Mefloquine mania

malaria seems to be India's growing nemesis. In Rajasthan, 3,000 documented deaths were attributed to malaria last year. However, Vikas Rampal of the Delhi-based Lok Nayak Jayaprakash Narain Hospital cynically remarked, "Three thousand means 30,000! There is an official apathy to admit that there is a rise in the incidence of malaria.' In such a situation, doctors and government officials are currently caught between the horns of a dilemma with respect to the emergence of a drug called mefloquine.

Malaria, of late, has become even more lethal due to its resistance to readily available medicines like chloroquine. Medicos are now looking up to the imported