Dr. Kesavan Rajasekharan Nayar MCH, PhD

Professor and Principal-GIPH

A renowned public health researcher with decades of teaching and research experience, Dr KR Nayarhas more than 70 publications and four books to his credit. He was the DAAD-INNOVOTEC Professor at the Institute of Tropical medicine and hygiene, Heidelberg University Germany. He served the Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi as Professor for many years before he joined Global Institute of Public Health as Professor and Head. He has produced more than 25 PhDs.His areas of interest are Social Determinants of health, Health Policy, Research Methodology and Environmental Health.

Contact Address:

Dr. Kesavan Rajasekharan Nayar
Professor and Head - GIPH
Global Institute of Public Health, Ananthapuri Hospitals,
Trivandrum 695 024, Kerala, India Tel: +91 - 471 - 257 99 00
Fax: +91 - 471 - 250 69 69
Mob: +91- 9633 371 014
Email: krnayar@gmail.com

 

Core Areas

Social Determinants of health; Research Methodology; Environmental Health

 

Books

Journal Papers And Monographs

Pilakkadavath, Zarin I.; Rao, Arathi P.; Nayar, K. Rajasekharan, Raman Kumar and Shaffi F Koya. (2021). India needs a resilient cancer program. Journal of Family Medicine and Primary Care. 10(8):2735-2738

Arathi P Rao , Hitesh Shah, Manisha Gore, Kesavan Rajasekharan Nayar, Bindhya Vijayan (2021). Perspectives of caregivers on pubertal changes among adolescent girls with cerebral palsy: a qualitative analysis. Disability, CBR and Inclusive Development. 32 (3), 76-90.

U Gupta, Nayar KR (2021). COVID-19 Pandemic and Popular Discourses in Jharkhand: A Qualitative Study. Journal of the Anthropological Survey of India. https://doi.org/10.1177 …

K Rajasekharan Nayar (2021). Pandemic and the People: Distortions, Discontinuities, and Divisions. In Pushpendra ed. COVID-19 and Migration. New Delhi: Aakar Books.

Lekha Bhat, K Rajasekharan Nayar et al. (2021). Livelihood, Employment and Health in the Context of COVID 19 Pandemic: A Qualitative Study in Kerala, Karnataka, Maharashtra and the North East. India Migration Report 2021. Edited by Professor Irudaya Rajan. Routledge.

K Rajasekharan Nayar, Lekha Bhat, Bindhya Vijayan and Krishna Rejeesh (2021). Health and Wellbeing of Nonagenarian Persons in Kerala. In, Irudya Rajan (ed.). Handbook of Aging, health and Public Policy. Springer.

Pillai A M et al. (2021). How Universal is the Use of Facemask During COVID-19 Pandemic? A Photo-Epidemiology Study from the Indian State of Kerala. Biomedical Journal of Scientific & Technical Research. 35 (3), 27741-46.

Anoop T. Nair, Kesavan Rajasekharan Nayar, Shaffi Fazaludeen Koya et al. (2021). Social media, vaccine hesitancy and trust deficit in immunization programs: a qualitative enquiry in Malappuram District of Kerala, India. Health Research Policy and Systems. 19( Suppl 2):56.

K Rajasekharan Nayar et al. (2021). Health achieving societies: Past discourses, present predilections and possible future contradictions. Journal of Public Health and Primary Care

Seval Akgun and K Rajsekharan Nayar (2021). Emerging risk factors and the disease pattern in Turkey: An analysis based on Burden of Diseases. International Journal of Community Medicine and Public Health. 8 (7), 3638-3645

Jacob Kuruvilla and K Rajasekhara Nayar (2021). Distribution pattern and correlation for oral cancer rate and human development rank for countries: An ecological approach. Contemporary Clinical Dentistry. 12 (1), 9-13.

K Rajasekharan Nayar (2021). Global Public Good and Universal Health Coverage: Conceptual And practical concerns in the context of COVID-19. International Journal of Community Medicine and Public Health. 8 (6), 3198-3199

Akgun, Seval and Nayar, K Rajasekharan (2021). A Trend Analysis of COVID-19 Pandemic in Turkey. In, Michael D. Waters, Alok Dhawan, Tim Marrs, Professor Diana Anderson, Stafford Warren, and Claude L. Hughes. Eds. The COVID-19 Pandemic: antiviral agents, decontamination and the Future. The Coronavirus Pandemic and the Future: Virology, Epidemiology, Translational Toxicology and Therapeutics 1st Edition. London: The Royal Society of Chemistry, 2021

K. Rajasekharan Nayar. Looking beyond numbers in public health. Economic and Political Weekly. Vol. 55, Issue No. 48, 05 Dec, 2020

K. Rajasekharan Nayar et al. Waiting in Health and Medical Care: A Preliminary Exploration. British Medical Journal. Medical Humanities. October 1, 2020.

