Showing posts tagged health

Angelina Jolie reveals double mastectomy in op-ed

Actress Angelina Jolie has written about her decision to have a preventative double mastectomy in a New York Times piece.

In the piece, Jolie writes:

My mother fought cancer for almost a decade and died at 56. She held out long enough to meet the first of her grandchildren and to hold them in her arms. But my other children will never have the chance to know her and experience how loving and gracious she was.

We often speak of “Mommy’s mommy,” and I find myself trying to explain the illness that took her away from us. They have asked if the same could happen to me. I have always told them not to worry, but the truth is I carry a “faulty” gene, BRCA1, which sharply increases my risk of developing breast cancer and ovarian cancer.

Read more here.

Sugary drinks tied to 180,000 deaths worldwide

MyHealthNewsDaily: Consumption of soda and other sugar-sweetened beverages may contribute to hundreds of thousands of deaths around the world, mainly due to type 2 diabetes, a new study says.

The results show sugar-sweetened beverage consumption is linked to 180,000 deaths a year worldwide, including 25,000 deaths a year in the United States, the researchers say. The study is being presented at a meeting of the American Heart Association.

Ark. House overrides veto of 12-week abortion ban

AP:

The Arkansas House on Wednesday voted to override Democratic Gov. Mike Beebe’s veto of a bill that would ban most abortions from the 12th week of pregnancy onward, giving the state the country’s most restrictive abortion laws and setting the stage for a certain court challenge.

A day after the Republican-led state Senate voted to override Beebe’s veto, the GOP-controlled House voted 56-33 to do the same. Only a simple majority was needed in each chamber.

Baby now free of HIV has doctors talking

NBC News: A baby born infected with the AIDS virus who got immediate treatment now has no detectable virus in her blood. Her case, presented to a meeting of AIDS researchers, will prompt questions about how early babies should be treated. It also illustrates the possibility that immediate treatment with HIV drugs could do a lot to protect those who are newly infected.

Dr. Deborah Persaud of the Johns Hopkins Children’s Center, the virologist who led the study, says scientists see this as the first well-documented case of a functional cure in a neonatal child.

Persaud says a functional cure means the virus isn’t entirely gone, but it’s also not doing any damage. Doctors believe it’s because they began therapy for the baby within 48 hours of being infected

Teenage highway deaths jumped in 2012

Washington Post: Teenagers are dying in car crashes at a much higher rate, particularly 16- and 17-year-olds. Their death rate jumped 19% nationwide, with 240 killed in the first 6 months of last year, according to a report by the Governors Highway Safety Association.

News that teenage deaths rose last year appears to foreshadow data showing that overall highway deaths increased in 2012, reversing several years of decline that were credited to vehicle and highway safety improvements and crackdowns on drunken and distracted driving.

Gatorade removing controversial ingredient following complaints AP reports: PepsiCo says it is removing a controversial ingredient from Gatorade following customer complaints. A spokeswoman for the company said the move was in the works for the past year and wasn’t a response to a recent petition on Change.org. The petition on Change.org noted that the ingredient, brominated vegetable oil, has been patented as a flame retardant and is banned in Japan and the European Union. PepsiCo’s spokeswoman says Gatorade uses the ingredient as an “emulsifier,” meaning it distributes flavoring more evenly so that it doesn’t collect at the surface. Brominated vegetable oil, or BVO, is still used in other PepsiCo drinks, such as Mountain Dew, she said. Photo: Wikipedia Commons, via National Post View high resolution

Gatorade removing controversial ingredient following complaints

AP reports: PepsiCo says it is removing a controversial ingredient from Gatorade following customer complaints. A spokeswoman for the company said the move was in the works for the past year and wasn’t a response to a recent petition on Change.org.

The petition on Change.org noted that the ingredient, brominated vegetable oil, has been patented as a flame retardant and is banned in Japan and the European Union. PepsiCo’s spokeswoman says Gatorade uses the ingredient as an “emulsifier,” meaning it distributes flavoring more evenly so that it doesn’t collect at the surface. Brominated vegetable oil, or BVO, is still used in other PepsiCo drinks, such as Mountain Dew, she said.

