EDITORIALS & ARTICLES
8th May 2021
Facebook Oversight Board
Recently, the Facebook Oversight Board has held that the platform had rightly restricted the former president of the United Sates from accessing his page and posting content on it after the Capitol Hill violence.
- Trump had access to his Facebook and Facebook-owned Instagram accounts cut off on January 7, a day after the deadly insurrection in Washington DC.
- Trump's accounts were suspended indefinitely after Facebook believed that the risks of allowing the President to continue to use our service during this period are simply too great.
Facebook Oversight Board
- The board is an independent, court-like entity for appealing content decisions on Facebook-owned platforms.
- It formally started deliberating in October 2020 and has also been called “Facebook’s Supreme Court”.
- It is made up of 20 experts in areas like free expression, human rights, and journalism.
- The content moderation decisions made by Facebook and Instagram can be appealed to the board once users have gone all the way through the company's internal review process.
- Facebook says that decisions made by the board are final.
- A decision made by the board will be binding and Facebook will implement it promptly, unless implementation of a resolution could violate the law.
- It is funded by a $130 million trust created by Facebook.
- Its goal is to review moderation decisions made by the company and decide whether they were made in accordance with its stated values.
Reasons provided by Facebook Oversight Board on restriction
- It said that the social media giant must review the matter to determine and justify proportionate response that is consistent with the rules that are applied to other users of its platform.
- The Board found that in maintaining an unfounded narrative of electoral fraud and persistent calls to action, the former US President has created an environment where a serious risk of violence was possible.
- It highlights that there was a clear, immediate risk of harm and his words of support for those involved in the riots legitimized their violent actions.
Non-Steroidal Anti-Inflammatory Drugs (NSAIDs)
Recently, a new observational study of more than 72,000 people in the UK published that the use of non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) does not lead to higher rates of death or severe disease in patients who are hospitalised with Covid-19.
- The International Severe Acute Respiratory and emerging Infection Consortium Clinical Characterisation Protocol United Kingdom study found evidence that the continued use of NSAIDs in patients with Covid-19 is safe.
- The study found that the proportion of death was similar regardless of whether patients had taken the drugs or not i.e. 30.4 percent for those who had and 31.3 percent for those who had not.
- In patients with rheumatological disease, the use of NSAIDs did not increase mortality.
- It also found that those who took NSAIDs were no more likely to be admitted to critical care, need invasive or non-invasive ventilation, or require oxygen.
Non-Steroidal Anti-Inflammatory Drugs (NSAIDs)
- Prostaglandins are a family of chemicals that are produced by the cells of the body and have several important functions.
- They promote inflammation that is necessary for healing, but also results in pain, and fever.
- The NSAIDs block the cyclooxygenase (COX) enzymes and reduce prostaglandins throughout the body.
- The NSAIDs are common treatments for acute pain and rheumatological diseasessuch as rheumatoid arthritis and osteoarthrosis.
- The NSAID family of anti-inflammatory drugs includes those widely used by the general public like ibuprofen, an active substance in common drugs, such as Nurofen or Advil or ketoprofen.
Working of NSAIDs
- They block the production of certain body chemicals that cause inflammation.
- They are good at treating pain caused by slow tissue damage, such as arthritis pain.
- They also work well fighting back pain, menstrual cramps and headaches.
- They work like corticosteroids (also called steroids), without many of the side effects of steroids.
Volcanic Eruption in Mount Sinabung
Recently, the Mount Sinabung has erupted again and belching a massive column of volcanic ash and smoke 3,000 metres (3 km) into the sky.
Mount Sinabung
- It is a Pleistocene-to-Holocene stratovolcano of andesite and dacite.
- It is located in the Karo plateau of Karo Regency, North Sumatra, Indonesia.
- It is located on the seismically active zone known as the "Ring of Fire" i.e. an arc of volcanoes and fault lines encircling the Pacific Ocean.
Why volcanic eruption is common in Indonesia?
- Indonesia is home to many active volcanoes due to its position on the “Ring of Fire” or the Circum-Pacific Belt.
- The Circum Pacific Belt is an area along the Pacific Ocean characterised by active volcanoes and frequent earthquakes.
