Experts suspect that H1N1 flu vaccine might have resulted in acute disseminated encephalomyelitis (ADEM) in a thirteen-year-old boy in Guangzhou, South China's Guangdong province, Guangzhou Daily reported today.

A source from the city's health bureau said the local government will compensate the boy financially once he was diagnosed with the abnormal reaction from the H1N1 vaccine.

The boy was reportedly sent to the hospital on December 21st last year for running a fever and was discharged on January 21, 2010. He was inoculated the H1N1 vaccine on December 16, 2009.

Often one reads about historical failures in medical ethics, such as the Tuskegee Syphilis Study or the forced sterilization of Carrie Buck, and one reflects with relief that health care has progressed in our society to the point where such abuses are no longer possible. Then one stumbles upon an occasional systemic failure so grievous, such as the amputation of a patient's wrong leg, that it nearly defies credibility, and reminds us that we are still vulnerable to medical exploitation and misconduct. If the facts as alleged in the media and court filings prove accurate, then the treatment of a pregnant Tallahassee mother, Samantha Burton, by her obstetrician, Jana Bures-Forsthoefel, may well rank among the most egregious abuses perpetrated against a patient by her caregiver since the triumph of the patients' rights movement in the 1970s.

The facts as reported are strikingly straightforward. Burton, a married mother of two toddlers, contacted her obstetrician in March 2009 -- during her twenty-fifth week of pregnancy -- when she became concerned that she might be going into premature labor. The obstetrician advised her to report to Tallahassee Memorial Hospital. While at the hospital, it became apparent that Burton was not going into labor. However, Dr. Bures-Forsthoefel recommended up to fifteen weeks of bedrest for her patient. When Burton explained that she had two children at home and a job, and that full bed rest was not a viable option for her, Bures-Forsthoefel ordered her confined to a hospital room to protect the health of her fetus. The hospital and Bures-Forsthoefel then obtained an order from the Circuit Court of Leon County that mandated Burton remain in bed for the duration of her pregnancy (eg. up to fifteen weeks) and to undergo "all medical treatments" that her physicians believed were in the fetal interest. Burton was denied any opportunity to obtain a second opinion at another hospital. She was effectively held prisoner in her room for three days, at which point an emergency C-section revealed a dead fetus.

Isn't it bad enough that the statins are the number one selling drugs on the planet and that Lipitor is cranking in $10 BILLION, yes billion, not million folks, every year?

Now these greedy drug companies want even more money.

Please understand that I am a great fan of capitalism and I don't begrudge any company from making a profit, or even massively huge profits, but I have major objections to any person or company selling a solution that does not authentically benefit the end user. And when it comes to statin drugs that clearly is the case.

The "experts" are now saying that no matter how low your cholesterol count, if you are a diabetic you should take cholesterol-lowering drugs. They are completely ignorant of the well documented dangers of having too low of a cholesterol level.
What is concerning though is that this is not a lunatic doctor saying this, but this advice now is part of the official practice guidelines of the American College of Physicians, a major doctors' group, which represents more than 100,000 internists.

Damning new evidence has even the FDA worried about the impacts of BPA in consumer products, especially those for infants and children.

On Friday, in a substantial shift in policy, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration announced that it has "some concern" about the health effects of bishphenol A (BPA), particularly on infants and children. While not currently advocating regulation, the FDA is proposing steps that could lead to restrictions.

"We need to know more," said FDA Commissioner Margaret Hamburg during a press conference. But "as a precaution," the FDA has issued recommendations for reducing exposure.

This contrasts markedly with the FDA's 2008 assessment that declared BPA use safe in consumer products, including for infants and children. It also aligns FDA's views with those of the National Toxicology Program and National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences.

I'm seeing increasing numbers of patients with sleep problems, ranging from difficulty in falling asleep, to being unable to sleep soundly through the night. Rather than waking up in the morning restored and rejuvenated, they are dragging themselves out of bed, facing another day feeling drained and exhausted. (1)

As you know, disrupted sleep can exert a severe toll on your emotional and physical health, interfering with mental abilities, productivity and performance - leaving you feeling stressed, cranky, depressed and drowsy. (2) Poor sleep patterns are linked to a growing list of serious health conditions, including obesity, heart disease, Type two diabetes, and even, premature deaths in older adults.

Many moms today feel as if they are not good mothers unless they are racing around, shuttling their children from lessons to practices, and back to lessons again. What do you think matters most to your children? You driving them to lessons and practices? Or the smile and hug you greet them with after school?

If you guessed the latter, you are correct.

When scientists gathered in Houston recently for the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) Frontiers in Cancer Prevention Research Conference, they heard groundbreaking evidence about how colon cancer can be prevented. The new data wasn't about drugs or surgery, either. Instead, two separate research groups concluded natural substances appear to protect from often deadly colon malignancies.

Colon cancer, which the American Cancer Society estimates is diagnosed in over 108,000 Americans each year, is intricately linked to adenomas, also called polyps. These lesions grow in the large bowel and start off as benign. However, they can turn into cancerous tumors and 70 to 80% of all cancers of the colon (the longest part of the large intestine) and rectum result from adenomas-turned-malignant.

Saturated fat is the type of fat that dominates in animal food such as eggs, cream, meat and cheese and is also abundant in palm and coconut oil. Today, many scientists consider too much saturated fat just as dangerous to our arteries as greasy food leftovers is for the drains of kitchen sinks. Only 10,000 years ago, as hunter-gatherers, our Palaeolithic diet contained abundant saturated fat, though other scientists question this.

For several years skeptical scientists including myself have asked the experts on the Swedish National Food Administration for the scientific studies that allow them to warn against saturated fat. Their usual answers have been that "there are thousands of such studies", or they refer to the WHO ( World Health Organization ) guidelines, (1) said to have been written by the world's greatest experts.

The main argument in that document is that saturated fat raises cholesterol, but we now know that high cholesterol is not a disease. What we want to know is if we shorten our lives or if we run a greater risk of getting a heart attack or a stroke by eating too much saturated fat.

Early use of antibiotics in the 1960s may have given birth to one of the most common strains of MRSA, a study has found.

A new genetic method of tracking infection suggests that the superbug emerged five decades ago in Europe

Scientists used DNA-mapping technology to compare the genetic relatedness of bugs isolated from individual patients.

By identifying letter changes springing up in the bacteria's genetic code, they were able to track MRSA transmission between continents and from patient-to-patient within a single hospital.

Replacing confusing language and icons on standard warnings labels for prescription medicine and listing only the most important warnings could make a big difference in how well patients understand the instructions that are critical to their health, according to a new study from Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine.

Simple, concise language on warning labels of prescription medicine bottles is easier for patients to understand than the standard wording commonly used, according to the study. And the fewer warnings on a label, the more likely a patient will actually pay attention to them.

For the study, Northwestern researchers and colleagues worked with patients and nationally renowned graphic designers to simplify and redesign the confusing language and icons of standard warning labels. Many of them have been used for decades without any evidence to show patients comprehend them, or even if they are true.

"The study shows the value of a clear message," said Michael Wolf, associate professor of medicine and of learning sciences at Feinberg and lead author of the study.