Point-click-drink: It’s that easy for teens
The Internet is providing a new avenue for underage drinking. Results of a new survey confirm that millions of teenagers either buy alcohol online or know an underage friend who does.
A related audit of states shows that many state legislators are easing restrictions on online alcohol sales with little monitoring or oversight.
“This is a dangerous situation,” said Stan Hastings chairman of the Wine and Spirits Wholesales of America, Inc. (WSWA), the trade group that commissioned the survey.
State Health Department Web Sites Remain Unavailable to Many
State health department Web sites have become more user-friendly over the past five years, but too many sites are still hard to read, only available in English and inaccessible to people with disabilities, a new report concludes.
“People in particular need of up-to-date and accurate health care information appear least able to share in the benefits of online government resources,” say researchers Darrell West, Ph.D., and Edward Alan Miller, Ph.D., of Brown University.
Their study appears in the latest issue of the Journal of Health Care for the Poor and Underserved.
British farmer dies from rabbit flu
An apparently healthy young farmer in Britain has died from rabbit flu.
John Freeman, a 29-year-old farmer, died earlier this month from blood poisoning which he contracted from a rabbit he picked up on his farm after shooting it.
Mr. Freeman of Aspall near Stowmarket in Suffolk, is believed to be Britain’s first rabbit flu victim.
Subsidy for breast cancer drug
A LIFE-saving drug that has been costing breast cancer victims more than $50,000 a year is to be subsidised by the Federal Government.
Health Minister Tony Abbott said today Cabinet had agreed to place the breast cancer treatment Herceptin on the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme (PBS) from October 1 for women suffering “positive early stage” cancer.
The move will cost the Government $470 million over the next four years and is expected to help about 2000 Australian women a year.
New Approach Assesses Risk of Water-Borne Pathogen Disease
Researchers at the University of California, San Diego (UCSD) School of Medicine, along with colleagues at the University Peruana Cayetano Heredia in Lima, Peru, have developed a novel approach for assessing the risk to humans of acquiring leptospirosis - a severe, water-borne disease that is the common cause of severe jaundice, renal failure and lung hemorrhage in urban areas throughout the developing world - from environmental water exposure.
The approach, which uses advanced molecular methods to measure risk for infection, may also be applicable to other water-borne bacterial diseases. The findings will be published on line August 21 in advance of the September issue of the journal Public Library of Science (PLoS) Medicine.
“What we found supported our hypothesis that severe leptospirosis in the Peruvian Amazon is associated with higher concentrations of more virulent forms of the bacteria at sites of exposure and transmission,” said Joseph Vinetz, M.D., Associate Professor of Medicine in UCSD’s Division of Infectious Diseases.
Diet changes may slow recurrent prostate cancer
When prostate cancer recurs, eating a plant-based diet and reducing stress may help slow progression of the disease, a new study shows.
Writing in the journal Integrative Cancer Therapies, Dr. Gordon A. Saxe of the Moores UCSD Cancer Center in La Jolla, California and colleagues note that hormone treatment may be used to extend survival when prostate cancer returns. However, they add, the treatment reduces sex drive, causes hot flashes and weakens bones.
The researchers investigated whether a plant-based diet might be another way to slow the advance of recurrent prostate cancer, because the typical “Western” diet high in animal protein and low in plant foods has been seen to boost the progression of the disease.
TV may dull kids’ pain from needles
Some consider TV mind-numbing, but pediatric researchers have found it may be pain-numbing as well.
In a study of 69 children undergoing blood tests, Italian researchers found that when they showed kids cartoons during the procedure, it distracted them enough to ease their pain.
The finding may not come as a surprise to parents who’ve seen their child entranced by the TV screen. What may surprise them is the finding that mothers couldn’t soothe their children nearly as well as television did.
China debates first anti-drug law
Chinese lawmakers on Tuesday began debating the country’s first bill specifically designed to crack down on drugs that flood across China’s borders.
“It is important to introduce such a law as China is now facing a grave situation in drug control,” Xinhua news agency quoted Zhang Xinfeng, vice minister of public security, as telling the standing committee of China’s rubber stamp parliament.
The country was estimated to have more than 700,000 heroin addicts, Xinhua said, with most the drugs coming from the Golden Triangle area that includes Myanmar and Laos, and the Golden Crescent along the Pakistan and Afghan frontiers.
Glaxo adds strong heart risk warning to ADHD drug
GlaxoSmithKline Plc has said it will add a strong warning about possible heart risk to its attention deficit hyperactivity drug Dexedrine, according to a letter posted on the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s Web site on Monday.
Packaging for the drug will also include information about possible psychiatric adverse events, like hallucinations and mania, linked to stimulants, according to the letter dated August 4.
Inclusion of the new warning comes after two FDA advisory panels offered conflicting opinions over how strong such warnings should be.
