Health News and Scoops

By Kate Kelland

LONDON |
Fri Sep 30, 2011 12:44pm EDT

LONDON (Reuters) – With almost 30,000 cases of measles and eight deaths from the disease recorded in the European Union so far this year, a leading health official is urging doctors to do more to ensure parents have their children vaccinated with MMR.

Doctors’ support for the triple measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccine is vital if Europe is to halt the measles outbreaks and have a chance of beating the highly contagious disease, Marc Sprenger, director of the European Center for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC), said.

He said it was crucial for pediatricians and family doctors to give balanced, evidence-based information to help parents decide on vaccinations.

But he is concerned that a significant proportion of them are not doing that — a factor that means achieving the at least 95 percent vaccine coverage rate needed to win the battle against measles is a tough call.

“The good news is that parents trust doctors — but doctors should be a bit more aware that they could use that position to convince parents to vaccinate their children,” Sprenger said in a telephone interview from the Stockholm headquarters of the ECDC, which monitors the disease in Europe.

“The vaccine is extremely effective, but it’s important that we get vaccination coverage of at least 95 percent (because) this virus is highly contagious.”

All European countries were committed to a goal of eliminating measles and rubella by 2010, a target they have missed and has now been put back to 2015. Latest data, however, show the trend is going in the wrong direction.

France, Spain, Germany and Switzerland have experienced major measles outbreaks this year, each of them recording thousands of cases. Figures up to August 2011 show that more than 28,000 cases of measles were reported across the EU.

According to the ECDC, about a third of these cases required hospitalization, and in the first six months of the year, measles was responsible for eight deaths and 22 cases of a serious complication called acute encephalitis.

Rates of immunization with the MMR vaccine plummeted after 1998, when The Lancet medical journal published a study by Andrew Wakefield, a now-disgraced British doctor who researchers believe falsified data linking the triple shot with autism and bowel disorders.

The study has since been comprehensively dismissed as seriously flawed, The Lancet has retracted the paper and Wakefield has been struck off the medical register in Britain.

Measles is a viral disease affecting mostly children. Its symptoms include fever, coughs, runny nose, red eyes and a rash. Globally deaths from measles fell by 78 percent between 2000 and 2008, thanks largely to mass childhood vaccination campaigns.

But parents’ refusal to have their children vaccinated because of fears of links to autism have caused a rise in measles cases in the United States and Europe in recent years. Experts warn death rates may rise further if complacency or misinformation allows immunization efforts to fall behind.

Sprenger said MMR vaccine coverage rates across the region are currently around 90 percent, leaving significant groups such as children or young adults unprotected.

Britain’s Health Protection Agency (HPA) issued a warning as students returned to universities this month that parents should ensure they had had the MMR shot. Across England and Wales there were 777 cases of measles confirmed by the end of July 2011, compared to 374 for all of 2010.

Sprenger said that since family doctors and health visitors or nurses are the “backbone” of all national immunization programs in the EU, their role is paramount.

But he cited findings of surveys conducted in France, Italy and Germany showing that health workers were often ambivalent, ill-informed or skeptical about MMR vaccines — even many years after the flawed Wakefield paper was dismissed and retracted.

In Germany, for example, a 2008 survey of 549 midwives showed that a quarter of them objected to measles vaccination.

“People trust their doctors … so they can really make a difference,” Sprenger said. “We know for sure that this disease is not disappearing. It’s still increasing and the peak of this epidemic was far higher compared to last year.

“If we don’t change this trend we will never be able to eliminate measles by 2015.”

(Reporting by Kate Kelland; Editing by Janet Lawrence)

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By David Ljunggren

OTTAWA |
Fri Sep 30, 2011 1:46pm EDT

OTTAWA (Reuters) – Vancouver’s Insite clinic, the only safe-injection site for drug addicts in North America, can stay open, the Supreme Court of Canada ruled Friday in a landmark defeat for the federal government’s tough-on-crime agenda.

The top court, slapping down the Conservative government with some harsh language, ruled unanimously that closing the site in the Pacific Coast city would threaten the lives of drug users and therefore violate their human rights.

The government, which says it is determined to cut crime, complained that keeping Insite open made a mockery of laws designed to stamp out illegal drug use. The federal Health Department had said it would not extend a special exemption to drug laws that allowed the site to operate.

