In a compelling address that blended scientific rigor with urgent advocacy, Dr. Soumya Swaminathan delivered a stark warning about the converging planetary crises threatening human health, while outlining actionable solutions that could transform India’s response to climate change and air pollution, Rashmi Kumari of Neo Science Hub Reports.
Speaking at the 13th Dr. Manohar V.N. Shirodkar Memorial Lecture organized by the Telangana Academy of Sciences on January 7, 2026, Dr Soumya Swaminathan, the former Chief Scientist of the World Health Organization and current Chair of the MS Swaminathan Research Foundation, emphasized that climate change is not a distant threat but a present-day emergency disproportionately affecting vulnerable populations.
A Legacy of Scientific Excellence
The event, held at the PM Bhargava Auditorium at the Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology (CCMB), brought together distinguished scientists, including several in their nineties, alongside young researchers—a testament to the enduring relevance of the lecture series established through the generous endowment of Smt. Rajakumari Indira Devi Dhanrajgir.
In his presidential remarks, Professor Ch. Mohan Rao, President of the Telangana Academy of Sciences and former Director of CCMB, contextualized Dr. Swaminathan’s credentials within her remarkable lineage. “Obviously, you can see the trait of both parental influence has made her what she is today, a dedicated medical researcher, and fights for equitable access to health care all the time,” he noted, referencing her father M.S. Swaminathan, the globally recognized geneticist and father of India’s Green Revolution, and her mother Meena Swaminathan, an influential social worker dedicated to pre-school education for underprivileged communities.
Professor Rao highlighted Dr. Swaminathan’s pioneering role at the WHO, noting that as an international organization typically led by Europeans, her election as Deputy Director General and appointment as the first Chief Scientist represented a significant milestone. During the COVID-19 pandemic, her leadership in data analysis and policy guidance proved crucial when “information overload was very, very high, and it was confusing,” he recalled, emphasizing how laboratories were “connecting their sequencing machine to the press” and creating chaos that required “sensible analysis of data.”
Honouring Dr. M.V.N. Shirodkar’s Legacy
Dr. B. Sesikeran, former Director of the National Institute of Nutrition, introduced the audience to the distinguished scientist in whose memory the lecture series was established. Dr. Manohar V.N. Shirodkar (1927-2012) was a pioneering virologist born in Mumbai to Dr. V.N. Shirodkar, a famous obstetrician-gynecologist remembered in medical circles for groundbreaking contributions to his field.
An exceptional student from his earliest years, Dr. Shirodkar placed first in his school and second in the Mumbai presidency in senior Cambridge examinations in 1944. After graduating in biology from Vidyanath Akhil University—which awarded him a 50-year medallion in 2001—he earned his medical degree from GS Medical College and later a coveted doctorate in virology from Johns Hopkins University in 1973.
Dr. Shirodkar’s career included heading the Department of Virology at the century-old Hopkins Institute following a government invitation, serving as Emeritus Medical Scientist with the Indian Council of Medical Research from 1966 to 1988, and working at the National Institute of Virology in Pune. His major contributions included discovering anti-viral and anti-cancer biologicals presented as plasma factors, developing a novel model for Hepatitis B virus using monkey lungs, and training numerous MSc, MD, and PhD students who now hold responsible positions in India and the United States.
In 1983, Dr. Shirodkar was elected President of the Association of Microbiologists of India and served as trustee of the Dr. V.N. Shirodkar Memorial Research Foundation in Mumbai, which works on clinical aspects of female cancer and indigenously discovered biologicals. Since his passing in 2012, the Telangana Academy of Sciences has conducted this memorial lecture annually without fail, attracting speakers including Nobel laureates, Fellows of the Royal Society, and eminent scientists from around the world.
Professor Rao acknowledged the lecture series’ remarkable roster of past speakers: Sir Richard Roberts, Nobel Prize winner for discovering restriction enzymes; Dr. Pawan Sinha from MIT’s Brain and Cognitive Science department; Dr. Emmanuelle Charpentier, co-inventor of CRISPR-Cas9; Dr. Krishna Ella of Bharat Biotech; and Dr. Sharath Bhatt, who during the COVID period lectured on vaccine development. The previous year’s lecture was delivered by Dr. Nageshwar Reddy on artificial intelligence in healthcare.
