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 New research from the University of Cincinnati (UC) implicates the primary chemical used to produce hard plastics—bisphenol A (BPA)—as a risk factor for metabolic syndrome and its consequences.
In a laboratory study, using fresh human fat tissues, the UC team found that BPA suppresses a key hormone, adiponectin, which is responsible for regulating insulin sensitivity in the body and puts people at a substantially higher risk for metabolic syndrome. Science Daily
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Toddlers received the recommended vaccinations against childhood diseases at record levels in 2007, federal health officials said on Thursday, as they urged parents to continue to trust vaccine safety.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention issued its report on vaccination rates for children ages 1 1/2 through 3 a day after another study came out showing no link between autism and the vaccine given to guard against measles, mumps and rubella.
A record 77.4 percent of children in this age group received the full recommended series of vaccinations, the centers said.
Ninety percent of children got all but one of the six individual vaccines in the series, it said.
The one exception was the four doses of diphtheria, tetanus and pertussis or whooping cough vaccine, received by 84.5 percent of toddlers, the centers said. The New York Time
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 Eleven refugees, who left Sudan as children, were raised in Cuba, and educated in medicine in Canada, now return to Sudan, where they may help improve medical conditions, according to a Comment released on September 5, 2008 in The Lancet.
The authors of this piece, Dr Rodney Crutcher, Health Sciences Centre, University of Calgary, Canada, and colleagues, describe the story of these eleven students. In 1985, amidst war in the Sudan, they were chosen as a group of 600 children chosen to be educated in Cuba with the hopes of returning later in life. Grants were given to 25 students by the Cuban government for a medical education there, and then sent to Canada as refugees. Medical News Today
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The FDA today ordered stronger warnings about the risk of potentially deadly fungal infections, especially one called histoplasmosis, in people taking the drugs Cimzia, Enbrel, Humira, and Remicade, which are called TNF blockers.
The FDA has received 240 reports of patients taking TNF blockers who developed histoplasmosis, a fungal infection that starts as a respiratory infection and can spread throughout the body.
Of those 240 patients, 45 patients died, including at least 12 who hadn't been diagnosed with histoplasmosis right away, according to Jeffrey Siegel, MD, clinical team leader in the division of anesthesia, analgesia, and rheumatology products at the FDA's Center for Drug Evaluation and Research. The histoplasmosis patients ranged in age from 8 to 86 years; none of the deaths involved children.
The FDA wants patients and doctors to watch for signs and symptoms of histoplasmosis, including persistent fever, cough, shortness of breath, and fatigue.
"Our advice to patients is don't hesitate to call your doctor if you see these signs and symptoms that are related to these types of infection," Siegel said at a news conference today. WebMD |
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 Treating low-income mothers for depression, stress and anxiety could help combat the childhood obesity epidemic and reduce the number of teenagers developing type 2 diabetes and heart problems, a study has found.
About 1.5 million Australian children, or one in four, are overweight or obese, putting huge demand on the health system. Last month the Children's Hospital at Westmead became one of the first in the world to appoint a doctor dedicated to treating overweight children.
The prevalence of cheap fast food and computer games have been blamed for the obesity crisis.
However, a study published in this month's Pediatrics journal found many children were overweight or obese because their mothers were stressed, anxious or depressed and had little patience or energy to enforce healthy eating habits. It found that the more stressed a mother was, the more likely it was her child would be overweight or obese. Style & Life
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 Scientists have revealed the earliest developmental changes that lead to Down's syndrome.
The team from Barts and the Royal London say the changes to embryonic stem cells are caused by the presence of an extra copy of chromosome 21.
The study, in the American Journal of Human Genetics, says the extra chromosome sets off a chain of genetic changes in the developing embryo.
The Down's Syndrome Association welcomed the "excellent" research.
Down syndrome belongs to a group of conditions called "aneuploidies", which are defined by an abnormal loss or gain of genetic material, such as fragments of chromosomes or whole chromosomes.
Aneuploidies cause congenital anomalies that are a prime cause of infant death in Europe and the US, and are currently on the increase with advancing maternal age in European countries.
