China rushes in vaccine after deadly bird flu found
China has rushed more than three million doses of bird flu vaccine to a remote western province after migratory birds were found dead from the H5N1 strain which can be fatal to humans, state media said on Monday.
Poultry across Qinghai province, neighbouring Tibet and Xinjiang, had become the “target of a compulsory vaccination campaign”, the China Daily newspaper said.
Scientists had proved that the virus killed scores of geese in Qinghai in early May, media said at the weekend, the first report of H5N1 detected in China since last year.
Resveratrol may have anti-flu activity
Resveratrol, a chemical found in red grapes, blocks replication of the influenza virus in cell culture and in animals, Italian researchers report.
“Resveratrol merits further investigation as a potential weapon for combating the growing threat of influenza,” Dr. Anna Teresa Palamara of the Institute of Microbiology in Rome and colleagues conclude.
In cell culture experiments, resveratrol prevented influenza from replicating.
U.N. adopts new rules to curb disease spread
Possible travel and trade restrictions to help prevent deadly diseases such as bird flu or SARS crossing borders were among new rules approved by member states of the World Health Organization on Monday.
The regulations, adopted by the U.N. agency’s 192 member states after two years of negotiations, oblige countries to tighten up disease detection and set guidelines for international measures to be taken.
Computers no cure-all for drug errors
Even with computerized systems for ordering and checking medications, a high rate of adverse drug events (ADEs) occurs, according to a report released today.
Several reports have shown that computerized ordering is useful in reducing medication errors, but the impact such systems have on adverse drug events was unclear, investigators explain in the Archives of Internal Medicine.
Bird flu kills Vietnamese, toll hits 18 since Dec
Bird flu may have claimed the life of a Vietnamese man in the past week, bringing the country’s toll to 18 since the latest outbreak in late December, health officials said on Monday.
A provincial health official told Reuters preliminary tests by the Hanoi-based National Institute of Hygiene and Epidemiology had confirmed the 46-year-old man from the northern province of Hung Yen died last Thursday at a Hanoi hospital from bird flu.
The official said by telephone from Hung Yen, 64 km (40 miles) southeast of Hanoi, that the man was admitted to hospital a week ago with a high fever and coughing.
Iodine pills curb radiation-induced cancer risk
A study confirms that exposure in childhood to radioactive iodines, mainly iodine-131, increases the risk of thyroid cancer and suggests that both iodine deficiency and iodine supplementation may be important and independent modifiers of this risk.
These results have important public health implications, researchers say. They think, based on their study, that giving iodine pills to iodine-deficient populations may substantially reduce the risk of thyroid cancer from radioactive iodine exposure in childhood that may occur after radiation accidents or during medical diagnostic and therapeutic procedures.
