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Fish-related ciguatoxin danger highlighted

Researchers report that 28 cases of ciguatera fish poisoning occurred in New York City during 2010–2011, a greater number than were reported during the preceding 10-year period.

6 Feb 2013

Fifth GOP governor backs Medicaid expansion

Ohio Gov. John Kasich announced Monday that he will push to expand Medicaid to cover more low-income Ohioans, as Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius pledged to fund such expansions longterm.

6 Feb 2013

BMJ examines why India's dengue epidemic continues to grow

This BMJ feature examines why India's dengue epidemic continues to grow worse each year, stating, "In the past decade, according to the National Vector Borne Disease Control Programme (NVBDCP), the number of cases has escalated steadily from 3,306 in 2001 to 47,209 in 2012," and "[d]eaths have risen from 53 in 2001 to 242 in 2012."

6 Feb 2013

Catholic hospital says its argument on fetuses was 'morally wrong'

A Catholic hospital is backtracking on its claim in court that two fetuses that died under its care were not human beings -- saying now that that argument was "morally wrong."

6 Feb 2013

Experimental TB vaccine does not protect infants, study shows

"Hopes that a much needed new tuberculosis [TB] vaccine was on the way, the first for 90 years, have been dashed by trial results showing it did not protect babies against the disease," the Guardian reports.

6 Feb 2013

Feds clear way for Fla. to enroll Medicaid recipients into private plans

The waiver approved by HHS means elderly people who need long-term care can be put in programs that will offer services in their homes and help them stay out of nursing homes, the Associated Press reports.

6 Feb 2013

Obama administration proposes eliminating 'obsolete' Medicare regs

Doing away with the regulations, which it has deemed are "excessively burdensome," would save an estimated $676 million a year, according to the administration. In other news, The Medicare NewsGroup examines the population of people with a permanent disability who also qualify for Medicare.

6 Feb 2013

Technology helps doctor unlock clues about illness's environmental causes

Epidemiologist David Van Sickle spent years studying asthma, but like many researchers of the chronic disease, he was frustrated by the obstacles to determining precise triggers of an individual attack. That frustration gave him an idea for a rescue inhaler topped with a GPS sensor.

6 Feb 2013

TB vaccine candidate trial results are 'landmark' in fight against disease

"Today marks an important landmark for the fight against tuberculosis (TB)," with the publication in the Lancet of clinical trial results showing the TB vaccine candidate MVA85A "was no more effective in protecting infants from developing pulmonary TB than" the standard Bacillus Calmette-Guerin (BCG) vaccine, Peggy Johnston, senior program officer at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, writes in the foundation's "Impatient Optimists" blog.

6 Feb 2013

Demand for family planning services growing in Malawi despite challenges

IRIN examines access to family planning services in Malawi, where women have an average of 5.8 children and the population is expected to grow from 15 million in 2010 to 50 million in 2050, according to the news service.

6 Feb 2013

South African government should take responsibility for HIV/AIDS treatment

Noting the many successes of PEPFAR, Stuart Rennie, co-principal investigator of NIH/Fogarty bioethics grants for the Democratic Republic of Congo and South Africa, writes in his "Global Bioethics Blog," "HIV requires lifelong treatment, and it is not healthy to have your existence depend on the decisions of a foreign government, especially an economically sputtering and lurching superpower."

6 Feb 2013

High-Level Panel on Post-2015 Development Agenda wraps up second meeting

The U.N. Secretary-General's High-Level Panel on the Post-2015 Development Agenda wrapped up its second meeting on Friday in Monrovia, Liberia, with British Prime Minister David Cameron, a co-chair of the panel, "saying it is possible to eradicate extreme poverty worldwide within our generation," Liberia's The Inquirer reports.

6 Feb 2013

Learning from development, global health failures critical for program successes

Noting that many development agencies and organizations publicly "document their triumphs and innovations," Sam Loewenberg, a 2012 Nieman Foundation global health reporting fellow at Harvard University, writes in a New York Times opinion piece.

6 Feb 2013

Researchers, organizations urge Secretary of State Kerry to support AIDS funding

"Saying they are 'gravely concerned about reports that the Obama Administration's FY 2014 budget requests for PEPFAR and the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria fail to provide adequate resources,' researchers and physicians from programs, centers and institutions leading the international AIDS response sent a letter to Secretary of State John Kerry Friday, urging him to speak up for funding that will back policy and pursue the goal of an AIDS-free generation," the Center for Global Health Policy's "Science Speaks" blog reports.

6 Feb 2013

GOP lawmakers at odds over strategies for spending cuts, broader party message

Republicans have little interest in Obama's desire to find more tax revenue to control deficits, and pledge they will fight for deeper spending cuts. Their promise of a 10-year balanced budget.

6 Feb 2013

CDC, State Department, World Bank should lead fight against fake, substandard TB drugs

"Thanks to billions of dollars spent on diagnosis and treatment of tuberculosis (TB) over the past decade, deaths and infections are slowly declining," but "fake and poorly made antibiotics are being widely used to treat tuberculosis," according to a study "to be published Tuesday in the International Journal of Tuberculosis and Lung Disease," Roger Bate, a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute and an author of the study, writes in a New York Times opinion piece.

6 Feb 2013

World Cancer Day provides opportunity to challenge assumptions that prevent effective action

"For the poor, cancer remains a silent killer. Breaking this silence could save hundreds of thousands and likely even millions of lives each year -- most of them in developing, low- and middle-income countries (LMICs)," Felicia Knaul, secretariat co-director of the Global Task Force on Expanded Access to Cancer Care and Control in Developing Countries, writes in the Huffington Post's "World" blog.

6 Feb 2013

Women in developed countries survive roughly 10 years longer after breast cancer diagnosis

Women in developed countries survive roughly 10 years longer after a breast cancer diagnosis compared to women in poor-to-middle-income countries, a new University of Michigan study suggests.

6 Feb 2013

Gates Foundation blog interviews director of aid effectiveness at Oxfam about new campaign

In a post in the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation's "Impatient Optimists" blog, Tom Scott, director of global brand and innovation at the foundation, and Gregory Adams, director of aid effectiveness at Oxfam, examine "why a new vision of aid is critical."

6 Feb 2013

Acute alcohol intoxication increases risk of suicide in American Indians

American Indians are at much greater risk of suicide after acute alcohol intoxication, according to a study led by researchers at The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston (UTHealth).

6 Feb 2013