The court ordered the health minister to maintain the exemption, saying to remove it would be an arbitrary decision that broke the principles of fundamental justice.

“It is also grossly disproportionate: the potential denial of health services and the correlative increase in the risk of death and disease to drug users outweigh any benefit that might be derived from maintaining an absolute prohibition on possession of illegal drugs on Insite’s premises,” it ruled.

Insite operates in Vancouver’s poor Downtown Eastside district, one of the most deprived urban areas in Canada. The clinic was set up in 2003 to allow intravenous drug users to shoot up in a place that had medical supervision.

“Although we are disappointed with the Supreme Court of Canada’s decision today, we will comply. We believe that the system should be focused on preventing people from becoming drug addicts,” said Health Minister Leona Aglukkaq.

A study in the Lancet medical journal this year said the site had cut drug overdose deaths by 35 percent in the area. Police and local officials had campaigned for it to stay open.

The site’s operators – who argued that drug addiction was a disease – said that, before the site opened, drug users were regularly dying of overdoses on the streets. The Downtown Eastside has around 4,600 intravenous drug users.

“It means, finally, after eight years of operating Insite and being subjected to political whims, that now we are safe,” Liz Evans, an Insite director, told reporters in Vancouver.

Recovered heroin addict Dean Wilson, a member of the board of the users’ group, jumped in the air, whooped loudly and clenched his fists in delight when told of the ruling.

“This has nothing to do with the law-and-order platform, this has to do with gold standard medical intervention for a group of very very ill people,” he said at the Supreme Court.

Heroin and cocaine addicts receive clean needles to inject themselves with their own drugs under supervision by a nurse. They can then stay in a special “chill-out” room before returning to the streets.

The Conservatives, who won a majority in the May general election, plan to push through tougher laws on crime and open new prisons – moves that critics say are expensive and will put many more people in jail.

“The Supreme Court sent a clear message to the Conservative government today: its position is indefensible. Their ‘war on drugs’ has not worked in Canada and has proven to be an abject failure everywhere else in the world,” said Hedy Fry, health spokeswoman for the opposition Liberal Party.

The case is Attorney General of Canada et al. v. PHS Community Services Society, et al. (Case no: 33556).

(With additional reporting by Greg Joyce in Vancouver; editing by Rob Wilson)

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By Alina Selyukh

Fri Sep 30, 2011 1:57pm EDT

(Reuters) – California-based True Leaf Farms is recalling 90 cartons of chopped romaine lettuce as it may be contaminated with listeria, though no related illnesses have been reported.

Listeria is a frequent cause of U.S. food recalls but concerns over the bacterial contamination are heightened due to an outbreak linked to cantaloupes grown in Colorado, which has already killed 13 people and infected 72 people across 18 states.

There is no connection between the lettuce recall and the outbreak tied to cantaloupes, the Food and Drug Administration spokesman Douglas Karas said on Friday.

It is the fourth listeria-related food recall since Colorado’s Jensen Farms voluntarily recalled cantaloupes linked to the outbreak on September 14. Only one of the four subsequent recalls — of cantaloupes by Kansas food processor Carol’s Cuts LLC — was related to the outbreak.

True Leaf Farms, a processing arm of Salinas, California-based Church Brothers LLC, is voluntarily recalling romaine that was shipped between September 12 and 13 to a food service distributor in Oregon, who further sent it to at least two other states, Washington and Idaho, the company said in a release posted on the FDA website.

The two-pound bags also made their way to Alaska, according to the state’s Department of Environmental Conservation.

The romaine lettuce affected by the recall has a September 29 use-by date, the company said in the release. Church Brothers was not immediately available for comment.

“Any time we find listeria in food we would consider that food adulterated and ask for a recall,” Karas said in an email. “The finding of listeria in romaine lettuce was a result of an FDA research program to understand the prevalence of listeria in fresh produce, particularly lettuce and leafy greens.”

Listeria rarely causes serious illness. For it to do so, the organism needs to get onto the food and grow to levels where it can cause disease. Because it can grow at low temperatures, that can happen anywhere along the food chain.

Listeria outbreaks are usually associated with deli meats, unpasteurized cheeses and smoked refrigerated seafood products, rather than fresh produce.

Previous food recalls this month included Queso Fresco’s Del Bueno Casero Fresh Cheese in Washington state, Publix Super Markets’ spinach dip in Florida and Fine Mexican Food Products Inc’s avocado pulp and halves in California.