- The Ring of Fire is home to about 75 per cent of the world’s volcanoes and about 90 per cent of its earthquakes.
- It is a horseshoe-shaped seismically active belt of earthquake epicentres, volcanoes, and tectonic plate boundaries that fringes the Pacific basin.
- It follows chains of island arcs such as Tonga and New Hebrides, the Indonesian archipelago, the Philippines, Japan, the Kuril Islands, and the Aleutians, as well as other arc-shaped geomorphic features, such as the western coast of North America and the Andes Mountains.
Reasons for Volcanic Eruption
- There are three types of volcanoes i.e. active, dormant or extinct.
- An eruption takes place when magma (a thick flowing substance), that is formed when the earth’s mantle melts, rises to the surface.
- As magma is lighter than rock, it is able to rise through vents and fissures on the surface of the earth.
- The molten magma is called Lava after eruption takes place.
- The explosiveness of volcano is dependent on the composition of magma which means:
- When the magma is runny and thin, gases can easily escape it and the magma will flow out towards the surface.
- If the magma is thick and dense and gases cannot escape it, it builds up pressure inside resulting in a violent explosion.
Unique ID for Persons with Disabilities
Recently, the Centre has made it mandatory for all States/UTs to grant certificate of disability through online mode only using UDID (Unique ID for Persons with Disabilities) portal with effect from June 1.
What does Central Government’s announcement on disability certificate mean?
- The sector had been demanding such a move, especially during the coronavirus crisis where people with disabilities were unable to get their certificates due to the prevalent restrictions.
- A disability certificate for people with disabilities is a necessity as they can avail the benefits of different government schemes by furnishing the document.
- The concerned authorities of all States/UTs have been imparted training by DEPwD for working on the UDID portal.
- The States/UTs have been given adequate time to convert to online mode which will ensure complete digitization of certification of disability from 1st June 2021.
What is Unique ID for Persons with Disabilities?
- The “Unique ID for Persons with Disabilities” project is being implemented with a view of creating a National Database for PwDs.
- The UDID project is under implementation since 2016..
- The project aims to issue a Unique Disability Identity Card to each person with disabilities.
- The project will encourage transparency, efficiency and ease of delivering the government benefits to the person with disabilities.
- The UDID card will be valid pan-India.
- The UDID portal shall be designed to provide an online platform for the following:
- New application for UDID
- Renewal of existing Certificate/Card on expiration of validity
- In the event of loss of card/certificate
Types of disabilities
- As per the Persons with Disabilities (Equal Opportunities, Protection of Rights & Full Participation) Act, 1995 A person with disability can be defined as one with one or more of disabilities falling under any of the below mentioned categories :
- Blindness: It refers to a condition where a person suffers from any of the following conditions namely:-
- Total absence of sight; or
- Visual acuity not exceeding 6/60 or 20/200 (Snellen) in the better eye with correcting lenses; or
- Limitation of the field of vision subtending an angle of 20 degree or worse;
- Cerebral Palsy: It means a group of non-progressive conditions of a person characterized by abnormal motor control posture resulting from brain insult or injuries occurring in the pre-natal, peri-natal or infant period of development;
- Low vision: It means a person with impairment of visual functioning even after treatment of standard refractive correction but who uses or is potentially capable of using vision for the planning or execution of a task with appropriate assistive device;
- Locomotor disability: It means disability of the bones, joints or muscles leading to substantial restriction of the movement of the limbs or nay form of cerebral palsy;
- Leprosy-cured: It means person who has been cured of leprosy but is suffering from:
- Loss of sensation in hands or feet as well as loss of sensation and paresis in the eye and eye-lid but with no manifests deformity;
- Manifest deformity and paresis but having sufficient mobility in their hands and feet to enable them to engage in normal economic activity;
- Extreme physical deformity as well as advanced age which prevent him from undertaking and gainful occupation and the expression "Leprosy Cured" shall be construed accordingly;
- Mental retardation: It means conditions of arrested or incomplete development of mind of a person which is specially characterized by sub normality of intelligence;
- Mental illness: It means any mental disorder other than Mental retardation
- Hearing Impairment: It means loss of sixty decibels or more in the better ear in the conversational range of frequencies.
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