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Congress works on tariff-lowering legislation for Haiti as Preval meets with U.S. leaders in Washington

The Senate Finance Committee's chair, Max Baucus (D-Mont.), and top Republican, Charles Grassley (Iowa), are working with colleagues in the House on legislation that would lower tariffs in an effort to help Haiti's apparel industry and help the country recover from the major January earthquake, CQ Politics reports.

11 Mar 2010

WHO's updated malaria guidelines include rapid diagnosis, new ACT

The WHO on Tuesday released new guidelines for the treatment of malaria, which recommend "parasitological testing before treatment begins" and add "a new artemisinin based combination treatment [ACT] to the list of prescribed drugs," BMJ News reports.

11 Mar 2010

Poor, minority adults with chronic kidney disease face increase risk of developing ESRD

Chronic kidney disease (CKD) afflicts a large number of younger minority adults receiving medical care in settings that serve the uninsured and underinsured (settings collectively known as the healthcare safety net). Poor, minority adults with moderate to severe CKD are also two to four times more likely to progress to kidney failure than non-Hispanic whites.

11 Mar 2010

$TLCVision to incorporate TearLab Osmolarity System to study DED in refractive surgery centers$

TLCVision to incorporate TearLab Osmolarity System to study DED in refractive surgery centers

OccuLogix, Inc., dba TearLab Corporation, announced today that TLCVision Corporation, North America's premier eye care services company, will be incorporating the TearLab™ Osmolarity System in eight of its U.S. refractive surgery centers to study Dry Eye Disease symptoms as they relate to LASIK surgery.

11 Mar 2010

British government, HIV/AIDS advocates warn decreased aid budgets could lead to reversals in HIV/AIDS treatment progress

Recent gains in the global fight against HIV/AIDS could be reversed as the "global economic downturn pinches poor countries' budgets and donors show signs of backing away from their promise to provide universal access to AIDS treatment," the British government together with Medecins Sans Frontieres warned Tuesday, Reuters AlertNet reports.

11 Mar 2010

FDA sponsoring workshops to increase rare disease treatment options

The Wall Street Journal: FDA is putting on workshops for pharmaceutical manufacturers to increase the pool of applicants for approved "orphan drugs," that treat rare diseases. Currently, there are about 7,000 so-called orphan diseases in the U.S. that have few or no FDA-approved treatments.

11 Mar 2010

NeuroSearch's MermaiHD study supports potential Huntington's disease modifying properties of Huntexil

NeuroSearch today announced that further analysis of the data from the MermaiHD study with Huntexil(R) (pridopidine) for the treatment of Huntington's disease supports potential disease modifying properties of the drug.

11 Mar 2010

Accelr8 Technology to present results of culture-free, quantitative pathogen identification study at 110th ASM

Accelr8 Technology Corporation today announced that it has received acceptance to present results for a study on 2-hour, culture-free, quantitative pathogen identification. The study was co-authored with principal investigators at the Denver Health Medical Center and the Barnes-Jewish Hospital in St. Louis.

10 Mar 2010

Cempra Pharmaceuticals completes Phase 1 clinical trials of CEM-101 macrolide

Cempra Pharmaceuticals today announced the successful completion of Phase 1 clinical trials of its oral formulation of CEM-101, which showed good tolerability in those studies. The company also announced plans to submit an IND to the FDA to begin a Phase 1 study with the company's intravenous formulation of CEM-101 in mid-2010.

10 Mar 2010

Strong, local leadership is the key for success of health departments and activities

The surge of funds for bioterrorism preparedness over the past decade does not appear to be improving local public health resources in general, according to research from Purdue University.

10 Mar 2010

Inadvertent exposure of hospital housekeepers to drug-resistant "Superbugs" may lead to hospital-infection epidemic

One cause of the rampant international hospital-infection epidemic may be the "inadvertent exposure" of hospital housekeepers and transporters to antibiotic-resistant "Superbugs" such as MRSA, says TeleTracking Technologies CEO Anthony Sanzo.

10 Mar 2010

Cellzome, GSK form second major alliance to develop new anti-inflammatory drugs

Cellzome today announced that it has formed a second strategic alliance with GlaxoSmithKline (GSK). This new collaboration gives GSK exclusive access to Cellzome's proprietary Episphere(TM) technology in the emerging field of epigenetics as applied to immunoinflammatory disease. Epigenetic mechanisms play a key role in controlling immune cell differentiation and inflammatory gene expression during an excessive inflammatory response.

