India is home to the most significant number of tuberculosis (TB) cases around the globe. The COVID-19 crisis has deeply perturbed most of the essential TB services in India. Regulating TB is difficult in a densely populated country like India due to latent TB infection in millions of Indians, which can reactivate at any point in the future. Due to the ongoing pandemic, healthcare workers have been diverted to activities implemented for effective COVID-19 management, leaving a meager workforce to help deal with TB management. Integrating TB and COVID-19 to augment India’s health outreach is the need of the hour to diminish the effect of the COVID-19 crisis on TB. Increasing overall testing capacity, active screening, implementation of strategies for easy identification of TB hotspots, and ensuring uninterrupted drug supply for treatment through heedful planning of local and regional distribution and transportation will especially help cater to the vulnerable population who are at a high risk of suffering from adverse outcomes of TB. Lessons learnt in the battle against COVID-19 can most definitely help in providing insights to fulfill the goal of eliminating TB from India.

Community engagement has emerged as a critical component in the effective control and elimination of neglected tropical diseases (NTDs), particularly in regions with persistent stigma and limited healthcare access. Drawing on case studies from Brazil, India, and Nigeria, this opinion piece explores how community-driven initiatives have successfully improved leprosy awareness, reduced stigma, and fostered early case detection and treatment adherence. The importance of culturally sensitive, inclusive approaches in health education and stigma reduction campaigns is highlighted, emphasizing the potential for community engagement to enhance national leprosy programs and contribute to the World Health Organization’s Zero Leprosy Strategy. By examining these examples, this article illustrates how integrating community participation into leprosy control and elimination programs can drive sustainable outcomes for achieving Zero Leprosy, even in resource-limited settings.

The present article aims to describe the status quo of the atmospheric air quality in Bishkek and the state measures taken to improve it and to give the perspective of research and policy development. Air pollution is one of the major environmental risks for premature death from respiratory diseases, cancer, strokes, heart attacks, diabetes, and other diseases. It exerts a negative effect on worker productivity and mental health. In the last 30 years, Bishkek, the capital of the Kyrgyz Republic, has turned from one of the cleanest and greenest cities in the former Soviet Union to one of the most polluted cities in the world. The roots of that transformation lie in the negative socio‐economic changes taking place in the country, including the population doubling of Bishkek mainly due to internal migration, uncontrolled construction of houses without relevant infrastructure, worsening socio‐economic conditions, increased number of used vehicles, and low quality of gasoline. The main sources of air pollution in Bishkek are domestic heating and vehicle exhaust fumes. During the winter, air pollution is aggravated by frequent temperature inversion and air stagnation due to air trapping by high‐rise buildings. The state's approaches and measures to address this issue are reflected in its laws and policies. The city and national government have taken a range of strategic measures to transform Bishkek into a green city with a favourable environment. Recommendations on research and policy development are provided in this perspective.

Suicide represents a significant global public health issue, accounting for 70% of all fatalities among women caused by intentional harm and ranking as the third leading cause of death worldwide among females aged 15-29 [1]. Especially, in SouthEast Asia suicide is one of the leading causes of death among women, accounting for almost half of all female suicides worldwide. The SouthEast Asia Region (SEAR) has a much higher female age-standardized suicide rate (11.5 per 100 000) compared to the global female average (7.5 per 100 000) [2]. The WHO SouthEast Asia Region experiences a disproportionate number of suicides among young women, reflecting a troubling mix of socioeconomic, cultural, patriarchal and psychological factors [3]. While mental health is often the focus of global suicide prevention strategies, for SouthEast Asian women, gender-based stressors-such as domestic violence, forced marriage, and economic dependency-play a much more prominent role [4].