The International donor community today pledged $475 million to fight bird flu after a senior United Nations official warned them that the virus, with its possible mutation into a deadly human pandemic, remains a potent threat around the world.
Malaria may be helping spread the AIDS virus across Africa, the continent hardest hit by the incurable disease. The way the two diseases interact greatly expands the prevalence of both among people in sub-Saharan Africa, a team of scientists said in a study in the journal Science.
The Food and Drug Administration continues to investigate an ongoing outbreak of E. coli O157 infection in consumers, associated with eating food from Taco Bell restaurants in six states.
In assessing the probability of an earthquake, scientists rely on two important pieces of data that are often inconsistent. The past geological record sometimes tells one story, while current measurements from the Global Positioning System (GPS) tell another. But a new forecasting model designed by Stanford University geophysicists may help close the gap.
Thousands of statin users worldwide are suffering preventable heart attacks, simply because they are not complying with their treatment or are taking too low a dose, according to new research published on-line today (Thursday 7 December) in European Heart Journal.
“Low-fat” foods may not help in the fight against obesity. Cornell studies in movie theatres, holiday parties and homes show people eat an average of 28 percent more total calories when they think a food is low-fat. This is worse for obese people, who tend to eat up to 50 percent more.
Results from a clinical trial evaluating new drug combinations for sleeping sickness, carried out by the international humanitarian medical aid agency Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF), and its research arm, Epicentre, have now been published in the journal PLoS Clinical Trials.
The International Myeloma Foundation (IMF) — conducting research and providing education, advocacy and support for myeloma patients, families, researchers and physicians — today noted that multiple studies presented at the 2006 Annual Meeting of the American Society of Hematology (ASH) illustrate the breadth of the gains being made in the treatment of multiple myeloma and related blood cancers.
Computer scientists are building mathematical models to represent the safest and most effective ways to perform surgery, including tasks such as suturing, dissecting and joining tissue.
Epilepsy specialists at Wake Forest University Baptist Medical Center are testing an investigational device designed to control seizures in patients with epilepsy. The device is a responsive neurostimulator (RNS? System) which is implanted in the brain, detects abnormal electrical activity in the brain and sends out electrical impulses to prevent seizures. Wake Forest Baptist is the only center in North Carolina, Tennessee and South Carolina to test the device made by NeuroPace.