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Many anti-malaria drugs in Africa fake or substandard, reports show

"Many of Africa's anti-malaria drugs are fake or of poor quality, weakening a crucial battle against the world's deadliest disease, a new investigation has found," GlobalPost reports, adding, "Many of the drugs -- even those approved by the World Health Organization -- are Chinese fakes or low-quality variants that failed quality tests, according to two new studies released today."

12 Jul 2012

Mayo Clinic, 18 other leading research institutions urge Congress to maintain funding levels for NIH

Mayo Clinic and 18 other leading medical research institutions nationwide are urging congressional leaders to maintain current funding levels for the National Institutes of Health.

12 Jul 2012

Obama administration's intellectual property policy inflating medical costs abroad

Noting that the Supreme Court last week upheld the Obama administration's Affordable Health Act, Huffington Post reporters Zach Carter and Sabrina Siddiqui write in this Huffington Post editorial that "while the president has focused on lowering health care costs at home, he has repeatedly sought to impose higher drug prices abroad." They add, "For pharmaceutical companies, that has meant steady profits, but for the global poor in desperate need of affordable drugs, those lofty prices are often a matter of life and death."

12 Jul 2012

BGI, BioMed Central launch GigaScience journal

BGI, the world's largest genome sequencing institute, and their publishing partner BioMed Central, a leader in scientific data sharing, announce the launch of a new journal, GigaScience, which publishes large-scale biological research in a unique format.

12 Jul 2012

Lifestyle behaviour in adolescents may adversely affect BP and cardiovascular risk in adulthood

Lifestyle behaviour in adolescents may adversely affect blood pressure and cardiovascular risk in adulthood, according to results from a large pregnancy follow-up study in Australia. In particular, alcohol consumption among boys, use of the Pill among girls, and high salt intake and increasing body mass index (BMI) in both sexes were important factors linked to blood pressure levels in late adolescence.

12 Jul 2012

Moderate alcohol intake may reduce risk of osteoporosis in postmenopausal women

Drinking a moderate amount of alcohol as part of a healthy lifestyle may benefit women's bone health, lowering their risk of developing osteoporosis.

12 Jul 2012

Johns Hopkins Berman Institute of Bioethics receives pilot project award from PCORI

The Johns Hopkins Berman Institute of Bioethics has been received one of 50 pilot project awards by the Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute (PCORI) to study stakeholder views of streamlined informed consent options for comparative effectiveness research (CER) studies.

12 Jul 2012

Prenatal and early childhood exposure to PCE may be associated with long-term visual impairments

Prenatal and early childhood exposure to the chemical solvent tetrachloroethylene (PCE) found in drinking water may be associated with long-term visual impairments, particularly in the area of color discrimination, a new study led by Boston University School of Public Health (BUSPH) researchers has found.

12 Jul 2012

Man Therapy launches in Colorado

Man Therapy, a groundbreaking new approach to suicide prevention and other men's mental health issues, was launched in Colorado today. Man Therapy reshapes the conversation, using humor to cut through stigma and tackle issues like depression, divorce and even suicidal thoughts head on, the way a man would do it.

12 Jul 2012

Viewpoints: Trouble keeping health costs down; Ignagni says law needs some revisions; Coverage is like clean water

Now that the Supreme Court has provided legal certainty on the recent healthcare reform law, the nation must turn its attention to affordability. While the law expands coverage to millions of Americans, a goal health plans have long supported, major provisions of the law need to be changed to avoid significant cost increases for consumers and employers.

12 Jul 2012

Secure protocol allows linking of patient records without revealing personal information

Monitoring the effectiveness of the HPV vaccine in Canada requires that data from multiple registries and other data sources be combined. Linking registries can be problematic, however, since they are often managed by unrelated organizations. Privacy legislation may also restrict the sharing of data for such linkages.

12 Jul 2012

Arrowhead initiates Adipotide Phase 1 trial in obesity

Arrowhead Research Corporation, a targeted therapeutics company, today announced that the first patient has been dosed in a Phase 1 clinical trial with Adipotide, a new class of treatment for obesity.

