‘A medical examiner blamed a 17-year-old track star’s death on the use of too much anti-inflammatory muscle cream, the kind used to soothe aching legs after exercise.
Arielle Newman, a cross-country runner at Notre Dame Academy on Staten Island, died after her body absorbed high levels of methyl salicylate, an anti-inflammatory found in sports creams such as Bengay and Icy Hot, the New York City medical examiner said Friday.
The medical examiner’s spokeswoman, Ellen Borakove, said the teen used “topical medication to excess.” She said it was the first time that her office had reported a death from using a sports cream.’
‘The US military is developing a robot with a teddy bear-style head to help carry injured soldiers away from the battlefield.
The Battlefield Extraction Assist Robot (BEAR) can scoop up even the heaviest of casualties and transport them over long distances over rough terrain.
New Scientist magazine reports that the “friendly appearance” of the robot is designed to put the wounded at ease. [..]
While the existing prototype slides its arms under its burden like a forklift, future versions will be fitted with manoeuvrable hands to gently scoop up casualties.
The Bear is controlled remotely and has cameras and microphones through which an operator sees and hears.’
‘The green blood came as a bit of a shock to Dr. Alana Flexman and her colleagues when they tried to put an arterial line into a patient about to undergo surgery in Vancouver’s St. Paul’s Hospital. [..]
As surgical staff prepared the man for the middle-of-the-night emergency operation, Flexman and a colleague attempted to insert a line into a wrist artery.
Arterial lines are used to monitor blood pressure during an operation; any blood that flows when the line is inserted into the artery should be vivid red, the sign it has been oxygenated in the heart.
But in this case, which occurred in October 2005, it was not.’
‘A study in which teetotal Spanish nuns drank a regular half-liter of beer showed that beer may help reduce cholesterol levels, a group financed by the Spanish Beer Makers’ Association said on Thursday.
The study also showed that the beer did not need to contain alcohol or to be drunk in large quantities to be good for you.
The “magic” ingredient is hops.
“Hops, one of the basic components of beer, may provide benefits … in reducing levels of total cholesterol and triglycerides,” the Centre for Information on Beer and Health said in a statement.
The experiment did not appear to have won many new beer fans among the teetotal Cistercian nuns who took part, chosen on the basis of their steady lifestyle and balanced diet.’
‘A major advance in understanding the genetics behind several of the world’s most common diseases has been reported.
The landmark Wellcome Trust study analysed DNA from the blood of 17,000 people to find genetic differences.
They found new genetic variants for depression, Crohn’s disease, coronary heart disease, hypertension, rheumatoid arthritis and type 1 and 2 diabetes.
The remarkable findings, published in Nature, have been hailed as a new chapter in medical science.
It is hoped they will pave the way for research into new treatments and genetic tests.’
‘Scientists say they have discovered a new gene linked with late-onset Alzheimer’s disease.
People with a damaged copy of the gene, GAB2, may be at four times increased risk of developing dementia, Neuron journal reports.
Experts said the latest findings were some of the most significant to emerge since the discovery of the ApoE4 Alzheimer’s gene.
Late-onset Alzheimer’s affects one in 10 people over 65 and half of over 85s.
The researchers, from 15 institutions including the Institute of Neurology in London, analysed the DNA of 1,411 people and found GAB2 influenced the risk of dementia among those with APOE4.’
‘Dutch researchers are trying to grow pork meat in a laboratory with the goal of feeding millions without the need to raise and slaughter animals.
“We’re trying to make meat without having to kill animals,” Bernard Roelen, a veterinary science professor at Utrecht University, said in an interview.
Although it is in its early stages, the idea is to replace harvesting meat from livestock with a process that eliminates the need for animal feed, transport, land use and the methane expelled by animals, which all hurt the environment, he said.
“Keeping animals just to eat them is in fact not so good for the environment,” said Roelen. “Animals need to grow, and animals produce many things that you do not eat.”‘
‘Prime Minister John Howard says he is opposed to gay couples adopting children and heterosexual adoption is a benchmark society should maintain.
But he said that didn’t mean gay and lesbian people had no affection for children.
The Victorian Law Reform Commission has recommended to the Victorian Parliament that gay couples be allowed to adopt and lesbians have access to IVF treatment.
Mr Howard said today he believed children should ideally have a mother and a father.
