Birth weight has significant and lasting effects, a new study finds. Weighing less than 5.5 pounds at birth increases the probability of dropping out of high school by one-third, reduces yearly earnings by about 15 percent and burdens people in their 30s and 40s with the health of someone who is 12 years older.
A new study shows that by the age of seven months, human infants are able to learn abstract grammar-like rules from sequences of syllables — and that they know the best place to look for such abstractions is in human speech.
The message “babies are born to be breastfed” was part of a campaign to improve the cultural acceptance of breastfeeding in Herkimer County, N.Y. The campaign was part of a $1 million, four-year project led Cornell researchers and funded by the US Department of Agriculture.
Routine male circumcision “must be considered” in areas of Africa with high HIV prevalence because the procedure is a “source of hope that could eventually save many lives,” columnist Michael Gerson writes in a Washington Post opinion piece.
Vical Incorporated (Nasdaq:VICL) today announced that a measles DNA vaccine formulated with the company’s Vaxfectin? adjuvant elicited protective levels of neutralizing antibodies in juvenile (1 ? 2 year old) nonhuman primates confirmed by complete protection following challenge more than one year after vaccination, and sterilizing immunity as evidenced by no clinical signs of disease and no detectable virus after challenge.
Abbott informed consumers and healthcare professionals of a nationwide recall of three lots of two-ounce bottles of Similac Special Care 24 Cal/fl. oz. Ready-to-Feed Premature Infant Formula with Iron, a highly specialized liquid ready-to-feed formula used only for premature infants after discharge from the hospital.
Abbott’s Ross Products Division announced a voluntary nationwide recall of three lots of two-ounce bottles of Similac Special Care 24 Cal / fl. oz. Ready-to-Feed (RTF) Premature Infant Formula with Iron, a highly specialized liquid ready-to-feed formula used only for premature infants after discharge from the hospital.
Very low birth weight infants are significantly more likely to survive when delivered in hospitals with high-level neonatal intensive care units that care for more than 100 such newborns annually than are those delivered in comparable facilities that provide care to fewer than 100 such children every year.
Reforms introduced as a result of the Sally Clark case could lead to a halving in the number of cases of unexplained infant deaths and a positive legacy emerging from tragedy, says a feature in this week?s BMJ.
Low-birth-weight infants are more likely to survive if born in hospitals having high performing Neonatal Intensive Care Units, revealed by researchers in a recent study.