10 Mar 2010

CDC survey finds HSV-2 infection as one of the most common STDs in U.S.

About 1 in 6 Americans (16.2 percent) between the ages of 14 and 49 is infected with herpes simplex virus type 2 (HSV-2), according to a national health survey released today by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. HSV-2 is a lifelong and incurable infection that can cause recurrent and painful genital sores.

10 Mar 2010

Insulin resistance in Hepatitis C patients: Mostly in muscle and not in liver

We have known for several years that Hepatitis C, a common cause of liver cirrhosis and cancer, also makes people three to four times more likely to develop Type 2 diabetes.

10 Mar 2010

AMT initiates dosing in Phase I/II gene therapy clinical trial for hemophilia B

Amsterdam Molecular Therapeutics, a leader in the field of human gene therapy, announced today that the first patient has been dosed in the Phase I/II exploratory clinical trial with a gene therapy product for hemophilia B, a seriously debilitating and potentially lethal disease.

10 Mar 2010

UNAIDS director cautions against funding cuts to Global Fund

During an appeal to government and private donors to pledge money to the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria on Monday, UNAIDS Executive Director Michel Sidibe warned of the repercussions tightening budgets could play in the global fight against HIV/AIDS, the Associated Press reports.

10 Mar 2010

U.N. official addresses increasing drug addiction in developing countries

The U.N. Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) on Monday warned of an impending "health disaster facing developing countries if wealthy nations fail to control drugs," Agence France-Presse reports. During a speech delivered in Vienna, UNODC Executive Director Antonio Maria Costa pointed to "increasing use of heroin in East Africa, cocaine in West Africa, and synthetic drugs in the Middle East and South East Asia as warning signs" of a growing drug problem in impoverished nations (3/8).

10 Mar 2010

Skin transplant surgery safe and effective for treating vitiligo

In the first study of its kind in the United States, Henry Ford Hospital showed that skin transplant surgery is safe and effective for treating vitiligo.

10 Mar 2010

Selective immunization of children may help reduce community transmission of influenza

Immunizing children and adolescents with inactivated influenza vaccine resulted in reduced rates of influenza in their community compared to a similar community in which children did not receive the vaccine, suggesting that vaccinating children may help prevent transmission of the virus and offer protection for unimmunized community residents, according to a study in the March 10 issue of JAMA.

10 Mar 2010

Opinions: Don't slow fight against HIV, TB, malaria; U.S. focus on women, girls

In a BusinessDay opinion piece, Executive Director of the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria Michel Kazatchkine reflects on the organization's progress and impact on global health outcomes since its creation in 2002, as detailed in the organizations' 2010 annual report. Kazatchkine writes, 2010 "will be a decisive year; the world will be reviewing progress on the millennium goals. But this is also the year of the fund's replenishment. The results of that will decide where the world will be in 2015 with regard to the millennium goals."

10 Mar 2010

Disease/Infection News

Congress works on tariff-lowering legislation for Haiti as Preval meets with U.S. leaders in Washington

WHO's updated malaria guidelines include rapid diagnosis, new ACT

Poor, minority adults with chronic kidney disease face increase risk of developing ESRD

TLCVision to incorporate TearLab Osmolarity System to study DED in refractive surgery centers

British government, HIV/AIDS advocates warn decreased aid budgets could lead to reversals in HIV/AIDS treatment progress

FDA sponsoring workshops to increase rare disease treatment options

NeuroSearch's MermaiHD study supports potential Huntington's disease modifying properties of Huntexil

Accelr8 Technology to present results of culture-free, quantitative pathogen identification study at 110th ASM

Cempra Pharmaceuticals completes Phase 1 clinical trials of CEM-101 macrolide

Strong, local leadership is the key for success of health departments and activities

Inadvertent exposure of hospital housekeepers to drug-resistant "Superbugs" may lead to hospital-infection epidemic

Cellzome, GSK form second major alliance to develop new anti-inflammatory drugs

CDC survey finds HSV-2 infection as one of the most common STDs in U.S.

Insulin resistance in Hepatitis C patients: Mostly in muscle and not in liver

AMT initiates dosing in Phase I/II gene therapy clinical trial for hemophilia B

UNAIDS director cautions against funding cuts to Global Fund

U.N. official addresses increasing drug addiction in developing countries

Skin transplant surgery safe and effective for treating vitiligo

Selective immunization of children may help reduce community transmission of influenza

Opinions: Don't slow fight against HIV, TB, malaria; U.S. focus on women, girls

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