe’ of the detector. Any variation caused by an alteration in the distance between the mirrors, produces a very small shift in phase between the beams and, thus, a variation of the intensity of the light, which is proportional to the wave’s amplitude.

Black hole

Black holes are imploded stars that keep its mass and gravity. The black holes are infinitely small with no real shape, and can suck in everything that is a certain distance away.
It exhibits strong gravitational effects, due to which, particles and electromagnetic radiation cannot escape from it.
It acts like an ideal black body reflecting no light. It continues to grow, by absorbing mass from its surroundings.

Black hole merger

Gravitational waves, postulated by Albert Einstein 100 years ago but discovered only in 2015 do not produce any sound on their own.
These are just ripples created in the fabric of space-time by moving celestial objects just like a moving boat produces ripples in water.
But when converted into audio signals, these can produce signature sounds that can reveal the origin of the gravitational waves.
The gravitational wave detected on September 14, 2015, is now known to have been produced by the merger of two black holes about 1.3 billion years ago.
Scientists already knew the kind of sound that gravitational waves emanating from such events were likely to produce.
As two such dense and massive objects, black holes or neutron stars, are about to merge, they start rotating around each other at almost the speed of light. The merger takes place within a fraction of a second.
The gravitational waves released in this last bit, when converted into audio signals, produce sound that is within audible range of human beings.

5. Tuberclosis

Subject: Science and tech

Context:

Though government is pushing to end TB by 2025, the COVID-19 pandemic has caused a massive disruption in TB services

Concept:

Tuberculosis (TB) is caused by bacteria Mycobacterium tuberculosis that most often affect the lungs.
Tuberculosis is curable and preventable.
TB is spread from person to person through the When people with lung TB cough, sneeze or spit, they propel the TB germs into the air.
About one-quarter of the world’s population has latent TB, which means people have been infected by TB bacteria but are not yet ill with the disease and cannot transmit the disease.
Persons with compromised immune systems, such as people living with HIV, malnutrition or diabetes, or people who use tobacco, have a higher risk of falling ill.

India and TB

India has the highest burden of both tuberculosis (TB) and multidrug-resistant (MDR) TB based on estimates reported in Global TB Report.

Schemes

Revised National TB Control Program

RNTCP uses the World Health Organisation (WHO) recommended Directly Observed Treatment Short Course (DOTS) strategy and reaches over a billion people in 632 districts/reporting units. The RNTCP is responsible for carrying out the Government of India five year TB National Strategic Plans.
With the RNTCP both diagnosis and treatment of TB are free.
The initial objectives of the RNTCP in India were: to achieve and maintain a TB treatment success rate of at least 85% among new sputum positive (NSP) patients and to achieve and maintain detection of at least 70% of the estimated new sputum positive people in the community.

2. Nikshay Poshan Yojana (NPY), a DBT scheme for nutritional support, was introduced in April 2018 by Ministry of Health and Family Welfare (MOHFW), Government of India under the Revised National TB Control Programme (RNTCP). It provides support worth Rs 500/- per month for the duration of treatment to TB patients.

3. National Strategic Plan (NSP) for Tuberculosis (2017-2025) with the goal of ending TB by 2025. The key focus areas are:

Early diagnosis of all the TB patients, prompt treatment with quality assured drugs and treatment regimens along with suitable patient support systems to promote adherence.
Engaging with the patients seeking care in the private sector.
Prevention strategies including active case finding and contact tracing in high risk / vulnerable population
Airborne infection control.
Multi-sectoral response for addressing social determinants.

6. Randomised control trial

Subject: Science and tech

Context:

PatanjaliAyurved claimed ‘Coronil’ and ‘Swasari’ would cure COVID-19 in only seven days and claimed that a randomised controlled trial (RCT) among COVID-19 positive patients had proved favourable results.

Concept:

A randomised controlled trial is an experiment that is designed to isolate the influence that a certain intervention or variable has on an outcome or event.
In medical field, it is a study in which people are allocated at random, entirely by chance, to receive one of several clinical interventions.
The intervention may be standard practice/treatment options, a placebo (a drug without an active substance, or a ‘sugar pill’), or no intervention at all.
The idea is to measure and compare the outcomes against the control after the participants receive the treatment.

7. Debt crisis of developing world in wake of corona

Subject: Economy

Context:

Nearly half of all low-income countries are living with high debt levels and have been since before the coronavirus crisis struck, according to estimates by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank.

Concept:

The health crisis, sharp downturn in activity, and turmoil in global financial markets caught emerging market and developing economies at a bad moment.

