Health in Malaysia
Leptospirosis is a water contract disease caused by bacteria of the genus Leptospirabacterial. It is a disease that affects both humans and animals. The number of leptospirosis cases had steadily increased from 2011 (2,268 cases with 55 death) to 2015 (8,291 cases with 78 death) and 5,284 cases with 52 death in 2016. Leptospirosis can have important health impact and is a burden to the nation if not well controlled. Addressing leptospisoris includes maintain a clean environment and by not swimming or wading in water that might be contaminated with animal urine, or eliminating contact with potentially infected animals.
Chandrima Shaha
Shaha's research programme is geared towards the understanding of cell death pathways and cellular defense processes in unicellular and multicellular organisms that have important bearing on designing of therapies for various diseases. Kala-azar, a neglected tropical disease remains a huge problem being endemic in certain parts of the country and is caused by the "Leishmania" parasite. Understanding of how parasite death occurs is important as successful killing of the parasite would reduce disease burden. The research demonstrated the ability of the "Leishmania" parasite to execute death phenotypes similar to metazoans and experimental evidence demonstrated the involvement of the single mitochondrion in apoptosis like death in one of the earliest eukaryotes. Host-parasite interaction studies show the involvement of Bcl-2 proteins in parasite survival. Other studies with cells having high division index like cancer cells and mammalian germ cells provides insight into the various pathways that are triggered by stress and their functional relevance in cell survival.