Public Health
Die-hard Cypriot smokers must stub out by Jan 1
|
|
Die-hard smokers in Cyprus will finally have to curb the habit when one of the last EU smoking havens imposes a Jan. 1 ban on puffing in public places.
Lawmakers are poised to pass tough new regulations banning smoking in public places, replacing an existing law which is regularly flouted.
Come Jan. 1, smoking will be prohibited in restaurants, bars, nightclubs and workplaces, with planned hefty fines for those caught having a puff.
Early telemedicine try didn’t cut Medicare costs
|
|
A telemedicine program designed to help Medicare beneficiaries with type 2 diabetes take care of their health didn’t cut costs, and had only a “modest” effect on patients’ health, researchers report in the journal Diabetes Care.
But that doesn’t mean that similar interventions can’t help patients and reduce health care spending, according to Dr. Lorenzo Moreno of Mathematica Policy Research, Inc., in Princeton, New Jersey, who led the research.
“Increased home-based tele-visits from nurses and self-tracking of progress could improve patients’ self care behaviors,” Moreno noted in a statement. “These improvements could help participants avoid long-term health complications, which in turn would reduce use of acute care services, hospitalizations, and Medicare costs.”
Say no to vodka, president tells Russians
|
|
President Dmitry Medvedev has told Russians they must kick the alcohol habit.
“We drink more now than in the 1990s, although those were difficult times,” the ITAR-Tass news agency quoted Medvedev as saying on Tuesday.
Health Minister Tatyana Golikova has been ordered to devise an anti-alcohol strategy. “We need to prepare a corresponding programme and take appropriate measures,” Medvedev said.
A report by The Lancet medical journal last week said alcohol-related diseases caused around half of all deaths of Russians between the ages of 15 and 54.
Weight-bearing exercise key for bone health
|
|
Higher-impact exercise, including running and jumping, is the most important type of activity for building stronger bones—especially around the time of puberty, according to a research review.
The review, which included dozens of studies published since the 1960s, confirms the importance of weight-bearing exercise in bone health across a person’s lifespan.
Weight-bearing activities, such as running, jumping rope and lifting weights, put the bones under stress. This forces the bones to respond by becoming stronger. In contrast, low-impact exercise, like biking or swimming, works the heart and trims the waistline, but puts little strain on the bones.
Canadian court rules treatment can be forced
|
|
Manitoba social workers were right to force a Jehovah’s Witness teenager to get a blood transfusion even though she said she felt it was like being raped, the Supreme Court of Canada ruled on Friday.
It was already clear under Canadian court decisions that babies and young children could be forced to get transfusions when authorities deemed this was needed but this case revolved around whether “mature minors” could make up their own mind.
The girl, known as A.C., was almost 15—the law stipulates 16 as the age when independent decisions are allowed—and argued that she knew what she was doing when she said she wanted to follow her religion and not take the blood.
Farrah Fawcett, 1970s sex symbol, dies aged 62
|
|
Actress Farrah Fawcett, the “Charlie’s Angels” television star whose big smile and feathered blond mane made her one of the reigning sex symbols of the 1970s, died on Thursday after a long battle with cancer. She was 62.
Fawcett, first vaulted to stardom by an alluring poster of her in a red swimsuit, was diagnosed with anal cancer in late 2006. It spread to her liver in 2007, proving resistant to numerous medical treatments in Germany and California.
“After a long and brave battle with cancer, our beloved Farrah has passed away,” Fawcett’s long time companion, actor Ryan O’Neal, said in a statement.
China shuts sex health websites to ordinary users
|
|
Ordinary web users in China will be banned from surfing sex-related medical and research websites from next month, amid an Internet crackdown on pornographic online content, according to new regulations.
Medical information service providers must install software to ensure only professionals can access sites that carry information and research about sex, the regulations on the website of the Ministry of Health (http://www.moh.gov.cn) said.
“It is prohibited to spread pornographic content in the name of sex-related scientific research,” the regulations said.
Study shows 1 in 25 deaths worldwide attributable to alcohol
|
|
Research from Canada’s own Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH) featured in this week’s edition of the Lancet shows that worldwide, 1 in 25 deaths are directly attributable to alcohol consumption. This rise since 2000 is mainly due to increases in the number of women drinking.
CAMH’s Dr Jürgen Rehm and his colleagues found that alcohol-attributable disorders are among the most disabling disease categories within the global burden of disease, especially for men. And in contrast to other traditional risk factors for disease, the burden attributable to alcohol lies more with younger people than with the older population.
