Pregnant women infected with swine flu have a higher rate of hospitalization and greater risk of death than the general population due to the H1N1 virus, according to a new study published Wednesday in the online version of the British medical journal Lancet.
"The death of a pregnant woman is always heartbreaking, and unfortunately we have been hearing reports of otherwise healthy women dying from H1N1," said Dr. Denise Jamieson, the lead author of the study. "If a pregnant woman feels like she may have influenza she needs to call her health care provider right away."
Health & Wellness
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Edwards plain truth is not accepted by Canada's penitentiary and parole system which, since the 1970s, has made rehabilitation of criminals its paramount objective - something akin to pounding a square peg into a round hole.
While all that pounding was going on Professor Robert D. Hare, of the University of British Columbia, was painstakingly doing intensive research unravelling the mystery of psychopathy. Hare's conclusion: psychopaths are "completely lacking in conscience and in feelings for others, they selfishly take what they want and do as they please, violating social norms and expectations without the slightest sense of guilt or regret."
Hare distilled his research and conclusions into plain language for the general public, and published Without Conscience - The Disturbing World of the Psychopaths Among Us.
A sample of the deadly Anthrax virus was stolen yesterday from the Science Gallery in Dublin. The stolen Anthrax Bacillus is the same viral agent used by bioterrorists in the US in the 2001 attacks, which caused panic around the world. It was being exhibited as part of an exhibition called "Infectious" at Dublin's Science Gallery and shockingly the public were allowed unrestricted access to the deadly spores. A spokesperson for the gallery claimed "The sample was absolutely safe. It was a microscope slide and the public are not at risk". However Anthrax spores are notoriously hard to kill and experts have expressed concern. The Science Gallery has been sealed off while the crime is investigated and people in biohazard suits have been observed entering the space.
The current threat of swine flu doesn't justify a gamble on a vaccine that has not been fully tested.
A mass vaccination programme moves ever closer. Orders have been placed; priority groups identified. There will be enough swine flu vaccine to inoculate the entire population, starting with NHS staff, in an attempt to halt the spread of the disease and save lives.
Is all this really necessary? To start with, swine flu is far milder than we first feared, so the case for vaccinating millions of healthy adults against a disease that is no more unpleasant than a bad cold is questionable. There is a stronger argument for vaccinating those at greater risk, such as those with lung, heart or kidney disease, those with suppressed immune systems (such as those on cancer treatment), pregnant women and children under 5 - but only if the vaccine works and is safe. But there are serious doubts about this.
Rushing the vaccine on to the market means we will have no idea how effective it is, although we do have a body of research on the effectiveness of flu vaccines in general, which gives some idea of what we might expect from the swine flu vaccine. Provided that we have matched the vaccine well with the virus, it is likely to be up to 80 per cent effective in healthy adults, the group at least risk from the virus.
A mass vaccination programme moves ever closer. Orders have been placed; priority groups identified. There will be enough swine flu vaccine to inoculate the entire population, starting with NHS staff, in an attempt to halt the spread of the disease and save lives.
Is all this really necessary? To start with, swine flu is far milder than we first feared, so the case for vaccinating millions of healthy adults against a disease that is no more unpleasant than a bad cold is questionable. There is a stronger argument for vaccinating those at greater risk, such as those with lung, heart or kidney disease, those with suppressed immune systems (such as those on cancer treatment), pregnant women and children under 5 - but only if the vaccine works and is safe. But there are serious doubts about this.
Rushing the vaccine on to the market means we will have no idea how effective it is, although we do have a body of research on the effectiveness of flu vaccines in general, which gives some idea of what we might expect from the swine flu vaccine. Provided that we have matched the vaccine well with the virus, it is likely to be up to 80 per cent effective in healthy adults, the group at least risk from the virus.
Swine flu vaccine makers may rely on a U.S. emergency declaration to use experimental additives made by GlaxoSmithKline Plc and Novartis AG to boost a limited supply of shots that will be available to fight the pandemic.
The ingredients, known as adjuvants, may be added for the first time to flu shots in the U.S. Health officials today are meeting to discuss the additives at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta, and to recommend who should receive the limited amount of vaccines drugmakers say they will begin delivering in September or October.
The U.S. Health and Human Services Department declared a public health emergency over swine flu in April, and the Food and Drug Administration has the power to allow the use of unapproved medical products during such a crisis. The U.S. has been slow to approve the use of adjuvants because of safety concerns, and for fear of giving Americans an excuse to avoid getting the shots, said John Treanor, a University of Rochester researcher.
The ingredients, known as adjuvants, may be added for the first time to flu shots in the U.S. Health officials today are meeting to discuss the additives at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta, and to recommend who should receive the limited amount of vaccines drugmakers say they will begin delivering in September or October.