Photo: Wikipedia Commons, via National Post

Rules would retire most research chimpanzees NPR: A working group put together by the National Institutes of Health says most of its chimps, currently living in research facilities, should be retired. The group’s report says the retired chimps should be sent to a sanctuary, a non-laboratory setting where chimps can lead more natural lives. The group concludes only a small population of about 50 chimps need to be retained for any future research needs, with the animals living in social groups of at least seven. Those retained for research purposes should also have at least 1,000 square feet of living space, year-round access to the outdoors, as well as the ability to forage for food and build nests. The group also says any proposed research should go through a review committee that includes members of the public. Photo: A chimp is sedated to draw blood in efforts to find a cure for Hepatitis C, a potentially deadly virus, at Texas Biomedical Research Institute in San Antonio Texas. (NBC News)

Rules would retire most research chimpanzees

NPR: A working group put together by the National Institutes of Health says most of its chimps, currently living in research facilities, should be retired. The group’s report says the retired chimps should be sent to a sanctuary, a non-laboratory setting where chimps can lead more natural lives.

The group concludes only a small population of about 50 chimps need to be retained for any future research needs, with the animals living in social groups of at least seven. Those retained for research purposes should also have at least 1,000 square feet of living space, year-round access to the outdoors, as well as the ability to forage for food and build nests.

The group also says any proposed research should go through a review committee that includes members of the public.

Photo: A chimp is sedated to draw blood in efforts to find a cure for Hepatitis C, a potentially deadly virus, at Texas Biomedical Research Institute in San Antonio Texas. (NBC News)

Support grows for Roe vs. Wade

Wall Street Journal:

Seven in 10 Americans believe Roe v. Wade should stand, according to new data from a Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll, as the landmark Supreme Court abortion-rights ruling turns 40 on Tuesday.

That is the highest level of support for the decision, which established a woman’s right to an abortion, since polls began tracking it in 1989.

Flu season getting worse across US; 29 children killed so far The flu season is getting worse across the United States with 48 states reporting widespread geographic influenza activity, the Centers for Disease Control said in its weekly report. The season is hitting the elderly the hardest, but 29 children have also died so far. More than 5,000 people have been sick enough to be hospitalized, NBC News reports.More on the 2012-2013 US flu season on BreakingNews.com.Photo: Phamacist Prakash Deshpande injects Judith Echevarria with influenza vaccine at a Manhattan pharmacy. (Mario Tama/Getty Images)

Flu season getting worse across US; 29 children killed so far

The flu season is getting worse across the United States with 48 states reporting widespread geographic influenza activity, the Centers for Disease Control said in its weekly report.

The season is hitting the elderly the hardest, but 29 children have also died so far. More than 5,000 people have been sick enough to be hospitalized, NBC News reports.

More on the 2012-2013 US flu season on BreakingNews.com.

Photo: Phamacist Prakash Deshpande injects Judith Echevarria with influenza vaccine at a Manhattan pharmacy. (Mario Tama/Getty Images)

Inquest confirms Indian woman was denied abortion in Ireland Staff at Galway University Hospital have backed up claims by the husband of Savita Halappanavar that she had asked for and was refused an abortion at the hospital just days before she died last October. The Irish Times reports: Halappanavar had been 17 weeks pregnant when she presented at the hospital a week earlier with severe back pain and was found to be miscarrying.Her husband said, following her death, that she had been in pain and repeatedly asked for a medical termination over a three-day period but this was refused as a fetal heartbeat was still present and they were told “this is a Catholic country.”She died in the hospital’s intensive care unit, four days after the fetal heartbeat stopped. Photo: This handout picture from the Irish Times on November 14, 2012, shows Indian national Savita Halappanavar who died after being refused a termination of her pregnancy at a hospital in Galway. (AFP - Getty Images)

Inquest confirms Indian woman was denied abortion in Ireland

Staff at Galway University Hospital have backed up claims by the husband of Savita Halappanavar that she had asked for and was refused an abortion at the hospital just days before she died last October.

The Irish Times reports:

Halappanavar had been 17 weeks pregnant when she presented at the hospital a week earlier with severe back pain and was found to be miscarrying.

Her husband said, following her death, that she had been in pain and repeatedly asked for a medical termination over a three-day period but this was refused as a fetal heartbeat was still present and they were told “this is a Catholic country.”

She died in the hospital’s intensive care unit, four days after the fetal heartbeat stopped.

