A seven-year-old boy died in Hong Kong on Tuesday after being hospitalized late last week with a suspected strain of bird flu, national media said.
Law Ho-ming had had a fever and a persistent cough for about two weeks before being hospitalized on March 6. He was later discharged, but rushed to the emergency department at Tuen Mun Hospital on March 8. The boy lapsed into a coma and was subsequently diagnosed as suffering from swelling of the brain.
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Victoria Inness-Brown's family was addicted to diet soda. After researching the effects of aspartame, she strongly believed the artificial sweetener might one day lead to their illness or even their early deaths.
Heated discussions with work colleagues and tight deadlines can undermine memory and learning, according to new research.
Researchers found chemicals released in response to acute stress undermined communication between brain cells involved in the formation and processing of memories.
Comment: Stress shocks the system and wears it down, as well as reducing the ability of the general populace to put two and two together, and thus understand what is being done to them. With bad times around the corner economically, it looks like an awful lot of people are likely to die because of the stress and shocks of the economy melting down.
Plant pigments called anthocyanins provide fruits and vegetables with beneficial blue, purple and red coloring. Now Agricultural Research Service (ARS) scientists are learning more about these compounds and their absorption into the human blood stream.
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| Anthocyanins are a group of healthful compounds that fall within the flavonoid class of plant nutrients. ARS scientists have identified 36 anthocyanins in red cabbage, including eight that had never before been detected in the cabbage.
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The widely used synthetic progestin medroxyprogesterone acetate (MPA) decreased endothelial function in premenopausal women in a study done at the University of Oregon. The finding, researchers said, raises concerns about long-term effects of MPA and possibly other synthetic hormones on vascular health in young women.
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| ©J. Meendering
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| Jessica Meendering, right, works with a young woman who participating in a study of MPA and its effects on the brachial artery.
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The health consequences of eating one large meal a day compared with eating three meals a day has not been established. Now two recently published journal articles are among the first to report the effects of meal skipping on key health outcomes, based on a study involving a group of normal-weight, middle-aged adults.
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| ARS and National Institute on Aging studies looked into health consequences of eating one meal a day, which some people do, compared to the standard recommendation of eating three meals a day.
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How far would you go to help wipe out one of the world's worst scourges?
Seattle-area residents will soon be able to go all the way: allowing themselves to be bitten by malaria-infected mosquitoes to aid in the quest for new vaccines and drugs.
Seattle Biomedical Research Institute (SBRI) is announcing plans today for a facility where volunteers will be exposed to the deadliest form of the disease, which kills at least a million people a year. Most victims are African children.
But scientists are quick to point out that participating in the clinical trials won't be a life-threatening experience.
BBCTue, 11 Mar 2008 12:41 UTC
There is evidence linking chronic health problems suffered by Gulf War veterans to exposure to pesticides and nerve agents, US research has found.
A third of veterans of the 1991 war experienced fatigue, muscle or joint pain, sleeping problems, rashes and breathing troubles, the research found.
A US Congress-appointed committee on Gulf War illnesses analysed more than 100 studies in the research.
Pity the poor school officials in Greene County, Ga. When they suggested last month that they wanted to become the first school district in the nation to segregate all public schools according to gender, you would have thought they'd announced their intent to revive racial segregation.
Women who survive breast cancer are often haunted by the fear that it might come back. But new research indicates that many more women than had been thought can do something to protect themselves.
Comment: Stress shocks the system and wears it down, as well as reducing the ability of the general populace to put two and two together, and thus understand what is being done to them. With bad times around the corner economically, it looks like an awful lot of people are likely to die because of the stress and shocks of the economy melting down.