The past decade has seen the largest, fastest, and most broad-based increase in debt in these economies in the past 50 years.
Since 2010, their total debt rose by 60 percentage points of GDP to a historic peak of more than 170 percent of GDP in 2019

Before the current pandemic period, emerging market and developing economies experienced the following three waves of broad-based debt accumulation between 1970 and 2009:

1970–89: A combination of low real interest rates and a rapidly growing syndicated loan market through much of the 1970s encouraged governments in Latin America and low-income countries, especially in sub-Saharan Africa, to borrow heavily culminating in a series of financial crises in the early 1980s.
1990 – 2001: Financial and capital market liberalization enabled banks and businesses in east Asia and the Pacific and governments in Europe and central Asia to borrow heavily, particularly in foreign currencies ending with a series of crises during 1997–2001 once investor sentiment soured.
2002–09: A run-up in private sector borrowing in Europe and central Asia from EU-headquartered megabanks followed regulatory easing when the global financial crisis disrupted bank financing during 2007–09 and tipped several of these economies into recession.
The three historical waves of debt had several things in common.
They all began during periods of low real interest rates and were often facilitated by financial innovations or changes in financial markets that promoted borrowing.
The waves ended with widespread financial crises and coincided with global recessions (1982, 1991, 2009) or downturns (1998, 2001).
These crises were typically triggered by shocks that resulted in sharp increases in investor risk aversion, risk premiums, or borrowing costs, followed by sudden stops of capital inflows and deep recessions.
The financial crises were usually followed by reforms designed to lower vulnerabilities (including greater reserve accumulation) and strengthen policy frameworks.
Many emerging economies introduced inflation targeting, greater exchange rate flexibility, fiscal rules, or more robust financial sector supervision following financial crises.

8. Recovery Trials

Subject: Science and tech

Concept:

As part of the RECOVERY trial, a range of potential treatments is being tested in patients being admitted to the UK National Health Service (NHS) hospitals that are positive for COVID-19.
Sponsored by Oxford University in England, the trial is assessing the effectiveness of different potential COVID-19 treatments on their ability to reduce all-cause (overall) mortality within 28 days.
RECOVERY Trial is testing a handful of drugs in consenting patients:
Lopinavir-Ritonavir (commonly used to treat HIV)
Low-dose Dexamethasone (a corticosteroid medicine used to treat inflammation)
Hydroxychloroquine (an anti-malarial drug used to prevent and treat malaria in areas where malaria is sensitive to chloroquine)
Azithromycin (a commonly-used antibiotic)
Tocilizumab (an anti-inflammatory treatment given by injection)
Convalescent plasma (collected from donors who have recovered from COVID-19 and contains antibodies against the SARS-CoV-2 virus).

9. Pashmina

Subject:Economy/Geography

Context:

Due to the border tension, much-coveted Pashmina wool businesses has hit worth Rs 13-14 crore annually.

Concept:

The Changpa are a semi-nomadic people: they usually stay in one place for a few months in a row, near pastures where their sheep, yaks and Pashmina goats can graze
They are mainly found in the Changtang, a high plateau that stretches across the cold desert of Ladakh.
The process of migration from plain areas to pastures on mountains during summers and again from mountain pastures to plain areas during winters is known as transhumance.
The Pashmina goat is a breed of goat inhabiting the plateaus in Tibet, Nepal, parts of Burma and neighbouring areas of Ladakh in Jammu and Kashmir, India.
It is also known as ‘Changthangi’, ‘Changra”.
They are raised for ultra-fine cashmere wool, also known as pashmina once woven.
Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS) has published an Indian Standard for identification, marking and labelling of Pashmina products to certify its purity.
The certification will help curb the adulteration of Pashmina and also protect the interests of local artisans and nomads who are the producers of Pashmina raw material. It will also assure the purity of Pashmina for customers.

Additional information:

Chiru goat also known as the Tibetan antelope is a ‘near threatened’ species whose underfur isused for making the famous Shahtoosh shawls.

10. Sensitivity and specificity of test

Subject: Science and tech

Concept:

Sensitivity measures how often a test correctly generates a positive result for people who have the condition that’s being tested for (also known as the “true positive” rate). A test that’s highly sensitive will flag almost everyone who has the disease and not generate many false-negative results.
Specificity measures a test’s ability to correctly generate a negative result for people who don’t have the condition that’s being tested for (also known as the “true negative” rate). A high-specificity test will correctly rule out almost everyone who doesn’t have the disease and won’t generate many false-positive results.