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Hoyer objects to Medicare cost control plan

House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, D-Md., said he disagrees with President Obama's support of transferring Congress's price-setting powers over Medicare to the Medicare Payment Advisory Commission (MedPAC), which now acts as an advisory panel, USA Today reports.

5 Jun 2009

GOP balking at public plan in health care reform

Inclusion of a government-run public insurance plan to compete with private insurers could endanger bipartisan support of a health care reform bill as Republicans stand firm against it, The Associated Press reports.

5 Jun 2009

Senate Finance ‘Dems’ back public plan, ‘Blue Dogs’ back away

Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., chairman of the Finance Committee expects the Senate's health care overhaul proposal to include a public health insurance plan, Dow Jones Newswire reports, adding that Baucus was "following the lead of President Obama and drawing a line in the sand on the controversial issue." The President strongly supported the public option in a letter to senators Wednesday.

5 Jun 2009

WHO recommends worldwide use of rotavirus vaccine for children

To reduce an estimated half million deaths and two million hospitalizations from diarrhea caused by rotavirus each year, the WHO on Friday recommended that oral rotavirus vaccines be added to national childhood immunization programs, broadening access to the vaccine in the developing world, Reuters reports.

5 Jun 2009

International HIV/AIDS experts to meet in Namibia next week

Thousands of international HIV/AIDS experts will convene in Windhoek, Namibia, next week for a five-day meeting focused on HIV/AIDS, New Era reports.

5 Jun 2009

Articles examine use of mobile phones for global health

The Economist examines how mobile phones could be used to detect the spread of diseases worldwide. According to the Economist, "[t]he world’s 4 billion mobile phones could be turned into sensors on a global data-collection network" and aid workers, engineers and several other professionals "are now building systems that use handsets to sense, monitor and even predict population movements, environmental hazards and public-health threats."

5 Jun 2009

Officials concerned about potential disease outbreaks among displaced Pakistanis; Obama requests more U.S. aid money

U.N. officials on Thursday expressed growing concern about potential disease outbreaks among the two million displaced Pakistanis and warned that aid money is running out, AFP/Yahoo! News reports (AFP/Yahoo! News, 6/4).

5 Jun 2009

Tuberculosis booster vaccine trials to begin next month In South Africa

A new two-year trial to test a tuberculosis vaccine aimed at boosting the efficacy of the BCG vaccine is scheduled to begin soon in South Africa, IRIN reports (IRIN, 6/4).

5 Jun 2009

HOPE welcomes NAO report on supporting adults with autism

The NAO today published a major report, "Supporting people with autism through adulthood". HOPE, the charity for adults with autism and learning disabilities, sees this important report as a blueprint for improving the lives of people with autism.

5 Jun 2009

New imaging technique: toward spinal cord regeneration?

The axon is a part of the neuron through which nerve impulses are transmitted, and at the end of which is located the synapse, which connects it to another neuron. In the event of a lesion, the axon is the component which must be regenerated in order to restore the connections between the different neurons and re-form the nerve.

5 Jun 2009

WHO recommends global use of rotavirus vaccines - can protect millions of children from diarrhoeal diseaseas

The World Health Organization (WHO) has recommended that rotavirus vaccination be included in all national immunization programmes to provide protection against a virus that is responsible for more than 500,000 diarrhoeal deaths and 2 million hospitalizations every year among children. More than 85% of these deaths occur in developing countries in Africa and Asia. This new policy will help ensure access to rotavirus vaccines in the world's poorest countries.

5 Jun 2009

Greater oversight needed in sharing of genetic information online

With just $399 and a bit of saliva in a cup, consumers can learn about their genetic risk for diseases from breast cancer to diabetes. Now, thanks to social networking sites set up by personal genomics companies, they can also share that information with family, friends and even strangers on the Internet.

5 Jun 2009

Middle-aged women experience more stress but have lower blood pressure

The study is part of the Prospective Population Study of Women in Gothenburg, Sweden. This study was initiated at the end of the 1960s, when 1,462 middle-aged women were examined, and interviewed about their lifestyle and other matters.

5 Jun 2009

Drug-resistant tuberculosis a very real threat in the Pacific region

Health officials in the Pacific are concerned about two new strains of tuberculosis - multi drug-resistant tuberculosis (MDR-TB) and extensively drug-resistant tuberculosis (XDR-TB) - both strains have been found to be resistant to the two most powerful drugs that have been used to treat tuberculosis (TB) for the past five decades.

5 Jun 2009

Alcohol and smoking the culprits in bowel cancer

Each year, worldwide around one million new cases of bowel (colorectal) cancer are diagnosed and more than half a million people die from the disease.

4 Jun 2009

Eyes provide clues to a common cause of stroke

In a groundbreaking study researchers have concluded that evidence of the cause of "lacunar stroke" can be found by looking at the back of a patient's eyes.

4 Jun 2009

Keep Grandad away from the pokies!

According to Australian researchers easier access to gambling venues has influenced the rise in the number of older adults with gambling problems but there is more to the issue.

4 Jun 2009

Delays to seeing docs stretch on

A new study finds the average wait for a medical appointment has increased by more than a week since 2004, to 8.6 days, USA Today reports.

4 Jun 2009

Hackers going after medical records

Hackers raided a server at the University of California, Berkeley last fall, stealing everything from Social Security numbers to immunization records in an episode that highlights one danger of moving health information from file cabinets to cyberspace, Forbes reports in a first-person account by one of the 160,000 victims.

4 Jun 2009

Medical bills underlie 60 percent of U.S. bankruptcies

"Medical bills are involved in more than 60 percent of U.S. personal bankruptcies, an increase of 50 percent in just six years, U.S. researchers reported on Thursday," according to Reuters.

4 Jun 2009