K Rajasekharn Nayar et al. The New Body Politics. Economic and Political Weekly, Vol. 55, Issue No. 37, 12 Sep, 2020

K Rajasekharan Nayar, Shaffi Fazaludeen Koya, Venkitesh Ramakrishnan, Arathi P Rao, Gnanaseelan Kanakamma Libu, Kanniyan Binub, Althaf Ali, Mansoor C Abdulla, Mahesh Gopinathan, Shahul H Ebrahim, Call to avert acceleration of COVID-19 from India’s Sabarimala pilgrimage of 25 million devotees, Journal of Travel Medicine, taaa153, https://doi.org/10.1093/jtm/taaa153

Anant Kumar & K. Rajasekharan Nayar (2020) COVID-19: Stigma, discrimination, and the blame game, International Journal of Mental Health, 31 August, DOI: 10.1080/00207411.2020.1809935

Rajasekharan Nayar K, Fazaludeen Koya S, Mohandas K, et al. Public health Implications of Sabarimala mass gathering in India; A multi-dimensional analysis. Travel Medicine and Infectious Disease, 16 Jun 2020, 37:101783.

Visweswaran, Kasi and others. Quality of life of End Stage Renal Disease Patients Undergoing Dialysis in Southern Part of Kerala, India: Financial Stability and Inter-dialysis Weight Gain as Key Determinants. Journal of Epidemiology and Global Health. 2020. https://doi.org/10.2991/jegh.k.200716.001

Anant Kumar and K Rajasekharan Nayar. COVID-19 and Mass Fatality Management: A Public Health Challenge. Disaster Medicine and Public Health Preparedness. 2020. 10.1017/dmp.2020.277

Akgun, Seval and Nayar, K Rajasekharan, COVID-19 Pandemic in Turkey and Kerala, India: Some Observations. July, 31 2020. Social Science Research Network (SSRN)  http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3664694.

P Rao, Arathi and Malik, Parul and M, Prabhath and Nayar, K Rajasekharan, COVID-19 Containment: Lessons From Bengaluru and Mumbai Cities in India (July 27,2020). SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3661046 

Anant Kumar, K Rajasekharan Nayar and Lekha Bhat. Debate: COVID-19 and children in India. Child Adolesc Ment Health. 2020 Jun 29 : 10.1111/camh.12398.
doi: 10.1111/camh.12398 [Epub ahead of print]

Nayar K Rajasekharan and Muhammed Shaffi. Everyone has a heart but it may be expressed differently. Health care Academician Journal. 2020. Vol.& (2): 167-68

Anant Kumar, K Rajasekharan Nayar and Muhammed Shaffi. COVID-19: Challenges and its consequences for rural health care. Public Health in Practice. 2020 May 5. doi: 10.1016/j.puhip.2020.100009

Anant Kumar and K Rajasekharan Nayar. Covid 19 and mental health consequences. Journal of Mental Health. 27 April, 2020 https://doi.org/10.1080/09638237.2020.1757052

Nayar, K Rajasekharan and Chowdhury, Shabana Roze and P Rao, Arathi, Body Fluids, Body Contacts and Behaviours in Focus: A Post COVID Scenario for Evolving a Sustainable Health Behaviour Package (April 23, 2020). Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3583322 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3583322

Nayar, K Rajasekharan and Sadasivan, Lal and Shaffi, Muhammed and Vijayan, Bindhya and P Rao, Arathi, Social Media Messages Related to COVID-19: A Content Analysis (March 25, 2020). Available at SSRN: http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3560666

Nayar, K Rajasekharan and Vijayan, Bindhya, Coughing and Puffing Society: A Qualitative Study in the Context of Widespread Prevalence of Cough in Kerala (March 12, 2020). Available at SSRN: http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3553700

