Owner Of Drug Rehab Center Faces 8 Years In Prison

The owner of an unlicensed drug rehab center that was engulfed by a deadly fire over the weekend could receive eight years in prison, according to newspaper El Comercio, citing lawyer Mario Amoretti.

Raul Garcia Albornoz, owner of the Christ is Love center in Lima’s lower-class San Juan de Lurigancho district, turned himself into police following the fire on Saturday.

Peru’s Public Ministry opened an investigation into the cause of the fire, which broke out when two patients set fire to mattresses in an attempt to escape. The fire Read more…

Report Finds Juntos Program Helps Decrease Malnutrition

A government-run program has helped decrease malnutrition in children younger than 5 years old by almost eight percentage points between 2008 and 2010, according to a study by the Central Bank and the research group Grade.

According to a press release from the program, known as Juntos, chronic malnutrition has declined from 22.9 percent in 2008 to 15 percent in 2010 among high-risk children who participate in the program.

The release said that for children not affiliated in the program, chronic Read more…

Poor Eating Habits Cost Peru $8 Billion Per Year – Official

Poor eating habits that lead to illnesses such as diabetes and high blood pressure cost Peru some $8 billion per year, the Health Ministry said on Wednesday

Deputy Health minister Enrique Jacoby said the figure could increase and may affect the country’s development. In recent days, government officials have talked about placing a tax on junk food in an attempt to promote healthier eating.

“This extremely high figure creates a dilemma for the state because if we don’t act, the expenditure is going to eat up our budget,” state news agency Andina reported Jacoby saying. Read more…

Peru, Brazil, Haiti Account for Half of Tuberculosis Cases in Region

Peru, Brazil and Haiti account for 50 percent of the cases of tuberculosis in Latin America, according to a report by the World Health Organization.

“Compared to other regions in the World, Latin America is a little better but that doesn’t mean that the battle has been won,” Spanish news agency EFE reported Rafael Lopez of the Pan-American Health Organization as saying.

While the situation in Latin America has improved, widespread inequality in the region has created “large areas of poverty where tuberculosis is very present,” said Lopez.

Lopez said that the inequality skews national statistics so that the problem of Read more…

Opposition Lawmakers Call for Minister to Explain Children’s Deaths

Opposition lawmakers from Peru’s Fuerza 2011 party have presented a motion calling for the minister of Social Development and Women, Aida Garcia-Naranjo, to answer questions related to the deaths of three children earlier this month due to poisoning in a national food program.

Fuerza 2011, which supports jailed ex-President Alberto Fujimori, said it collected signatures from the Alianza por el Gran Cambio and Concertacion Parlamentaria parties as well, daily El Comercio reported.

“There are dead Peruvian children and there has to be someone politically responsible, and in this case it is the minister,” said the president of the congressional health committee and member of Fuerza 2011 for Cajamarca, Segundo Tapia.

Peru’s attorney general said this week that the children were poisoned by Read more…

Five fatalities in small plane crash in Peruvian jungle

Five people died when a small police plane in Peru’s eastern Ucayali department crashed, local media reported on Friday.

The crash was caused by mechanical failures late Thursday after the plane took off from the airport in Iparia, in the province of Coronel Portillo, on route to Pucallpa, the capital of Ucayali, daily El Comercio said. Read more…

Puno official says 27 children have died from cold

The regional health office in Southern Peru’s Puno region has reported that 27 children under the age of five  have died in recent weeks in the department from respiratory infections due to a sharp drop in temperature.

Children in Puno are one of the most vulnerable groups to the cold that hits the region during Peru’s winter. Numerous children regularly die every year as residents lack proper shelter to be protected from the cold, and children are more susceptible to bronchopulmonary diseases because their systems are weakened by cooking smoke within their homes. Read more…

Fujimori fit to return to prison, tongue growth not life-threatening

A pre-cancerous growth on ex-President Alberto Fujimori’s tongue is not terminal and he can return to his prison cell, according to Pedro Sanchez, a doctor at Lima’s oncology hospital INEN.

“He suffers from cancer in the buccal cavity, but doesn’t require hospitalization,” daily La Republica reported Sanchez as saying.

Fujimori, 72, was admitted to INEN last week to examine a precancerous growth on his tongue, on which he had surgery last year.

Doctors also conducted tests to determine if his weight loss is related to the growth on his tongue. Fujimori has recently lost 15kg (33 pounds). Read more…

Ex-President Fujimori undergoes medical tests on weight loss

Imprisoned ex-President Alberto Fujimori is undergoing medical exams to determine his weight loss, daily El Comercio reported.

Fujimori, 72, was admitted to Lima’s oncology hospital INEN to examine a precancerous growth on his tongue, on which he had surgery last year. Read more…

Ministries team up to launch projects for communities in voluntary isolation

Peru’s Culture and Health ministries are coordinating a joint campaign aimed at providing services to indigenous communities that are in voluntary isolation, state news agency Andina reported.

The ministries will invest $1.8 million on projects, such as vaccination campaigns, in Cuzco’s lower Urubamba region, Culture Minister Juan Ossio said. The funds are being provided by the Argentine oil company Pluspetrol. Read more…

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