This distinguished platform became possible through the vision of Rajkumari Indira Devi Dhanrajgir, eldest daughter of Raja Dhanrajgir Bahadur and Rani Vijay Rajyam, and wife of legendary poet Shri Guntur Sheshendra Sharma—referred to as “Yuga Kavi” (poet of the era), recipient of the Sahitya Akademi Award, and author of the epic “Naa Desa Naa Prajalu” (My Country, My People). A multi-talented individual herself, Smt. Dhanrajgir writes in English, Urdu, and Hindi, with works including paintings exhibited on television and a poem published in the University of Wisconsin magazine. Her published works include “Memoirs of Durkan” and “Return of Eternity,” along with an autobiographical book in Urdu.
Professor Rao also announced several recent honors for Academy fellows: Dr. Prakash Kumar, Director of NGRI, elected Fellow of the Geological Academy of Sciences; Dr. Mahipal Reddy and Dr. Ramachari elected Fellows of the Indian National Science Academy (INSA); and Dr. Yusuf Murthy elected Fellow of the Indian National Academy of Engineering.
Three Intersecting Planetary Crises
Dr. Soumya Swaminathan, in her speech, identified three interconnected global emergencies: climate change driven by anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions, air pollution that claims millions of lives annually, and accelerating biodiversity loss occurring at rates a thousand times greater than historical baselines.
Professor Rao framed the technical distinction between weather and climate in his opening remarks: “Climate technical definition—all parameters, average of 30 years, should be taken as a climate. For example, temperature, rainfall, wind, humidity. All these parameters, over a period of 30 years, will make something called climate.” He emphasized that rising temperatures would melt snow caps, increase sea levels, and flood coastal areas—”the ones which are fertile areas, the ones which are feeding us”—necessitating research into submergence-tolerant crops.
The scale of displacement is staggering—21 million people are forced from their homes by climate change each year, a figure projected to rise dramatically. Meanwhile, approximately 80% of the world’s coral reefs have already died due to ocean warming, threatening entire marine ecosystems.
In India, Down to Earth’s analysis revealed that almost every day in 2025, some climatic hazard—whether flood, cyclone, landslide, or extreme heat event—occurred somewhere in the country. Dr. Swaminathan noted that carbon budgets are being exhausted earlier each year; in 2024, the global annual quota was consumed by August, demonstrating how humanity is “completely over-consuming and over-emitting.”
Heat: The Silent Killer
One of the lecture’s most striking revelations concerned the physiological impact of heat stress. Drawing on research from heat laboratories, Dr. Swaminathan described how a 30-year-old woman running on a treadmill saw her heart rate spike from 120 to 160 beats per minute when temperature and humidity were increased—with no other variables changed.
“Imagine a construction worker or a rickshaw puller or anybody who’s doing physical labor in the heat, or a soldier or a policeman—what stress the heart is under,” she said, illustrating the cardiovascular strain faced by India’s outdoor workforce.
Heat impacts practically every bodily system. The cardiovascular system bears the brunt as the heart works harder to cool the body, particularly dangerous for those with pre-existing conditions. Prolonged UV exposure damages skin, while heat exacerbates mental health disorders like schizophrenia. Rising nighttime temperatures disturb sleep, preventing the body from resetting to baseline. Heat increases inflammation, impairs immune function, and progresses from heat exhaustion—characterized by heavy sweating and rapid heart rate—through dehydration to potentially fatal heat stroke.
Heat-related mortality has reached over 550,000 deaths annually worldwide, though Dr. Swaminathan noted this is likely an underestimate as many countries don’t record heat as a cause of death. In India, numerous districts face high heat risk, with concerning increases in both daytime temperatures and warm nights—the latter being particularly dangerous as bodies cannot reset during sleep.
Urban residents face additional challenges through the heat island effect, with city centers experiencing temperatures 5-10 degrees Celsius higher than surrounding areas due to cement, glass, and insufficient greenery. Research in Thane district revealed that people living under metal roofs in informal settlements experienced indoor temperatures 5-6 degrees higher than outside—making the standard advice to “stay indoors during heat waves” potentially counterproductive for vulnerable populations.