“It gives children the best opportunity in life,” he said on Southern Cross radio.’
‘Research reported this week by three different groups shows that normal skin cells can be reprogrammed to an embryonic state in mice. The race is now on to apply the surprisingly straightforward procedure to human cells.
If researchers succeed, it will make it relatively easy to produce cells that seem indistinguishable from embryonic stem cells, and that are genetically matched to individual patients. There are limits to how useful and safe these would be for therapeutic use in the near term, but they should quickly prove a boon in the lab.
“It would change the way we see things quite dramatically,” says Alan Trounson of Monash University in Victoria, Australia. Trounson wasn’t involved in the new work but says he plans to start using the technique “tomorrow”. “I can think of a dozen experiments right now — and they’re all good ones,” he says.’
‘About 26,000 people are killed every year by the 100 million land mines believed to be scattered around the world. [..]
Removing mines and making them safe is relatively easy. Detecting them is difficult and risky. Conventional methods, using electronic mine detectors, heavy machines, sniffer dogs, or gentle probes into the ground using a sharp object, are time-consuming, costly — and dangerous. Sometimes, those searching for mines become victims themselves.
Now, a Danish company called Aresa Biodetection believes it has found a cheaper and safer method to find land mines by using a plant that changes color when it detects explosives in the soil. It has conducted tests using a genetically modified thale cress plant. The thale cress family includes the cress plant used often in salads and also the weeds that grow in sidewalk cracks.’
(5.7meg Flash video)
see it here »
‘Alone in the woods with his left leg pinned beneath a fallen tree for 11 hours, a 66-year-old man used pocket knives to cut off his limb below the knee to free himself, a neighbor and authorities said.
Al Hill had been cutting trees last Friday when one fell on him. After freeing himself, he cried out for help, and a neighbor passing through this sparsely populated area heard him.
Eric Bookey then hiked nearly two miles to get a cellular signal and placed an emergency call to the town’s all-volunteer fire department about 7:30 p.m., Fire Chief Luana Dowling told The Associated Press on Wednesday.
Hill was eventually airlifted by helicopter to a hospital where he underwent amputation surgery, Dowling said. “He’s a pretty remarkable person,” Dowling said.’
‘A confused 80-year-old man drove his car into a hospital reception where he told shocked staff “I’ve come to visit my wife.”
Staff dived for cover as the elderly man drove his Suzuki Ignis into the day surgery unit of Eastbourne District General Hospital on May 25th.
The wheels on his blue hatchback continued spinning on the carpet, filling the day surgery unit with smoke, until a member of staff switched off the ignition. [..]
Sussex Police said no charges would be laid but the man has surrendered his licence and won’t be driving again.’
‘Nigeria has filed charges against the pharmaceutical company Pfizer, accusing it of carrying out improper trials for an anti-meningitis drug.
The government is seeking $7bn (£3.5bn) in damages for the families of children who allegedly died or suffered side-effects after being given Trovan.
Kano state government has filed separate charges against Pfizer.
The firm denies any wrongdoing, saying the trials were conducted according to Nigerian and international law.’
‘A New York man has sued the makers of a health drink, saying it has given him a permanent erection for the last two years.
Christopher Woods said he drank the vitamin-enriched Boost Plus, made by the Swiss-based Novartis pharmaceutical company, on June 5, 2004.
He woke up the next morning “with an erection that would not subside” and sought treatment of the condition, called severe priapism, court papers say.
Mr Woods, 29, had a penile implant to move blood from one area to another, acccording to the Associated Press.’
‘A man in southeast China says 40 years of swallowing tree frogs and rats live has helped him avoid tummy ache.
Jiang Musheng, a 66-year-old resident of Jiangxi province, suffered from frequent abdominal pains and coughing 20 years ago.
But he says an old man called Yang Dingcai suggested tree frogs as a remedy, the Beijing News said today.
‘At first, Jiang Musheng did not dare to eat a live, wriggling frog, but after seeing Yang Dingcai swallow one, he ate two without a thought,’ the paper said.
‘After a month of eating live frogs, his stomach pains and coughing were completely gone.’
Over the years Jiang had added live mice, baby rats and green frogs to his diet, and had once eaten 20 mice in a single day, the paper said.
On top of that he never gets worms.’
