Pneumonia News and Research

Latest Pneumonia News and Research

World must extend access to life-saving vaccines to all children

"For too long, there has been an unwritten rule that it can take 15 years or more before children in the poorest nations benefit from new life-saving vaccines in use in rich countries," Seth Berkley, CEO of the GAVI Alliance, writes in this post in the Independent's "Notebook" blog.

27 Apr 2012

Ghanaian vaccination campaign hopes to prevent up to 14,000 child deaths

In a Huffington Post Blog opinion piece, Orin Levine, executive director of the International Vaccine Access Center (IVAC), describes watching the suffering of an infant with severe pneumonia and his parents while in Ghana on Thursday, writing that the experience was "a personal reminder as to why our work to prevent disease is so perilous, and why disease control so promising in Africa."

27 Apr 2012

Ghana launching childhood immunization campaign for rotavirus, pneumococcal disease

"Starting this week, Ghana will vaccinate the first babies in a new campaign against rotavirus -- a cause of severe diarrhea -- and pneumococcal disease, which causes pneumonia, meningitis and sepsis," Reuters reports.

27 Apr 2012

FDA approves Novartis’ Afinitor for treatment of renal angiomyolipomas and TSC

Novartis Pharmaceuticals Corporation announced today that the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved Afinitor (everolimus) tablets for the treatment of adult patients with kidney tumors known as renal angiomyolipomas and tuberous sclerosis complex (TSC), who do not require immediate surgery.

27 Apr 2012

Ghana rolls out vaccines against pneumonia and diarrhoea

Ghana has become the first African country to introduce pneumococcal and rotavirus vaccines at the same time, simultaneously tackling the leading causes of the world’s two biggest childhood killers – pneumonia and diarrhoea.

26 Apr 2012

Study confirms overuse of blood transfusions during surgery

Citing the lack of clear guidelines for ordering blood transfusions during surgery, Johns Hopkins researchers say a new study confirms there is still wide variation in the use of transfusions and frequent use of transfused blood in patients who don't need it.

25 Apr 2012

USAID's Shah urges cooperation to improve child health, survival

"Seeing a child die from pneumonia, diarrhea or a mosquito bite is simply unimaginable to most parents. But that is the sad reality for many families each day," USAID Administrator Rajiv Shah writes in a Huffington Post Blog opinion piece, noting, "Last year over seven million children under five died of largely preventable causes."

24 Apr 2012

Herpes zoster vaccine safe and well tolerated: Study

The herpes zoster vaccine, also known as the shingles vaccine, is generally safe and well tolerated according to a Vaccine Safety Datalink study of 193,083 adults published online in the Journal of Internal Medicine.

23 Apr 2012

Gum disease and heart problems not linked: Review

It has been claimed for the past few decades that gum disease is linked to heart problems or strokes but according to latest findings the link does not hold up on deeper research says the American Heart Association.

22 Apr 2012

FDA warns about contaminated ultrasound gel

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has issued warnings for doctors, hospitals and clinics regarding contaminated ultrasound gel produced by a New Jersey company that infected 16 cardiac patients and could pose serious risks to pregnant women and others who undergo ultrasound imaging and treatment.

22 Apr 2012

UCSD named among 100 Top Hospitals by Thomson Reuters

UC San Diego Medical Center, located in Hillcrest, has been named one of the nation's 100 Top Hospitals by Thomson Reuters. Ranked among the country's major teaching hospitals, the Medical Center was also one of twelve hospitals to receive the Everest Award. This award honors hospitals that have achieved both the highest current performance and the fastest long-term improvement over a five-year period in Reuter's national benchmarking study.

19 Apr 2012

Nigerian Vaccine Summit an opportunity to translate political will into action

In this post in the Huffington Post Blog, Orin Levine, executive director of the International Vaccine Access Center (IVAC), reports on the Nigerian Vaccine Summit, where Nigeria's leaders will meet this week to discuss children's health in the country.

18 Apr 2012

Viewpoints: The missing debate on women; The true cost of care; Fair wages for home health aides

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention just reported that the nation's teen pregnancy rate is at an all-time low. Increased contraceptive use appears to have played a significant role in the decline. The Guttmacher Institute estimates that without Title X services, hundreds of thousands more teenagers would become pregnant every year. Why does GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney think eliminating the federal money for family planning - $327 million annually - is wise?

17 Apr 2012

Cholera vaccination pilot project begins in Haiti

"A year and a half after cholera first struck Haiti, a tiny portion of the population on Thursday began getting vaccinated against the waterborne disease that has infected more than 530,000 Haitians and killed more than 7,040," the New York Times reports.

16 Apr 2012

CLYD gene serves as crucial negative regulator in pulmonary fibrosis

An international team of researchers led by Georgia State University scientists have found a key component in the pathological process of pulmonary fibrosis, a fatal disease for which there is currently no cure.

11 Apr 2012

Results from Abbott’s multiple interferon-free Phase 2 HCV studies to be presented at ILC 2012

Abbott will present clinical trial results from two different interferon-free, Phase 2 studies for the treatment of hepatitis C (HCV) at the International Liver Congress 2012 (ILC 2012), the annual meeting of the European Association for the Study of the Liver (EASL), April 18-22 in Barcelona, Spain.

5 Apr 2012

Trends in diagnostic coding may explain the cause of decline in pneumonia hospitalizations

Although data indicate that between 2003-2009 there was a substantial decline in the U.S. in hospitalizations for pneumonia and inpatient deaths, analysis suggests that trends in documentation and diagnostic coding, rather than improvements in actual outcomes, may explain much of the observed changes, according to a study in the April 4 issue of JAMA.

4 Apr 2012

April issue of WHO Bulletin available online

The April issue of the WHO Bulletin features an editorial on the WHO research agenda for influenza; a public health round-up; an article on influenza in Ghana; a research paper on population-based burden of influenza-associated hospitalization in rural western Kenya; and a policy paper on the integration of pneumonia prevention and treatment interventions with immunization services in resource-poor countries.

3 Apr 2012

Researchers discover regulation and functional significance of acute phase response during pneumonia

Researchers at Boston University School of Medicine (BUSM) have discovered the regulation and functional significance of the acute phase response during a lung infection. The findings, which will be published in the May edition of the Journal of Clinical Investigation, demonstrate that the liver responds in order to increase defenses in the blood that prevent localized infections from spreading throughout the body.

3 Apr 2012

Positive outcome from AiCuris’ Letermovir phase 2b trial on HCMV infections

AiCuris announced today that data on the positive outcome of Letermovir (AIC246) tested in a phase 2b trial in transplant patients will be disclosed at several international meetings on behalf of the AIC246 study team.

3 Apr 2012