The economic toll is equally severe. Heat waves and droughts cause at least 3-4% increases in food insecurity, with losses to GDP running into trillions of dollars globally across agriculture, construction, services, and manufacturing. Climate modeling suggests grain yields could reduce significantly due to unpredictable weather patterns, wheat production may decline, and rising carbon dioxide is decreasing the nutritional content of food crops—compounded by soil degradation from monoculture and overuse of chemical pesticides and fertilizers.
Air Pollution: India’s Invisible Emergency
Dr. Swaminathan characterized air pollution as “the single largest environmental threat to human health worldwide,” responsible for approximately 8 million premature deaths annually, including 2 million in India alone. In North India, air pollution may be shortening life expectancy by five to six years, compared to two years globally.
The lecture highlighted that at least one-third of the global population remains exposed to dangerous levels of household air pollution, primarily women cooking with biomass fuels like wood, animal dung, crop waste, and coal. Despite the success of the Ujjwala scheme in providing LPG connections to nearly every Indian household, approximately 30% of families cannot afford regular cylinder refills—a “low-hanging fruit” that could immediately reduce ambient air pollution if addressed through subsidies. Household biomass burning contributes roughly 30% of outdoor air pollution, a figure that could be eliminated if refills were affordable.
Particulate matter smaller than 2.5 microns (PM 2.5) poses particular danger, penetrating deep into lungs and entering the bloodstream to affect multiple organ systems, including the heart and neurological system. Studies now link air pollution to accelerated dementia, diabetes, strokes, and heart attacks. When combined with high temperatures, the health risks multiply—research from Los Angeles showed excess death risk increased threefold on days with both elevated heat and air pollution, a combination many Indian cities and regions now regularly experience.
Dr. Swaminathan emphasized that India has not paid adequate attention to environmental risk factors: “We think a lot about infectious diseases, but we don’t think enough about water, about air, and about water quality, heavy metals, for example, in the soil, exposure to lead.”
Research from the Translational Health Science and Technology Institute (THSTI) in Faridabad, through their pregnancy cohort called “Garbhini,” documented relationships between ambient PM 2.5 and adverse outcomes including preterm birth and fetal growth restrictions—contributing to India’s existing problems with low birth weight, stunting, and malnutrition.
Gender Disparities and Climate Vulnerability
Perhaps the lecture’s most sobering findings came from Dr. Swaminathan’s own research at the MS Swaminathan Research Foundation, which revealed how climate stress disproportionately affects women and children. A 2024 scoping study examined impacts across India’s 20 agro-ecological zones—which cross state borders, demonstrating that climate responses cannot be confined to state-level policies.
Analysis of National Family Health Survey (NFHS) data from rounds four and five, overlaid with districts experiencing prolonged drought, recurrent floods, or cyclones over the past decade, showed clear and statistically significant correlations. In climate-stressed districts, rates of intimate partner violence, child marriage (girls under 18), teenage pregnancies, and women dropping out of antenatal care all increased substantially.
“The most surprising thing but also the most worrying was increase in intimate partner violence or domestic violence,” Dr. Swaminathan stated. The research found increased gender-based violence was directly correlated with districts exposed to climatic stress.
A 2025 study across seven states, conducted with the International Institute of Population Studies, constructed a Heat Vulnerability Index incorporating not just temperature hazards but exposure and socioeconomic vulnerability factors. The findings were stark:
- Anemia prevalence was higher in high-vulnerability districts
- Underweight prevalence in children and women increased
- Antenatal care coverage decreased
- Usage of sanitary napkins was lower
- Hysterectomy rates in the poorest wealth quintiles were double in high-vulnerability districts compared to low-vulnerability areas—25% versus 12%
Dr. Swaminathan noted with concern: “You can imagine that women are resorting to hysterectomies because of whatever stress they’re under, they’re not able to find other solutions.”
Of 3,000 women interviewed, 18% reported experiencing domestic violence, with half stating it worsened during summer months. Women reported significant income losses due to inability to work in extreme heat (“they just can’t go to work, it’s so hot all the time”), with conditions worse for women in Scheduled Caste communities. They also reported increased anxiety, irritability, sleep disturbances, and negative impacts on family relationships, with heat affecting interpersonal dynamics.
Yet health systems remain woefully unprepared. Many women did not seek care or even recognize heat-related illnesses. Twelve percent relied on pharmacists, six percent used home remedies. Frontline workers—ASHAs, Anganwadi workers, and Auxiliary Nurse Midwives—lacked training and protocols to identify heat-related illnesses. Facilities often missing basic infrastructure: air conditioning, cooling spaces, water stations, and informational materials.
