Health Highlights: Feb. 25, 2003
Health Highlights: Feb. 25, 2003
source: HealthScoutNews
Here are some of the latest health and medical news developments, compiled by editors of The HealthScout News Service:
Companies Get Contracts to Create Safer Smallpox Vaccine
Two companies have been awarded U.S. federal government contracts to develop safer smallpox vaccines.
Acambis Inc. of Cambridge, Mass., and Bavarian Nordic A/S of Denmark will receive up to $20 million in first-year funding, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services announced today.
The three-year contracts, to be administered by the U.S. National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, specify deadlines for the companies to produce prototype vaccines and to perform safety testing on animals and humans.
The companies will develop, manufacture and conduct safety trials of modified vaccinia virus Ankara (MVA) vaccine candidates.
Current smallpox vaccines use live vaccinia virus, which can spread throughout the body and cause potentially serious or deadly side effects, especially in people with compromised immune systems and in pregnant women.
MVA can’t replicate inside human cells and therefore can’t spread through the body, the companies say.
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Transplant Victim’s Organs Unusable For Donation
The family of the Mexican teenager who died after a botched heart-lung transplant is being criticized for not making the girl an organ donor, even though her organs are unusable.
Jesica Santillan was declared dead on Saturday after receiving a second heart-lung transplant. During her first transplant, she was mistakenly given organs of the wrong blood type.
Family spokesman Mack Mahoney told the Associated Press that Jesica’s family has received a number of critical e-mails from people who are concerned that Jesica’s family refused to donate the girl’s organs.
But Mahoney told the AP that Jesica’s mother was told by doctors that the heart and lungs could not be reused and Jesica’s kidneys and liver were ruined from being on life support for too long.
Mahoney said that Jesica’s other organs and tissues were also unusable for transplant because they were saturated with anti-rejection drugs and medications.
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U.S. Denies Creating Smokescreen Against Anti-Tobacco Treaty
A coalition of American medical groups charges that the Bush Administration is trying to sabotage negotiations on an international anti- tobacco treaty because it wants to protect the interests of the U.S. tobacco industry.
“The U.S. government is working methodically to weaken virtually every aspect of this treaty,” John Seffin, chief executive officer of the American Cancer Society, told BBC News.
“I am ashamed of the role my government has played in the negotiations,” Alfred Munzer, of the American Lung Association, told BBC News.
“It has clearly sacrificed long-term improvement in global public health to serve the interests of an industry whose product is responsible for four million deaths annually from cancer, heart disease and emphysema,” Munzer said.
Most of the countries taking part in the negotiations want a treaty that creates sweeping restrictions against tobacco, including a total advertising ban and tough controls on labeling.
The U.S. delegation has rejected such an advertising ban, claiming it would violate constitutional principles of free speech.
Terry Pechacek, of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, is a member of the U.S. delegation. He told the BBC that his team is negotiating in good faith and is making a sincere effort to bring home a treaty that can be signed and ratified.
Negotiators have until Friday to agree on what’s called the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control.
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U.S. Asthma Rates Soar Among Children: Report
The percentage of American children with asthma more than doubled over the five years analyzed in a newly released study, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency says.
From 1980 to 1985, the rate soared to 7.5 percent from 3.6 percent, the EPA says. And the rate rose even higher by 2001 to 8.7 percent, or 6.3 million children, the agency adds.
In a wide-ranging report titled “America’s Children and the Environment,” the EPA says there is also “growing concern” about exposure to mercury by women of child-bearing age, which could lead to harmful consequences on the children they might have. The primary source of mercury exposure is the burning of coal, mostly at electric power plants, according to a Washington Post analysis of the EPA report.
About 8 percent of American women ages 16 to 49 have amounts of mercury in their blood that could pose a danger to a fetus, the report says. The agency had not included mercury in prior years’ reports, so it could not provide trend information, the newspaper says.
In what the report calls “good news for children,” it cites declines in exposure among American kids to lead and second-hand smoke.
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Controversial Substance Found in Everyday Foods
The possibly cancer-causing substance acrylamide is found not only in fast foods and snacks like potato chips but in everyday foods that are otherwise considered healthy, report scientists with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.
Last spring, Swedish scientists made headlines when they released a study finding that acrylamide, which is in popular foods like french fries, caused cancer when given in high doses to lab animals. But the FDA says the substance is found in lower levels in products like vitamin-enriched breakfast cereals, toast and coffee, reports the Associated Press.
In general, foods with a lot of carbohydrates that are cooked at very high temperatures seem to contain more acrylamide than other foods, the FDA says.
The agency warns not to change your diet just yet, since the substance’s ability to cause cancer in people hasn’t been established, and doing away with certain diet staples might do more harm than good. Saying there are “no quick fixes” to the issue, the agency adds that manufacturers are busy searching for ways to reduce amounts of the substance in their products.
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