Around one in every 1,000 babies born in the UK will have Down's syndrome.
There are 60,000 people in the UK with the condition. BBC News
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Most can be controlled, but you need to know what triggers them, experts say
If you are one of the 36 million Americans who suffer from seasonal allergies, there is nowhere in the United States that is free from pollen and other allergens this fall, a new report shows.
Allergies don't only happen in the spring, they can be bothersome in other seasons as well. In the fall, the most challenging cities to live in are Greensboro, N.C., Greenville, S.C., Little Rock, Ark., Raleigh-Durham, N.C., and Jackson, Miss., according to the report from the Asthma and Allergy Foundation of America. USA Today
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 If there's one thing that everyone knows about newborn babies, it's that they don't sleep through the night, and neither do their parents. But in fact, those first six months of life are crucial to developing the regular sleeping and waking patterns, known as circadian rhythms, that a child will need for a healthy future.
Some children may start life with the sleep odds stacked against them, though, say University of Michigan sleep experts who study the issue. They will present data from their study next week at the European Sleep Research Society meeting in Glasgow, Scotland.
Babies whose mothers experienced depression any time before they became pregnant, or developed mood problems while they were pregnant, are much more prone to having chaotic sleep patterns in the first half-year of life than babies born to non-depressed moms, the team has found. Science Daily
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The Food and Drug Administration ordered stronger warnings Thursday on four medications widely used to treat rheumatoid arthritis and other serious illnesses, saying they can raise the risk of possibly fatal fungal infections.
The drugs — Enbrel, Remicade, Humira and Cimzia — work by suppressing the immune system to keep it from attacking the body. For patients with rheumatoid arthritis, the treatment provides relief from swollen and painful joints, but it is “a double-edged sword,” said Dr. Jeffrey Siegel of the drug agency. That is because the drugs also lower the body’s defenses to infections.
Dr. Siegel, who heads the office that oversees arthritis drugs, said the agency became concerned after discovering that doctors seemed to be overlooking a kind of fungal infection called histoplasmosis. Of 240 cases reported to the agency in which patients taking one of the four drugs developed this infection, 45 died. That is about 20 percent. The New York Time
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 Mexico City once topped lists of places with the worst air pollution in the world. Although efforts to curb emissions have improved the situation, tiny particles called aerosols still clog the air. Now, atmospheric scientists from UC San Diego and six other institutions have sorted through the pall that hangs over the city to precisely identify aerosols that make up the haze and chart daily patterns of changes to the mix.
This forensic work will help to identify the sources of these persistent pollutants, which plague other megacities in places like China and India as well. With this information, leaders will be better able to develop policies that will effectively clear the air. Medical News Today
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Are fewer Americans using illicit drugs? How many people are binge or heavy drinkers?
To answer those questions and more, a new federal government study takes a look at trends in drug, alcohol, and tobacco use across the nation.
The 2007 National Survey on Drug Use and Health: National Findings is being released by the Department of Health and Human Services.
The survey showa that people aged 18 to 25 are using less cocaine and methamphetamine, but they are using more prescription pain relievers recreationally compared to 2006.
Baby boomers aged 55 to 59 more than doubled their use of illicit drugs since 2002 (from 1.9% to 4.1%).
Health and Human Services Secretary Mike Leavitt says in a news release that the figures reflect a positive move overall, but that there's still work to be done. "These results confirm that progress has been made, particularly regarding substance abuse among younger Americans."
He adds, "The report also reminds us of the importance of our efforts to provide substance abuse treatment to those in need and to encourage health care professionals to identify people who are at risk for developing substance abuse problems and intervene early."
The survey was given to about 67,500 people aged 12 and older. WebMD
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 Technology to reveal dangerous changes in blood pressure during delicate brain surgery is under development.
The British project could make complex operations safer, New Scientist magazine reports.
It relies on a combination of scans and massive computing power to predict how the brain's blood vessels will respond to surgery.
The brain is supplied by a complex tangle of tiny blood vessels, and a surgeon who wants to deal with an abnormality must navigate through these.
The University College London team said the simulation could one day spot those at highest risk of a fatal aneurysm. BBC News
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