Dr. Swaminathan emphasized that despite disproportionate impacts, women must be central to climate action: “We need everyone on board, and particularly because women are often the people who are managing the household resources, responsible for the food, responsible for taking care of children and education.” Research by economists shows cash transfers to women more effectively improve family situations than transfers to men. Women serve as first responders, developing solutions and sometimes organizing collectively to address climate challenges. “Investing in gender equality and women’s empowerment does have far-reaching benefits,” she concluded.
Solutions Exist—But Require Political Will
Despite the dire statistics, Dr. Swaminathan’s message was ultimately one of possibility. She pointed to successful interventions worldwide and outlined comprehensive solutions across multiple sectors, emphasizing: “There is absolutely no doubt that science and technology can solve the problems that we face today as a globe. If at all anything can solve it, it is only science that can find solutions.”
China’s experience demonstrates what’s achievable—after launching a major air quality initiative in 2013 with extensive monitoring and coordinated interventions, Beijing and other cities achieved dramatic improvements within years. Similarly, London’s ultra-low emission zones led to immediate reductions in hospital admissions for heart attacks following PM 2.5 decreases, demonstrating that “you don’t even have to wait for many years. It has an immediate impact.”
Dr. Swaminathan called for a national clean air mission that is “science-led and data-driven,” adopting an “airshed approach” that recognizes air pollution transcends political boundaries. “The entire Indo-Gangetic plain is one airshed and so you can’t have a solution for any one city or even one state.” Coordinated action is required across states and even neighboring countries like Nepal and Pakistan, which share the same air quality challenges.
She serves on the global commission “Our Common Air,” which works to mobilize public and political action on air pollution. “It is absolutely possible to achieve acceptable air quality in five years if we launched a mission like that,” she asserted, noting that while WHO guidelines recommend PM 2.5 levels below 5 micrograms per cubic meter—a standard few places globally meet—interim standards of 30, 35, or 50 would still yield immediate reductions in all-cause mortality.
Key Interventions Across Sectors
Energy and Transport: Accelerating India’s transition to renewable energy while transforming transport systems through expanded metro networks, large electric bus fleets, and improved last-mile connectivity. While India has exceeded renewable energy capacity targets ahead of schedule, fossil fuels still dominate overall energy production. Transportation accounts for roughly 40% of urban emissions.
Dr. Swaminathan praised Hyderabad’s metro construction but emphasized it’s insufficient alone: “You’re going to need a very large fleet of electric buses, as well as smaller vehicles which can provide that last mile connection.” Public transport must become so convenient and affordable that “whether you’re rich or you’re poor, you still prefer to use public transport because you can get from place A to place B much more rapidly than if you were in your own car. So we have to get the cars off the road.”
Cities like London demonstrate effectiveness of ultra-low emission zones requiring payment to drive in central areas, combined with excellent public transit alternatives. “The two have to go hand in hand,” she noted, adding that using public transport naturally increases walking, providing health co-benefits.
Waste Management: Ending unsegregated dumping in landfills that creates toxic chemical mixtures leaching into soil and water, and stopping waste burning that releases toxic gases. “If we started managing our waste better, it would be a huge win-win… It’s not just a question of it looks nice, but it’s really a question of our health.”
Sustainable Agriculture: Moving beyond stubble burning through reviving traditional practices and supporting natural or regenerative agriculture that restores soil microbiomes depleted by monoculture and chemical overuse. “Farmers never used to burn their stubble in the past. It’s a recent phenomenon because of the cycles that we have for sowing and harvesting have got shrunk.” Solutions exist but require implementation alongside curbing forest fires.
Dr. Swaminathan emphasized the importance of traditional knowledge about nitrogen fixation through legumes and pulses, intercropping, and natural soil regeneration, while acknowledging emerging CRISPR-based research attempting to introduce nitrogen-fixing properties into crops like rice—though still at early stages.
Building Design: Implementing climate-resilient building codes and rediscovering traditional materials suited to Indian climates. “When you see Hyderabad, the way that buildings are being constructed, I don’t think that the builders are necessarily thinking about making them climate resilient or less sensitive to heat impacts in the future,” she observed critically. “We use only concrete, steel, and glass now, which are totally unsuited for the kind of weather and climate that we have in India,” while cement and steel are the greatest contributors to emissions.