‘A gay gang that allegedly raped victims lured on the internet, drugged them and infected them with the AIDS virus has shocked the Netherlands and raised questions over its liberal sex culture.
A date rape drug known as “Easy Lay” and ecstasy were allegedly involved.
Health Minister Ab Klink called the case “horrible”, as the press splashed the news across its front pages today.
The matter came to light yesterday, when police said they had arrested three men two weeks ago after four victims, men aged 25 to 50, accused them of rape and premeditated bodily harm. [..]
The three suspects – one of whom is a male nurse – were said to have raped the men, and even injected some of them with a mix of their contaminated blood.’
‘Brian Conant stood alongside his fellow National Guardsmen during a training session about eight years ago in Hawaii. He was wearing a heavy chemical warfare suit lined with charcoal.
“Any time I expelled gas in the suit, I realized nobody could smell it,” Conant, 48, says. “It was amazing.”
According to the American College of Gastroenterology, 58 million Americans suffer from one or more medical disorders that cause excessive gas. To treat it, doctors usually recommend a change in diet. Sometimes they recommend medication, such as Gas-X or Bean-O, which alters the bacteria that may be causing the foul odor. But with Conant’s invention, the Flatulence Deodorizer, also known as Flat-D, there is an alternative way to limit the embarrassment.
The long, narrow washable pad, lined thinly with charcoal, absorbs chemicals, including hydrogen sulfide, a byproduct of the bacteria that causes odorous gas. The pad, at $12.95, curves with the contour of the body, and one size fits most.’
‘Four people billed a health insurance company for 20 brain operations that were never performed on them, sometimes for the same person on multiple occasions, authorities said.
One 36-year-old man from New York City claimed nine brain surgeries for himself, along with his wife and two sons, receiving reimbursements from New York-based Group Health Incorporated totaling $142,268, federal investigators said Friday.
GHI paid out more than $300,000 in reimbursements to all four defendants, based on the claims.’
In this video they apply some liquid to a guy’s face and all these little worms start to crawl out of his skin.
Erk.
see it here »
‘US officials have warned consumers to avoid using toothpaste made in China after a shipment was found to contain a poisonous chemical used in anti-freeze.
The Food and Drug Administration said it could contain diethylene glycol, which has been blamed for the deaths of at least 50 people in Panama last year.
The brands affected are usually sold at “bargain” retail outlets, the FDA said.
The warning comes amid a series of contamination scandals involving Chinese exports to the Americas.
On Thursday, Nicaraguan health authorities seized 40,000 tubes of Chinese-made toothpaste after they were found to contain diethylene glycol (DEG).
The Dominican Republic, Panama and Costa Rica had already removed thousands of tubes of toothpaste from store shelves. ‘
‘Bus drivers are to be issued with DNA kits so that passengers who spit on them can be traced by police.
The “spit kits” are already supplied at all 275 Tube stations and are expected to be rolled out this summer across London’s 7,000-strong bus fleet.
It is the latest initiative against anti-social behaviour on buses and has coincided with the Mayor’s introduction of free bus travel for under-16s.
The DNA kits will allow drivers to take swabs of saliva that can be passed to the police and checked against criminal records. Transport for London says that about seven out of 10 samples provides a match.’
‘The Bush administration said Tuesday it will fight to keep meatpackers from testing all their animals for mad cow disease.
The Agriculture Department tests fewer than 1 percent of slaughtered cows for the disease, which can be fatal to humans who eat tainted beef. A beef producer in the western state of Kansas, Creekstone Farms Premium Beef, wants to test all of its cows.
Larger meat companies feared that move because, if Creekstone should test its meat and advertised it as safe, they might have to perform the expensive tests on their larger herds as well.
The Agriculture Department regulates the test and argued that widespread testing could lead to a false positive that would harm the meat industry.’
‘Researchers are seeking to formally classify a new family of abnormal sexual behaviours or “sexsomnias” that occur while people are asleep.
Ranging from masturbation to fondling to unconscious rape, sleep-related sexual abnormalities need to be properly categorized and labelled so physicians will recognize them when they crop up, according to a paper published today in the journal SLEEP.
“We wanted to call attention to how sexuality looms throughout all the known disorders of sleep,” says Dr. Carlos Schenck, a University of Minnesota psychiatrist and the paper’s lead author.’
