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Candida yeast infections more common in men with schizophrenia or bipolar disorder

In a study prompted in part by suggestions from people with mental illness, Johns Hopkins researchers found that a history of Candida yeast infections was more common in a group of men with schizophrenia or bipolar disorder than in those without these disorders, and that women with schizophrenia or bipolar disorder who tested positive for Candida performed worse on a standard memory test than women with schizophrenia or bipolar disorder who had no evidence of past infection.

4 May 2016

Early exposure to pathogens may play pivotal role in immune system development

Exposure to pathogens early in life is beneficial to the education and development of the human immune system.

30 Apr 2016

Nepal, one year on – VSO heads up new recovery and reconstruction hub.

VSO and the UK government (DfID) have set up the ‘National Disaster Recovery Coordination Secretariat’ (NDRCS) in Kathmandu. It aims to help rebuild Nepal, following the devastation of two earthquakes (25th April and 12th May 2015) which claimed nearly 9,000 lives and left hundreds of thousands people homeless.

25 Apr 2016

New study demonstrates diversity, resourcefulness of Vibrio cholera

In humans, cholera is among the world's most deadly diseases, killing as many as 140,000 persons a year, according to World Health Organization statistics. But in aquatic environments far away from humans, the same bacterium attacks neighboring microbes with a toxic spear - and often steals DNA from other microorganisms to expand its own capabilities.

7 Apr 2016

GHIT Fund invests in two innovative malaria eradication tools

The Global Health Innovative Technology Fund (GHIT Fund) announced today that it’s investing US$1,383,785 in a pair of innovative malaria eradication tools—a vaccine that could block transmission of two species of the deadly disease and a rapid field test that can reveal a malaria infection in minutes.

1 Apr 2016

Health inequities become a persistent challenge as world’s urban population continues to grow

New data on the health of city-dwellers in almost 100 countries show that as the world’s urban population continues to grow, health inequities - especially between the richest and poorest urban populations - are a persistent challenge, according to a report by the World Health Organization and the United Nations Human Settlements Programme.

31 Mar 2016

UC Riverside researchers identify immune protein that protects the body from infections

Researchers in the School of Medicine at the University of California, Riverside have identified an immune protein in mice that is quickly triggered in the body following infection and serves to protect the body's tissues. Called "RELMalpha," this protein, whose homologue in humans is called "resistin," is responsible more for protecting the body than attacking the parasite.

30 Mar 2016

New report finds 'double burden of malnutrition’ in South East Asia

A joint report from UNICEF, WHO and ASEAN has shed new light on the nutrition situation of children across South East Asia. The report finds that several ASEAN countries are facing simultaneous crises of over and undernutrition, with some children overweight while their peers suffer from stunting and wasting.

29 Mar 2016

Parasitic flatworm rejuvenates its skin to survive in human bloodstream

A parasitic flatworm that infects hundreds of millions of people in the developing world is able to survive in the bloodstream for decades by constantly renewing its skin - a mechanism that could inform potential new treatments against infection.

23 Mar 2016

ICUH 2016 aims to improve health in cities worldwide

Hundreds of researchers, educators, community leaders, practitioners, and policy makers from all regions of the world will convene in San Francisco, California from April 1-4 to advance understanding of actions needed to improve health and health equity in cities worldwide.

21 Mar 2016

Excessive growth of bacteria in small intestine could lead to stunting in young children

Excessive growth of bacteria in the small intestine could be damaging the guts of young children, leading to stunting, scientists from the U.S. and Bangladesh have discovered.

22 Feb 2016

UNICEF launches US $2.8 billion appeal to meet the needs of children in crisis

In the Pacific Islands, many children don’t have enough safe water to drink and their education has been interrupted as result of the severe, ongoing El Niño.

27 Jan 2016

Areas stricken by extreme poverty more likely to be associated with high rates of Ebola transmission

Since October 2014 the Ebola epidemic in West Africa has been diminishing and efforts have shifted from emergency response to prevention and mitigation of future outbreaks. Researchers from the Liberian Ministry of Health and the Yale Center for Infectious Disease Modelling and Analysis evaluated 3532 Ebola cases reported in 2014 in order to quantify the impact of poverty on the transmission and spread of Ebola.

4 Jan 2016

New study pinpoints five top risk factors responsible for undernutrition among children in India

In India, nearly 40% of all children are stunted--of extremely low height for their age--and nearly 30% are underweight. A new study from Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health has now pinpointed the five top risk factors responsible for more than two-thirds of the problem.

18 Dec 2015

New research sheds light on how gut damage can cause malnutrition, oral vaccine failure

It has been estimated that if every nutritional measure known to be helpful were applied to every child in the world, global malnutrition would be decreased by only a third. New research from the University of Virginia School of Medicine, the University of Vermont and the International Centre for Diarrhoeal Disease Research in Bangladesh sheds light on why: Damage to the gut from infection explains why food alone is not a solution to malnutrition.

15 Dec 2015

Experts call for radical action to assure health for entire India

A paper published in The Lancet today calls for a radical transformation in the architecture of India’s healthcare delivery system, if the country is to achieve the government’s vision of assuring health for all.

15 Dec 2015

Leading University of Leicester experts to discuss climate issues at Framing the Climate Crisis event

Leading experts from the University of Leicester will be discussing prominent environmental issues - including how air pollution will become the world's top environmental cause of premature death in the coming decades - at an event on Wednesday 25 November.

23 Nov 2015

Roundworm infection increases fertility among women in the Amazon

Parasitic worms can live inside humans gaining nourishment from the food we ingest (roundworms) or from our blood (hook worms), whilst being safe from predators. Although roundworm infections are generally symptomless they are not something any of us would choose to have. However, it has recently been found that infection with roundworm increases a woman's fertility.

20 Nov 2015

WHO: Strong actions needed to address climate change to protect people's health

According to WHO estimates, climate change is already causing tens of thousands of deaths every year - from shifting patterns of disease, from extreme weather events, such as heat-waves and floods, and from the degradation of air quality, food and water supplies, and sanitation.

18 Nov 2015

Deaths from avoidable risk factors: an interview with Dr Ali Mokdad, IHME

The study showed that about thirty percent to maybe half of the leading causes of death in the world are preventable. These are risk factors that you could manage and thus you could prevent a lot of premature deaths.

3 Nov 2015