11 Jul 2012

Anemia prevention in pregnancy works just as well with fewer iron supplements

Taking iron supplements one to three times a week instead of every day is just as effective at preventing anaemia in pregnant women, according to the findings of a new Cochrane systematic review. The authors of the review also showed that women experienced fewer side effects when taking iron supplements intermittently rather than daily.

11 Jul 2012

FDA clears Asthmapolis’ sensor system and associated software

Asthmapolis announced today that it has received U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) 510(k) clearance to market its asthma sensor system and associated software to healthcare providers and their patients.

11 Jul 2012

African-American youths in public housing communities more likely to use tobacco

Today, nearly 4,000 adolescents in the United States will smoke their first cigarette, and about a fourth of those youth will become daily smokers, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services reports. A recent study by a University of Missouri researcher found that African-American youths who live in public housing communities are 2.3 times more likely to use tobacco than other African-American youths.

11 Jul 2012

Clinical preventive services increase by IPHR

Patients who use an interactive personal health record (IPHR) are almost twice as likely to be up to date with clinical preventive services as those who do not, according to a new study led by Alex Krist, M.D., M.P.H., research member of the Cancer Prevention and Control program at Virginia Commonwealth University Massey Cancer Center.

11 Jul 2012

HIV and AIDS treatment: An interview with Charles Flexner, MD

The best estimates at the moment reckon that there are about 25 million people infected with HIV. Most of those are in resource-limited settings, including sub-Saharan Africa, South East Asia and India.

11 Jul 2012

July issue of Health Affairs examining PEPFAR impact to be discussed at briefing on Tuesday

The July 2012 issue of Health Affairs, published Monday, examines the impact of PEPFAR, focusing on "the origins of the program; the lessons learned from implementation; the successes achieved in terms of human health and well-being; and the opportunities that now exist to lay the groundwork for an 'AIDS-free generation,'" the Health Affairs Blog reports, noting, "The new Health Affairs issue will be discussed Tuesday morning at a Washington, D.C., briefing."

11 Jul 2012

Study refutes link between depression and Facebook use

A study of university students is the first evidence to refute the supposed link between depression and the amount of time spent on Facebook and other social-media sites.

11 Jul 2012

African leaders should 'take action' to implement human-rights based laws, policies to enhance HIV response

Noting the release of a report from the Global Commission on HIV and the Law showing that "punitive laws are standing in the way of effective AIDS responses," Festus Mogae, former president of Botswana, and Stephen Lewis, co-director and co-founder of AIDS-Free World, both members of the commission, write in a health-e opinion piece, "We cannot hope for an HIV-free generation when we have laws that marginalize and punish those most vulnerable to the disease."

11 Jul 2012

Public Health News and Research

Many anti-malaria drugs in Africa fake or substandard, reports show

Mayo Clinic, 18 other leading research institutions urge Congress to maintain funding levels for NIH

Obama administration's intellectual property policy inflating medical costs abroad

BGI, BioMed Central launch GigaScience journal

Lifestyle behaviour in adolescents may adversely affect BP and cardiovascular risk in adulthood

Moderate alcohol intake may reduce risk of osteoporosis in postmenopausal women

Johns Hopkins Berman Institute of Bioethics receives pilot project award from PCORI

Prenatal and early childhood exposure to PCE may be associated with long-term visual impairments

Man Therapy launches in Colorado

Viewpoints: Trouble keeping health costs down; Ignagni says law needs some revisions; Coverage is like clean water

Secure protocol allows linking of patient records without revealing personal information

Arrowhead initiates Adipotide Phase 1 trial in obesity

Anemia prevention in pregnancy works just as well with fewer iron supplements

FDA clears Asthmapolis’ sensor system and associated software

African-American youths in public housing communities more likely to use tobacco

Clinical preventive services increase by IPHR

HIV and AIDS treatment: An interview with Charles Flexner, MD

July issue of Health Affairs examining PEPFAR impact to be discussed at briefing on Tuesday

Study refutes link between depression and Facebook use

African leaders should 'take action' to implement human-rights based laws, policies to enhance HIV response

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