‘A Dutch reality television show in which a supposedly dying woman had to pick one of three contestants to whom she would donate a kidney was revealed as an elaborate hoax on Friday.
The show, which the broadcaster had said aimed to focus attention on a shortage of donor organs in the Netherlands, was condemned by Dutch Prime Minister Jan Peter Balkenende before broadcast Friday night and sparked controversy worldwide.
Identified only as “Lisa,” the 37-year-old woman who had been said to be suffering from a brain tumor was to base her selection on the person’s history and conversations with the candidates’ families and friends.
In the last minutes of the program, she was revealed as a healthy actress and producers stunned viewers by saying “The Big Donorshow” was a hoax.
The contestants were also part of the deception, although all three are genuine kidney patients.’
Followup to Reality show prize: a kidney.
‘he man infected with potentially fatal tuberculosis is receiving treatment at a Denver, Colorado, hospital as federal health officials continue to track down airline passengers who may have been exposed to the illness.
The man has been identified by multiple medical and law enforcement sources as Andrew Speaker, 31, a lawyer from Atlanta, Georgia.
Speaker’s father-in-law works for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta, an agency spokesman said Thursday.
The father-in-law, Robert C. Cooksey, is a microbiologist who has conducted research on tuberculosis for the National Center for Infectious Diseases, according to a CDC biography posted on the agency’s Web site.
CNN affiliate WSB-TV reported that Cooksey gave his son-in-law “fatherly advice” after he found out Speaker had contracted the infectious disease, but did not advise him in any official capacity.’
Followup to Man knew he had TB before flying to Europe.
‘A man infected with the extensively drug-resistant form of TB known as XDR TB knew he was not supposed to travel overseas but did so anyway, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Dr. Julie Gerberding told CNN’s “American Morning” on Wednesday.
The man, who is quarantined at an Atlanta, Georgia, hospital, told the Atlanta Journal Constitution that Fulton County health officials had said they “preferred” he not travel, but knew about his plans for an overseas wedding and honeymoon. [..]
“The patient really was told that he shouldn’t fly,” she added.
“The patient himself was not highly infectious” but there still was a small risk he could transmit the disease to someone else, Gerberding told CNN.
It is the first time in 40 years the federal government has issued a quarantine order for an individual. Gerberding acknowledged that “we kind of had to make up a plan as we went along.”‘
‘Mercury Energy says it was unaware that disconnecting power to a south Auckland home could have potentially life-threatening consequences.
Folole Muliaga, 44, died within two hours of a contractor cutting power to her Mangere home at 2pm yesterday.
Today a relative said Mrs Muliaga’s family had told the contractor that the mother-of-four was dependent on an oxygen machine, which needed electricity to run.
Mrs Muliaga’s son told TV One News that his mother – sitting with the machine – had asked the contractor to give them a chance, but the man had replied he was just doing his job.’
‘Step aside Big Brother housemates – three dying contestants competing for a donated kidney will plunge reality television to fresh lows this week.
A terminally ill cancer patient will gift one of her kidneys to one of three recipients chosen by a television audience, in a bizarre Dutch program.
Viewers will watch video clips depicting the three “contestants” chatting about their lives – and then will vote via text message to literally save one.’
‘Exposure to pesticides could lead to an increased risk of contracting Parkinson’s disease, a study has found.
Researchers discovered that high levels of exposure increased the risk by 39%, while even low levels raised it by 9%. [..]
The study included more general questions about family health history and tobacco use.
All the replies were then compared to those from a group of people of similar age and sex who had not been diagnosed with Parkinson’s.
They revealed that while having a family history of Parkinson’s was the clearest risk factor for developing the disease, exposure to pesticides also gave a clear increase.
People who had been knocked out once were 35% more at risk, while being knocked out on more than one occasion appeared to increase the risk by two-and-a-half times.’
‘Water-pipe smoking may pose the same health risks as cigarettes, the World Health Organization said Tuesday, adding that more scientific research was needed into the link between hookah use and a number of fatal illnesses.
“Using a water pipe to smoke tobacco is not a safe alternative to cigarette smoking,” the U.N. health agency said in a seven-page document on the practice. “Contrary to ancient lore and popular belief, the smoke that emerges from a water pipe contains numerous toxicants known to cause lung cancer, heart disease and other diseases.”‘