Nayar, K Rajasekharan and Vijayan, Bindhya and Rejeesh, Krishna, A Qualitative Study of Nonagenarian Persons in Two Districts of Kerala (March 30, 2020). Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3565338

Nayar, K Rajasekharan, Grassroot Level Health Workers: Have They Taken Root in India? (October 17, 2019). Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3471010

Nayar, K Rajasekharan, Un-Veiling Fashions and Attires: Diffusion of Dress Culture in Kerala, Its Health and Ecological Dimensions (May 03, 2019). Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3389696 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3389696
Nayar, K Rajasekharan, A Timeless Disoriented View on Floods and Suffering in Kerala (August 30, 2019). Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3445260 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3445260

Emerging diseases and evolving popular health orientation in Kerala: Towards ‘syncretic holism’. In, Susan Visvanathan and Vineetha Menon (Eds.). Chronology and Events: The Sociological Landscape of Changing Concepts. Volume in honor of Prof. T.K Oommen. New Delhi: Winshield press. 2019

To Be or not to Be: Is TB elimination possible in India through a humanistic approach? BMJ Medical Humanities, 13 May, 2019.

Rajasekharan K. Nayar et al. Methods to overcome Vaccine Hesitancy. The Lancet. Volume 393 (10177), pp.1203-04. 2019.
Smoking and lung cancer paradox in Kerala: An Epidemiological Epiphany. BMJ Medical Humanities, 13 February, 2019. (with Raghu Ram K. Nair)

Soaring but Souring Sugar: Type2 Diabetes in Kerala. BMJ Medical Humanities, 23 January, 2019.

Climate change in Kerala: Hot air and cold facts. British Medical Journal Medical Humanities, 23 October, 2018.

Eat. Drink and Be not merry and die too: Public health implication of alcohol consumption. BMJ Medical Humanities, 17 May 2018

Wuthering Wastes and the withering state of Kerala, India. BMJ Medical Humanities 24 April, 2018.

Working in Twilight Zones: Some reflections on the conceptual and methodological issues of inter-disciplinary approach in public health. Public Health Open Access. Vol.2, Issue 2, 2018

The Feverish State and Syncretic Holism: The Re-assertion of Oral Tradition in Medicine, British Medical Journal Medical Humanities. 18 January, 2018
‘Without Syndrome’: A qualitative exploration of Diabetes in Kerala. Journal of Health Systems, 1. 2017 Nov 24;2(2):14–6.

Senanayake H, Wijesinghe RD, Kesavan Rajasekharan Nayar. Is the policy of allowing a female labor companion feasible in developing countries? Results from a cross sectional study among Sri Lankan practitioners. BMC Pregnancy and Childbirth (2017) 17:392

Patrick Brzoska Seval Akgun, Bassey E Antia, K R Thankappan, Kesavan Rajasekharan Nayar and Oliver Razum. Enhancing International Perspective in Public Health Teaching through Formalized University Partnerships. Frontiers in Public Health 5:36. March 2017.

Rakesh PS, Kesavan Rajasekharan Nayar, Muhammed Shaffi, Chitra Grace. Do we need to consider universalizing the hepatitis A vaccine in Kerala, India? BMJ Opinion, February 10, 2017.
Anant Kumar, Nayar KR, Shaffi M, Grace C, Bhat LD (2017). Happy days are not here. Economic and Political Weekly, Vol.52 (19).

Nayar KR, Jacob Kuruvilla, Muhammed Shaffi (2016). Construction and contours of crises in heath care. Heath care Academician Journal, Vol. 3 (1): 41-46
Chitra Grace, K Rajasekharan Nayar, Lekha D Bhat, Anant Kumar, G. Ratheesh Babu, Muhammed Shaffi. How effective will be the anti-spitting initiatives in India. Economic and Political Weekly, vol. 51, No.26-27, 2016.