(Reporting by Alina Selyukh and Ian Simpson in Washington; additional reporting by Yereth Rosen in Anchorage and Julie Steenhuysen in Chicago; editing by Anthony Boadle)

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DUBLIN–(BUSINESS WIRE)–Research and Markets(http://www.researchandmarkets.com/research/bb572e/u_s_type_2_diabet)
has announced the addition of Frost Sullivan’s new report “U.S.
Type 2 Diabetes Patients’ Choice: Awareness, Usage, and Preferences of
Insulin Injection Pens” to their offering.

“U.S.
Type 2 Diabetes Patients’ Choice: Awareness, Usage, and Preferences of
Insulin Injection Pens”

Type 2 diabetes is the most common form of diabetes. It is a chronic
disease marked by high levels of glucose in the blood. Type 2 diabetes
is most common in patients that are of 45 years or greater, have a
high-density lipoprotein (HDL) cholesterol of less than 35 mg/dL or
triglyceride level of greater than 250 mg/dL, and/or have high blood
pressure. The primary goal to treat type 2 diabetes is diet and
exercise. However, if diet and exercise does not help maintain normal
glucose levels, physicians may prescribe medication.

This Frost Sullivan research service titled U.S.
Type 2 Diabetes Patients’ Choice: Awareness, Usage, and Preferences of
Insulin Injection Pens provides the findings of a Web-based survey
conducted among 1,002 adult type 2 diabetic patients who use an
injection pen to administer insulin into their bodies. In this research,
Frost Sullivan’s expert analysts examine the following markets:
prefilled insulin injection pens and durable insulin injection pens. In
addition, this study also analyzes awareness of injection pen brands,
measures current usage of injection pen brands, as well as importance of
features/attributes.

For more information visit http://www.researchandmarkets.com/research/bb572e/u_s_type_2_diabet

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DUBLIN–(BUSINESS WIRE)–Research and Markets(http://www.researchandmarkets.com/research/8e6e24/biopolymers_biome)
has announced the addition of John Wiley and Sons Ltd’s new book “Biopolymers:
Biomedical and Environmental Applications” to their offering.

This handbook focuses on biopolymers for both environmental and
biomedical applications. It shows recent advances in technology in all
areas from chemical synthesis or biosynthesis to end use applications.
These areas have not been covered in a single book before and they
include biopolymers for chemical and biotechnological modifications,
material structures, characterization, processing, properties, and
applications.

After the introduction which summarizes the importance of biopolymer in
the market, the book covers almost all the topics related to
polysaccharides, biofibers, bioplastics, biocomposites, natural rubber,
gums, bacterial and blood compatible polymers, and applications of
biopolymers in various fields.

Key Topics Covered:

Part I. Polysaccharides

Part II. Bioplastics and Biocomposites

Part III. Miscellaneous Biopolymers

Part IV. Biopolymers for Specific Applications

Author:

Susheel Kalia is Assistant Professor in the Department of Chemistry,
Bahra University (Shimla Hills), India. He received his PhD from Punjab
Technical University Jalandhar, India. He has 33 research papers to his
credit in international journals along with 45 publications in
proceedings of national international conferences as well as several
book chapters. He is a life member of the Asian Polymer Association and
Indian Cryogenics Council. He has edited the book, Cellulose Fibers,
Bio- and Nano- Polymer Composites (Springer 2011). He is currently
working in the field of polymer composites, cellulose nanofibers,
hydrogels and cryogenics.

Luc Avrous is Director of the Laboratory of Engineering Polymers for
Advanced Technologies at the University of Strasbourg, France. He
obtained his PhD in science and polymer engineering from the School of
Mines of Paris in 1995. For the last 15 years his major research
projects have dealt with multiphase systems (blends, multilayers,
biocomposites and nano-biocomposites) based on agro-resources (starch,
lignins, chitosan, cellulose etc.) and biopolyesters (PLA, PHA, PCL
etc.). He has been particularly involved in the study of the
materials-process-properties chain. He has published more than 60
journal articles, 15 book chapters, has 2 patents to his name, and has
co-edited 3 books. With his expertise in starch-based materials, and
more generally in biopolymers, he is regularly invited to organise
symposia and conferences. .

For more information visit http://www.researchandmarkets.com/research/8e6e24/biopolymers_biome

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