The U.S. Health and Human Services Department declared a public health emergency over swine flu in April, and the Food and Drug Administration has the power to allow the use of unapproved medical products during such a crisis. The U.S. has been slow to approve the use of adjuvants because of safety concerns, and for fear of giving Americans an excuse to avoid getting the shots, said John Treanor, a University of Rochester researcher.
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Lilianne Mujica-Parodi, a cognitive neuroscientist at Stony Brook University in New York and colleagues collected sweat from the armpits of first-time tandem skydivers as they hurtled towards the earth.
The smell of their sweat was wafted under the noses of volunteers as they lay in an fMRI scanner. Even though they had no idea what they were inhaling, two separate sets of volunteers showed activation of the amygdala - the area of the brain responsible for emotion-processing, plus areas involved in vision, motor control and goal-directed behaviour. Sweat produced under non-stressed conditions didn't produce this reaction.
What's more, in behavioural tests, the "stress sweat" seemed to heighten people's awareness of threat, making them 43 per cent more accurate in judging whether a face was neutral or threatening.
Women should embrace the full pain of childbirth to bond with their babies instead of resorting to anaesthetic drugs, a leading male midwife has said.
UK professor Dr Denis Walsh said the pain of labour should be considered a "rite of passage" and a "purposeful, useful thing".
The pain prepares women for the responsibilities of motherhood, he wrote in an international journal published yesterday.
UK professor Dr Denis Walsh said the pain of labour should be considered a "rite of passage" and a "purposeful, useful thing".
The pain prepares women for the responsibilities of motherhood, he wrote in an international journal published yesterday.
A new study casts doubt on a commonly held but controversial belief that autistic children have more gut problems than their peers.
The Mayo Clinic study, published Monday in the journal Pediatrics, found autistic kids in the study were more likely than their nonautistic counterparts to be picky eaters or constipated. But the researchers did not find a significant difference between the two groups when it came to diarrhea, abdominal discomfort, bloating, reflux or vomiting.
"We did not find a difference in gastrointestinal symptoms in total," said Dr. Samar Ibrahim, lead study author and a Mayo Clinic pediatric gastroenterology fellow.
The Mayo Clinic study, published Monday in the journal Pediatrics, found autistic kids in the study were more likely than their nonautistic counterparts to be picky eaters or constipated. But the researchers did not find a significant difference between the two groups when it came to diarrhea, abdominal discomfort, bloating, reflux or vomiting.
"We did not find a difference in gastrointestinal symptoms in total," said Dr. Samar Ibrahim, lead study author and a Mayo Clinic pediatric gastroenterology fellow.
Comment: The article is misleading in stating the reason why autistic children are placed on gluten-freecasein-free (GFCF) and other restrictive diets. These are often not due to obvious gastrointestinal symptoms per se. Rather, the working hypothesis is that in some autistic people, improperly digested gluten and casein are turned into peptides which act as endogenous opiates, impairing brain function. Additionally, an unusual immune response can be triggered by those peptides which further contributes to the problem. Regrettably, the study appears to support the mainstream medical agenda that offers little to autism sufferers.
International cancer experts have moved tanning beds and other sources of ultraviolet radiation into the top cancer risk category, deeming them as deadly as arsenic and mustard gas. For years, scientists have described tanning beds and ultraviolet radiation as "probable carcinogens."
A new analysis of about 20 studies concludes the risk of skin cancer jumps by 75 percent when people start using tanning beds before age 30. Experts also found that all types of ultraviolet radiation caused worrying mutations in mice, proof the radiation is carcinogenic. Previously, only one type of ultraviolet radiation was thought to be lethal.
The new classification means tanning beds and other sources of ultraviolet radiation are definite causes of cancer, alongside tobacco, the hepatitis B virus and chimney sweeping, among others.
A new analysis of about 20 studies concludes the risk of skin cancer jumps by 75 percent when people start using tanning beds before age 30. Experts also found that all types of ultraviolet radiation caused worrying mutations in mice, proof the radiation is carcinogenic. Previously, only one type of ultraviolet radiation was thought to be lethal.
The new classification means tanning beds and other sources of ultraviolet radiation are definite causes of cancer, alongside tobacco, the hepatitis B virus and chimney sweeping, among others.
About 2 years ago, dozens of workers at a large chicken hatchery in Arkansas began experiencing mysterious skin rashes, with painful lumps scattered over their hands, arms, and legs. "They hurt real bad," says Joyce Long, 48, a 32-year veteran of the hatchery, where until recently, workers handled eggs and chicks with bare hands. "When we went and got cultured, doctors told us we had a superbug." Its name, she learned, was MRSA, or methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus. This form of staph bacteria developed a mutation that resists antibiotics (including methicillin), making it hard to treat, even lethal. According to the CDC, certain types of MRSA infections kill 18,000 Americans a year--more than die from AIDS.
Comment: The end result of the study is the justification of pushing a new, poorly studied and generally unsafe vaccine onto an already vulnerable sub-population.