Hand washing and public health. Economic and Political Weekly 2015, Vol.50, No. Vol.50, No. 48, pp. 19-21 (with Lekha D Bhat, Hisham Moosan, Sanjeev Nair, Muhammed Shaffi)
Diphtheria Deaths in Kerala: Signs of an Impending crises. Economic and Political Weekly 2015, Vol.50, No. 43, October 24. Web Exclusives (Muhammed Shaffi, Lal SS)
A Perilous Pilgrimage: The Case of Sabarimala. Economic and Political Weekly 2015, Vol.50, No. 25, June 20. (with K Mohandas, Muhammed Shaffi)

Recent Popular Articles
Travails, Tribulations and Trepidations of a media infected: There are positives too! Counter currents, September 12, 2021
Transformation of Higher Education post COVID-19 in India. Counter currents, February 15, 2021 (with Sudhamshi Beeram and Arathi Rao).
COVID-19 Vaccine hesitancy: Understanding the challenges. Counter currents, January 22, 2021. (with Sudhamshi Beeram and Arathi Rao).
The Myth of Hardness: Public Sciences and Jugglery. Counter currents, Feb 9. 2021
Life after 2020: Need for a new vision on health. Counter currents, January 20, 2021
Family planning: Where have all the people gone? Counter currents, December 16, 2020
Current COVIDIAN trends and Popular Epidemiology. Counter currents, December 8, 2020
Slower than the snail: Health care policy process and reforms in India. Counter currents, October 23, 2020.
Tuberculosis and the Indian Poor: The present and the future. Counter currents, October 18, 2020.
Knowledge society, the ‘KAP GAP’ and the way forward. Counter currents. October 13, 2020.
New possibilities in pedagogy: Some meandered musings. Counter currents, October 7, 2020
Is Universal Health Care a ‘proxy’ for an Insurance-based selective health care to the people? Counter currents, October, 4, 2020.
Can India Sustain a safe sanitary culture. Counter currents, October 3, 2020
A Friendly Note on the Virus. Counter Currents, 3 May, 2020.
Can health literacy empower the health care workforce in handling the COVID-19 pandemic more effectively? Counter Currents, September 14, 2020. (With Arati Rao, Parul Malik, Anil K Bhat).
Self-Medication Syndrome and the emergence of a new health culture. The Medium, 29 August, 2020.
The Disappearing collegiality in Pedagogy: The COVIDian times. Counter Currents. 29 August 2020
Unknown Virus Behaviour, unsteady human behaviour and community masking: A Public Health challenge. Counter Currents, 11 June, 2020 (With Anant Kumar, Arathi P Rao and Lekha D Bhat)
Vaccine development and immunity for COVID-19: Some thoughts and doubts. Counter Currents. 31 May, 2020. (With Arathi P Rao)
Disease control: A post-COVID scenario in Kerala. Counter Currents, 27 May 2020. (With Bindhya Vijayan and Muhammed Shaffi)
The ‘Vayye-Vayya’ society: Morbidity and medicalization in Kerala. Counter Currents, 23 May 2020.
Jumping into conclusions on COVID: People, State and the Scientists. Counter Currents, 26 April, 2020.
The Science, Arts and Politics of COVID. Counter Currents, 30 April, 2020 (With Muhammed Shaffi and Anant Kumar)
The ‘silent spring’ again: Where have all the people gone? Counter Currents, 28 April, 2020.
Body fluids, body contacts and behaviours in focus: A Post COVID scenario for evolving a Sustainable Health Behaviour Package. Counter Currents, 23 April, 2020.
COVID in Kerala and how it was contained? Some known and unknown hypotheses. The Medium, April 14, 2020
COVID-19 and the ‘Future Perfect’ . The Medium, April 20, 2020.
Why we need a Planetary Policy on Pandemics: Zemblanity or natural burst?. The Medium, May 8, 2020.
The Ecological conundrum on COVID- 19. The Medium, April 9 2020.
Clinical, public health and administrative decisions during epidemics: The synergies and dichotomies. The Medium, April 8 2020.
The Pandemic Era: Time to assess our priorities. The Medium, April 5 2020.
The COVID times and a ‘calorific society’: Possible emergence of a new world. The Medium, April 4, 2020.
The Forgotten Path: Past, present, future and the virus….. The Medium, April 3, 2020.
COVID-19 and the World of Probabilities, The Medium, April 16, 2020.
The poisoned people of Kerala. Madras Courier. March 19, 2019.
The ned for a safe pilgrimage policy at Sabarimala. Madras Courier, October 15, 2018.
Links
https://medium.com/@kesavanrajasekharannayar
https://medium.com/@krnayar
https://madrascourier.com/author/krajasekharannayar
https://countercurrents.org

Previous Positions

Professor, 2004 to 2013 Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi
Associate Professor 1997-2004 Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi
Assistant Professor 1985-1997 Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi
Research Officer 1983-1985 Indian Council of Medical Research