Photo: This handout picture from the Irish Times on November 14, 2012, shows Indian national Savita Halappanavar who died after being refused a termination of her pregnancy at a hospital in Galway. (AFP - Getty Images)

ER visits tied to energy drinks doubles since 2007, survey finds AP: A new government survey suggests the number of people seeking emergency treatment after consuming energy drinks has doubled nationwide during the past four years, the same period in which the supercharged drink industry has surged in popularity in convenience stores, bars and on college campuses. From 2007 to 2011, the government estimates the number of emergency room visits involving the neon-labeled beverages shot up from about 10,000 to more than 20,000. Most of those cases involved teens or young adults, according to a survey of the nation’s hospitals released late last week by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. Photo: Reza Estakhrian / Getty Images stock via NBCNews.com

ER visits tied to energy drinks doubles since 2007, survey finds

AP: A new government survey suggests the number of people seeking emergency treatment after consuming energy drinks has doubled nationwide during the past four years, the same period in which the supercharged drink industry has surged in popularity in convenience stores, bars and on college campuses.

From 2007 to 2011, the government estimates the number of emergency room visits involving the neon-labeled beverages shot up from about 10,000 to more than 20,000. Most of those cases involved teens or young adults, according to a survey of the nation’s hospitals released late last week by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration.

Photo: Reza Estakhrian / Getty Images stock via NBCNews.com

CDC: Flu spreads to 47 US states, but may be starting to wane Flu activity remains high across the US, but there are signs this year’s bad season may be waning in some areas, NBC News reports.Forty-seven states reported widespread flu activity as of the week ending Jan. 5, up from 41 the previous week. Twenty-four states and New York City reported high levels of flu, but that was down from 29 states the week before, according to new data released by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.Photo: Russell Waddley of Miami receives a flu shot in early December from Alina Pastoriza Garcia at a CVS pharmacy’s MinuteClinic. (Joe Raedle / Getty Images file)

CDC: Flu spreads to 47 US states, but may be starting to wane

Flu activity remains high across the US, but there are signs this year’s bad season may be waning in some areas, NBC News reports.

Forty-seven states reported widespread flu activity as of the week ending Jan. 5, up from 41 the previous week. Twenty-four states and New York City reported high levels of flu, but that was down from 29 states the week before, according to new data released by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Photo: Russell Waddley of Miami receives a flu shot in early December from Alina Pastoriza Garcia at a CVS pharmacy’s MinuteClinic. (Joe Raedle / Getty Images file)

Supreme Court won't block contraceptives coverage

NBC News: The U.S. Supreme Court has declined to put a temporary hold on a controversial provision in the new health care law requiring employers to provide health insurance coverage for contraceptives.

Two businesses challenging the act — the nationwide chain of 500 Hobby Lobby Stores and Mardel, a chain of Christian bookstores — contended that the law violates their religious freedom. Their legal battle is continuing over the merits of their claim. In the meantime, they asked the US Supreme Court to put a temporary hold on the law, which takes effect January 1, 2013.

On Wednesday, Justice Sonia Sotomayor, who handles emergency appeals from the courts where the companies are based, declined to grant an injunction.

Judge orders tobacco companies to admit deception Major tobacco companies have to take out advertisements saying they deliberately deceived the U.S. public about the danger and addictiveness of cigarettes, a federal judge ruled today. Reuters reports: The ruling in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia attempts to finalize the wording of the advertisements that the judge first ordered in 2006 after finding the companies violated federal racketeering law. Photo: Cigarette butts in an ashtray, seen in Los Angeles, California, on May 31, 2012. (Reuters / Jonathan Alcorn)

Judge orders tobacco companies to admit deception

Major tobacco companies have to take out advertisements saying they deliberately deceived the U.S. public about the danger and addictiveness of cigarettes, a federal judge ruled today.

Reuters reports:

The ruling in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia attempts to finalize the wording of the advertisements that the judge first ordered in 2006 after finding the companies violated federal racketeering law.

Photo: Cigarette butts in an ashtray, seen in Los Angeles, California, on May 31, 2012. (Reuters / Jonathan Alcorn)

Planned Parenthood sues Texas again over abortion funding Planned Parenthood is suing to void a Texas law that blocks public funds for affiliates of abortion providers, saying the measure will cost the state almost $200 million in federal health-care funding for poor women Bloomberg News reports: Today’s complaint in state court in Austin follows yesterday’s statement by Texas Governor Rick Perry that he will immediately move to cut off funding for Planned Parenthood after a federal appeals court refused to intervene. View high resolution

Planned Parenthood sues Texas again over abortion funding

Planned Parenthood is suing to void a Texas law that blocks public funds for affiliates of abortion providers, saying the measure will cost the state almost $200 million in federal health-care funding for poor women

Bloomberg News reports:

Today’s complaint in state court in Austin follows yesterday’s statement by Texas Governor Rick Perry that he will immediately move to cut off funding for Planned Parenthood after a federal appeals court refused to intervene.