Clean and Affordable Fuels: Making LPG refills affordable for the 30% of households with Ujjwala connections who cannot afford regular refills would immediately eliminate a major pollution source. “This is not well recognized or appreciated… it is a huge contributor to the ambient air pollution.”
Healthcare System Adaptation: Comprehensive reforms required across multiple dimensions:
- Establishing cooling rooms in health facilities, with Dr. Swaminathan citing an Ahmedabad example where simply moving the maternal and neonatal ward from the top floor to ground floor reduced heat-related illness and death among newborns
- Redesigning clinical care protocols for heat illness, including development of cooling jackets and wearables to protect workers and rapidly cool heat stroke victims
- Modifying labor codes to mandate rest breaks, access to cool water, shade, and restrooms for outdoor workers, with medical attention available
- Integrating heat resilience across all national health programs, from maternal health to tuberculosis care
- Creating climate-proof blueprints for new facilities and retrofitting existing ones
- Prioritizing equity in interventions through community cooling centers and cool rooms, particularly for low-income housing, as demonstrated by SEWA and Mahila Housing Trust in Gujarat and Rajasthan
Dr. Swaminathan called for hackathons, innovation challenges, and startup support to develop cooling solutions: “How do you actually keep your core temperature cool? There are things like jackets and things like that, wearable, which will cool you down, or which will protect workers.”
Strengthening Primary Care: Expanding the Ayushman Bharat program and Health and Wellness Centers while adapting them for climate realities: “This district is heat-prone and it’s going to get worse. So how do we establish cooling rooms? How do we redesign clinical care?”
The Critical Role of Science Communication
Throughout her address, Dr. Swaminathan emphasized science communication as fundamental to addressing climate challenges, particularly relevant given Hyderabad’s concentration of scientific institutions. She urged young scientists to develop skills in translating complex research for general audiences, noting the growing distrust in science actively promoted by anti-science movements.
“Scientists often talk in jargon. We learn how to write scientific papers and publish them in peer-reviewed journals because that’s how we are judged by our peers,” she explained. “But I take inspiration from Dr. Balu,” referencing a science communicator who writes in The Hindu, “taking the latest advances from Nature or Science or Lancet and breaking it down so that it makes it so relevant for every reader, every lay reader.”
Drawing lessons from the COVID-19 pandemic, when evolving scientific understanding was misinterpreted as inconsistency, she stressed: “The general public needs to know how science is done, that science evolves.” During regular pandemic press conferences, people would say, “Last week you said this, and now you’ve changed your mind. That means you’re a useless scientist, or you don’t know, or you’re lying.”
She explained that rapid changes during COVID—new variants behaving differently, evolving understanding of immunology, transmission mechanisms, and emerging tools—necessitated updated communication. “That sometimes is interpreted as, you don’t know what you’re talking about. So one is that science must and will continue to evolve and change. But that doesn’t mean that we have what ultimately solves us.”
Dr. Swaminathan drew parallels between COVID and climate change: “Both of them, whether it’s a viral pandemic or whether it’s climate change, they don’t respect any kind of borders.” Both require global solutions, collaboration, solidarity, and sharing of scientific knowledge—”the best way to also build relationships between people who may otherwise disagree on political issues.”
She recalled how during COVID, scientists dropped usual barriers: “Scientists love to hoard data. Nobody wants to part with the data they’ve collected because at some point in the future, they’re going to use it. That future may never come. And so that data is actually wasted. One thing that happened during COVID is everybody started sharing their data at the very moment that they collected it.”
At WHO, she experienced communication with thousands of scientists worldwide—doctors, clinicians, epidemiologists, immunologists, virologists, vaccine manufacturers—starting with Chinese doctors treating the first Wuhan patients when nothing was known about COVID. “They were the ones who were telling us what were the clinical trials and how they were treating the patients, and what they were responding to.”
She emphasized: “If the solutions are not shared, and that too shared equitably, then I think the world is not going to benefit from science. And so this is why we often used to use science, solutions, and solidarity. These three words we used to repeat during the pandemic, because you don’t need only the science and the solution, but you need the solidarity.”
