Drugs plug gap as world awaits bird flu vaccine
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Scientists believe they have the know-how to make an effective vaccine against pandemic bird flu; the problem is how to make enough of it.
As avian flu spreads from Asia into Siberia and Kazakhstan, health experts are increasingly focused on the medical challenge of fighting the disease should it “go human” and start to spread easily from person to person.
Children bear brunt of Indian encephalitis outbreak
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With tears in his eyes, Indian farmer Ram Kumar Dwivedi rushes to the side of his convulsing son Vimal and begins pumping his chest with his hands to help the nine-year-old breathe.
Vimal is one of thousands of Japanese encephalitis patients in the impoverished, northern state of Uttar Pradesh, where more than 700 people have died over the past few weeks.
Treating sleep-breathing problem may ease blues
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New research suggests that symptoms of depression are fairly common among people suffering from obstructive sleep apnea, an ailment in which their airways become blocked and they frequently stop breathing for brief periods while they sleep.
However, treatment with continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP), which delivers pressurized air via a facemask to keep airways open while they sleep, may improve these depressive symptoms.
Nigerian women hurt in childbirth slowly find hope
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Soueiba Salisu endured the pains of childbirth for four days and four nights in a mud-brick house in her remote Nigerian village before her family, fearing for her life, took her to hospital.
When she arrived after hours of travel on unpaved tracks, doctors performed a Caesarean section but it was too late. The baby was stillborn, and a few days later 15-year-old Salisu started leaking urine.
Breast milk alternative may prevent food allergies
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Using hydrolyzed casein or whey formulas when breast milk is inadequately produced may help prevent at-risk infants from developing allergies, according to a review of studies on the topic.
“Both partially hydrolyzed whey formulas and extensively hydrolyzed casein formulas have been shown to reduce the incidence of allergy in high risk infants,” said study author Tiffani Hays.
U.N. says Angola polio controlled, vaccinates more
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Vaccination campaigns and public health education have bought a polio outbreak under control in Angola, the United Nations World Health Organisation says, warning awareness is still vital to prevent further cases.
Health officials had feared failure to stop transmission of the disease, which paralyses, deforms and kills children, could have led to it spreading not only within Angola but also to neighbouring countries such as the Republic of Congo, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Namibia and Zambia.
Different therapies can work for alcoholism
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The research team with the UK Alcohol Treatment Trial (UKATT) compared two approaches to helping people with Alcoholism, and found that they were equally beneficial and cost-effective.
Specifically, the study looked at “social behavior and network therapy” and the more established “motivational enhancement therapy.”
Acupoint stimulation shows promise for heartburn
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A no-needle version of acupuncture could offer a new way to battle chronic heartburn, if preliminary research pans out.
The study, involving heartburn-free volunteers, found that electrical stimulation of an acupuncture point on the wrist reduced the number of “relaxations” in the band of muscle surrounding the passage from the esophagus to the stomach.
FDA knew of Guidant heart device failures
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Months before the U.S. Food and Drug Administration issued a safety alert in June about problems with Guidant Corp. heart devices, a company report to the agency showed that some of those units were short-circuiting, The New York Times reported on Monday.
But the agency did not make that data public at the time because it treats the information it receives in such reports as confidential, the newspaper said, citing FDA records.
Zimbabwe eviction drive seen worsening AIDS crisis
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Zimbabwe’s urban evictions violated the rights of hundreds of thousands of people and disrupted AIDS treatment across the country, threatening a new stage in the epidemic, a rights group said on Sunday.
Human Rights Watch called on U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan to investigate the campaign and accused President Robert Mugabe’s government of blocking U.N. efforts to help victims.
UK agency wants checks on drug-resistant E. coli
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Britain’s Health Protection Agency said on Monday it wants better monitoring of drug-resistant strains of E. coli bacteria, which have spread rapidly in England and Northern Ireland in the last two years.
E. coli are common bacteria which normally live harmlessly in the gut, but can also cause urinary tract infections and blood poisoning and can be potentially deadly.
Pfizer ready to monitor inhaled-insulin patients
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Pfizer Inc is ready to launch a patient-monitoring scheme to assess the safety of its novel inhaled-insulin drug Exubera if the product is approved for use, its worldwide head of development said on Thursday.
Exubera is being developed with Sanofi-Aventis SA and Nektar Therapeutics, and is due to be reviewed by a U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) panel later on Thursday.
Specialists improve breast cancer care
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Elderly women with Breast cancer whose surgeons refer them to cancer specialists are twice as likely to be prescribed tamoxifen, a treatment recommended for preventing recurrence of the disease, a new study shows.
“Older women should be given the opportunity to have these conversations with medical oncologists,” said Dr. Rebecca A. Silliman of the Boston University School of Public Health, the study’s lead author.
Drug protects kidneys of people with diabetes
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Kidney damage is a constant danger for people with Diabetes Mellitus, especially when their blood pressure is high. Now European researchers report that the addition of a drug, spironolactone, to standard blood pressure-lowering therapy for such patients helps reduce both blood pressure and the amount of albumin protein in urine, a measure of kidney impairment.
Dr. Kaspar Rossing of Steno Diabetes Mellitus Center in Gentofte, Denmark, and colleagues note in the medical journal Diabetes Care that two types of antihypertensive drugs—ACE inhibitors and angiotensin receptor blockers (ARBs)—have protective effects on the kidneys in diabetics who already have kidney damage.
Progesterone may reduce recurrent preemie risk
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For women who have had a previous preterm delivery, treatment with a synthetic version of the female hormone progesterone appears to reduce the risk of subsequent preterm birth, researchers report.
“While this treatment applies at this time to a limited number of women,” said Dr. Paul J. Meis, “it represents a hopeful start, the first effective method to reduce the chance of preterm delivery for women at risk for this problem.”
