Two separate sessions today were dedicated to skin allergies and rheumatoid arthritis. Atopic dermatitis and urticaria were discussed by Dr Bhushan Kumar, Dr Sanjeev Handa and Dr Lata Kumar and Dr Pradeep Bambery of PGI. Dr Ajay Wanchu conducted the session on rheumatoid arthritis.

Dr Adam Finn, Pediatric Immunologist from the University of Sheffield, UK, gave a lecture on primary immunodeficiency disorders. He also delivered a talk on "Mucosal immune responses to vaccines".

Talking to Newsline, Dr Finn said UK is the first country in the world where all babies under 16 will be administered meningococcus vaccine under a national programme.

Talking about immunodeficiency in children, he said: "Children are more prone to diseases and infections because of poor immune system. This is generally inherited and is a genetic disorder. The corrective measures include regular antibiotic drugs, which is cheap and convenient, and antibodies replacement, which is expensive and risky and bone marrow transplantation, which is extremely expensive and the success rate is only 60 per cent."

Explaining this technique, Dr Finn said the bone marrow is replaced in such patients from other healthy people with a strong immune system. A 90-minute symposium on "Aerobiology" was organised where scientists gave an update on their ongoing research work. A symposium on HIV was also organised. The session was chaired by Dr Shobha Sehgal and Dr Bhushan Kumar and the speakers included Dr Clemente Fernandes, Dr Shashi Kant and Dr Subhash Salunke. The topics discussed included - management of mother to child transmission of HIV, role of HIV vaccine and treatment of HIV associated opportunistic infections.