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British study links IMF loans to tuberculosis

Michael Kahn
Reuters
Mon, 21 Jul 2008 22:01 UTC
Austerity measures attached to International Monetary Fund (IMF) loans may have contributed to a resurgence in tuberculosis in eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union, researchers said on Tuesday.

Governments may be reducing funding for health services such as hospitals and clinics to meet strict IMF economic targets, the British researchers said.

Image
©REUTERS/Thomas Peter
An inmate sits in the multi-drug resistant tuberculosis (MDR-TB) ward in a prison hospital in the Siberian city of Tomsk, about 3500 km (2175 miles) east of Moscow, in this file photo from June 4, 2008.

The study, published in the Public Library of Science journal PLoS Medicine, found that countries participating in IMF programmes had seen tuberculosis death rates increase by at least 17 percent between 1991 and 2000 -- equivalent to more than 100,000 additional deaths. About one million new cases were recorded during the same period.
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Health

Breakthrough In Fight Against Deadly Superbug: Early Detection Method Greatly Increases Chances Of Survival


Science Daily
Mon, 21 Jul 2008 21:53 UTC
A research team led by University of Sunderland scientists has made a major breakthrough in the fight against a deadly hospital infection which kills tens of thousands of people every year, and it will be available within the next year.

Alexandre Bedernjak
©University of Sunderland
University of Sunderland PhD student Alexandre Bedernjak takes a closer look at the new superbug test that could save thousands of lives.

Experts have discovered a technique for the early detection of the superbug pseudomonas aeruginosa which particularly infects patients with cystic fibrosis. 70,000 people worldwide are affected by cystic fibrosis and on average around 50 percent of those will be infected with the superbug - 50 percent of those will die.

Although the research concentrated on the superbug's relation to cystic fibrosis, pseudomonas aeruginosa also attacks patients with localized and systemic immune defects, such as those suffering with burns, patients with AIDS and cancer.
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Syringe

UK government warns world over killer flu pandemic

Ben Russell
The Independent
Mon, 21 Jul 2008 21:35 UTC
The world is failing to guard against the inevitable spread of a devastating flu pandemic which could kill 50 million people and wreak massive disruption around the globe, the Government has warned.

In evidence to a House of Lords committee, ministers said that early warning systems for spotting emerging diseases were "poorly co-ordinated" and lacked "vision" and "clarity". They said that more needed to be done to improve detection and surveillance for potential pandemics and called for urgent improvement in rapid-response strategies.
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Heart

Decisions under pressure: it's all in the heart beat


Queensland University of Technology
Wed, 16 Jul 2008 13:38 UTC
A person's heart rate can reveal a lot about how they make decisions when feeling stressed, a Queensland University of Technology academic says.

Economics Associate Professor Uwe Dulleck, from the QUT Business Faculty, said stress in the workplace wasn't necessarily a bad thing, because it was, in fact, a natural reaction that had been given a negative connotation.

Professor Dulleck is leading the Australian arm of a study that was awarded an Australian Research Council grant to study the effects of both positive and negative stress on employees' decision-making.

"The study will use heart rate monitors to measure the stress of people 'on the job' and in the controlled environment of an experimental economics computer laboratory as they interact and communicate," Professor Dulleck said.
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Heart

How emotional pain can really hurt

Vivienne Parry
BBC News
Sun, 20 Jul 2008 11:48 UTC
Love really does hurt, just as poets and song lyric writers claim. New brain scanning technologies are revealing that the part of the brain that processes physical pain also deals with emotional pain.
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Clock

Blame your genes for being lazy!


Sify News
Thu, 17 Jul 2008 09:14 UTC
Are you a couch potato who hates getting up and working out? Well, as it turns out you may just be able to blame your genes for your lazy disposition.

While working out is known to be the key to manage good health, two new studies suggest that the inclination to engage in physical activity may be strongly affected by genetics.
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Bulb

A Brain of Two Halves

Emma Brockes
The Guardian
Tue, 15 Jul 2008 08:45 UTC
It was only when Jill Bolte Taylor, a neuroanatomist, had a stroke at the age of 37, that she fully understood the huge gulf between the left and the right parts of the brain.

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People

Women feel chronic pain more than men because their brains are different

Lucy Cockcroft
The Telegraph
Thu, 17 Jul 2008 08:42 UTC
Women feel pain more than men because their brains are not "wired" in the same way, scientists believe. New research suggests that the basic architecture of the brain, and the way it operates, is different in the two sexes.

Previously the different sensitivity to pain between the sexes had been explained by hormones and social pressures. However, a series of studies have suggested that there "is not just one kind of human brain, but two", a male version and a female version.
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Health

New Zealand: Anti-fluoride group denied referendum

David Loughrey
Otago Daily Times
Mon, 21 Jul 2008 06:30 UTC
Anti-fluoride campaigners on Dunedin's northern coast look set to be denied the public referendum they want on the issue, despite a 222-signature petition they collected.

Instead, the Ministry of Health and Public Health South will be invited to brief elected officials on the public health reasons to fluoridate public water supplies and address arguments opposing the practice.
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Cow

Massachusetts patient tested for mad cow disease


Associated Press
Sun, 20 Jul 2008 22:59 UTC
BOSTON - Public health officials in Massachusetts are investigating whether a patient in a Cape Cod hospital has the human form of mad cow disease.
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