Professor Rao reinforced this theme, noting that during COVID’s “information overload,” laboratories were connecting sequencing machines directly to press outlets, creating confusion that required the kind of sensible data analysis and policy guidance Dr. Swaminathan provided at WHO.
A Call for Interdisciplinary Action
Dr. Swaminathan concluded by emphasizing that climate change and air pollution represent contemporary challenges requiring India to take a leadership role given its large affected population. Solutions demand interdisciplinary collaboration—connecting data from meteorology, agriculture, soil science, human health, and other fields.
“These challenges require a lot more data. They require interdisciplinary work. They require different people from different disciplines to come together to find solutions,” she stated. “The solutions are not easy. You can’t find a drug or a vaccine to deal with it. So there are definitely much more complex problems requiring complex solutions, but things which are relevant and contextual for us.”
She noted particular opportunities for innovation and using new tools—”the omics tools, for example, to also better understand what is happening in our different populations and accordingly to then find the appropriate solutions.”
Professor Rao echoed this call, highlighting emerging research needs: submergence-tolerant crops for flooded agricultural areas, understanding how temperature increases affect plant and animal growth, and preparing for rising bacterial infectious diseases due to increased humidity, breathing-related issues, and non-communicable diseases “likely to increase several fold,” plus food security problems. “Knowing exactly what is the problem, knowing the quantum of the problem, and getting ready for that would make us survive,” he concluded.
The lecture emphasized equity throughout, recognizing that marginalized populations—whether due to biological vulnerability (elderly, young children, pregnant women, those with underlying diseases) or socioeconomic factors (lacking protective resources)—bear disproportionate impacts. “Every 10 microgram reduction in PM 2.5” yields immediate healthcare savings, productivity gains, increased tourism, and private sector opportunities in clean energy, buses, and industrial equipment, Dr. Swaminathan noted. “Most of all, we protect our vulnerable populations.”
She acknowledged global debates on climate justice: “Historically the developed countries have emitted much more CO2 than developing countries. So there is at the global level a very big debate on equity and justice. The fact that poorer countries still need their carbon budget to be able to grow and develop, because more and more energy consumption means more CO2 emissions”—though this will reduce as renewable energy scales up.
The lecture called for increased research investments, particularly interdisciplinary work connecting environmental, agricultural, and health data to identify emerging patterns and solutions. As Professor Rao noted in announcing recent Academy honors—including fellows elected to INSA, the Indian National Academy of Engineering, and the Geological Academy of Sciences—India’s scientific community continues producing world-class researchers who must now tackle these urgent challenges.
Conclusion
As India faces the compounding health impacts of rising temperatures and deteriorating air quality, Dr. Swaminathan’s message at this distinguished memorial lecture was unequivocal: comprehensive, science-based action is both urgently needed and entirely achievable—if matched with sufficient political will, investment, and coordination.
The choice of climate and health as the 13th Shirodkar Memorial Lecture topic reflects the Academy’s commitment to addressing contemporary challenges through scientific excellence. As Professor Rao stated in his opening remarks, this series has consistently attracted the world’s leading scientists—Nobel laureates, Royal Society Fellows, pioneering technologists—to share cutting-edge knowledge with India’s scientific community.
The lecture honored Dr. M.V.N. Shirodkar’s legacy of rigorous virology research and dedication to public health, while Smt. Rajakumari Indira Devi Dhanrajgir’s endowment ensures these critical scientific dialogues continue annually. In an era of growing anti-science sentiment and misinformation, such forums become ever more vital for translating scientific evidence into policy action and public understanding.
Dr. Swaminathan’s closing words resonated with both urgency and possibility: “This is a contemporary challenge for us, not just for India, but for the world. But the solutions, I think we will have to take a lead on, because we have a very large population that’s impacted by climate change and which is going to require our efforts.”
With 550,000 annual heat-related deaths globally, 8 million premature deaths from air pollution, 21 million climate refugees yearly, and India bearing disproportionate burdens, the scientific evidence demands immediate action. Yet as Dr. Swaminathan demonstrated through examples from China, London, Ahmedabad, and communities across India, effective solutions exist and deliver measurable results within years—not decades. The question is no longer whether science can solve these interconnected crises, but whether political will, public understanding, and coordinated action can match the scale and urgency the science demands.
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