Dr. Rehm still takes an optimistic ‘glass half full’ response to this large and increasing alcohol-attributable burden. “Today, we know more than ever about which strategies can effectively and cost-effectively control alcohol-related harms,” Dr. Rehm said today. “Provided that our public policy makers act on these practical strategies expeditiously, we could see an enormous impact in reducing damage.”
US group advises cuts in post-exposure rabies jabs
|
|
U.S. immunization advisers have recommended reducing the number of rabies shots needed to protect humans after exposure to a rabid animal in a move to conserve vaccine supplies.
The Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices or ACIP, which advises the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, voted on Wednesday to change the vaccine schedule from five doses to four, eliminating the last shot.
The move was intended to conserve vaccine supplies in the event of a vaccine shortage, which occurred from 2007 to 2009.
Apple’s Jobs has “excellent prognosis”
|
|
Apple Inc chief executive Steve Jobs underwent a liver transplant at a Tennessee hospital and has “an excellent prognosis”, the hospital that performed the operation confirmed on Tuesday.
Jobs, 54, received the transplant because he was “the sickest patient on the waiting list at the time a donor organ became available,” the Methodist University Hospital Transplant Institute said in a statement on its Website. http://www.methodisthealth.org/methodist/About+Us/Newsroom/News/Steve+Jobs+Receives+Liver+Transplant
“Mr. Jobs is now recovering well and has an excellent prognosis,” the statement said. James Eason, program director at the institute and the hospital’s chief of transplantation, added that the confirmation had come with Jobs’s permission.
Americans struggle to pay for healthcare: study
|
|
Americans are struggling to pay for healthcare in the ongoing economic recession, with a quarter saying they have had trouble in the past 12 months, according to a survey released on Monday.
Baby boomers—the generation born between 1946 and 1964—had the most trouble and were the most likely to put off medical treatments or services, said researchers at Center for Healthcare Improvement, part of the Healthcare business of Thomson Reuters.
The study, available here, found that 17.4 percent of households reported postponing or delaying healthcare over the past year.
Cher struggles, but supports child’s sex change
|
|
Cher has struggled to understand her child’s decision to have a sex change operation but remains supportive and respectful of the courage it takes, the pop star said in a statement on Thursday.
Formerly Chastity Bono, the 40-year-old is the child of Cher and Sonny Bono and now goes by the name Chaz Bono. Chaz has begun operations and hormone treatments to become a man.
“Chaz is embarking on a difficult journey, but one that I will support,” Cher, 63, said in a statement to People magazine and other celebrity media outlets.
The Joys of Fatherhood and Men’s Health
|
|
There are over 8 million fathers in Canada, according to Statistics Canada. Research has shown that a father’s involvement can affect the well-being of his children, but what about the impact of being a father on the man himself? Whether you’re expecting to be a dad or you’ve been one for years, having a child will change the way you live your life. Fatherhood is a central aspect of many men’s lives and can have both positive and negative effects on their health.
With Father’s Day just around the corner and in light of Men’s Health Week (June 15-21), CIHR experts are available to talk about the impact of fatherhood on men’s physical and psychological health, and vice-versa.
Experts:
Republicans plan rival U.S. healthcare plan
|
|
Pushing back against Democratic plans to overhaul the U.S. healthcare system, Republicans on Tuesday readied a less costly alternative they say will make insurance more affordable.
Representative David Camp, the top Republican on the House Ways and Means Committee, said the plan offered significant reforms, including incentives for healthy living, protection for doctors against malpractice lawsuits and tax breaks to encourage small businesses to offer insurance to their workers.
“We obviously think it’s important to make healthcare more affordable and to drive down costs,” Camp said in an interview before a planned news briefing on the plan on Wednesday.
WHO probes report of bubonic plague in Libyan town
|
|
Libyan authorities have reported an outbreak of bubonic plague in the Mediterranean coastal town of Tubruq, and the World Health Organisation was sending a team to investigate, a WHO official said on Tuesday.
The cases - approximately 16 to 18 have been reported - would be the first in more than two decades in Libya of the disease known in medieval times as the Black Death, according to John Jabbour, a Cairo-based emerging diseases specialist at WHO. “It is reported as bubonic plague,” Jabbour said, adding WHO still didn’t have “a full picture” of the situation.
“It is officially reported by Libya… Tomorrow, WHO is deploying a mission to Libya to investigate the whole situation, to see how many of the cases are confirmed, or not confirmed.”
