YellowBrix Top Health
Cervical Cancer Shot Gains Acceptance
Oct 10, 07:07 PM
One in four teenage girls received at least one dose of a relatively new vaccine against cervical cancer, U.S. health officials said.
The 25.1 percent vaccination rate among 13- to 17-year-olds provides the first national estimate of use of Merck & Co.'s Gardasil vaccine, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said.
Gardasil, administered in a three-dose series, is a vaccine against certain types of human papillomavirus, which infects the skin and mucous membranes.
Human papillomavirus, or HPV, infection causes nearly all cases of cervical cancer, the second leading cause of death from cancer in women worldwide.
Nearly 4,000 women die of cervical cancer in the United States each year.
"For a new vaccine, 25 percent coverage is really very good," Immunization Services Director Lance Rodewald said.
Vaccine proponents had hoped for higher vaccination rates.
Both men and women can be HPV carriers. Studies are being conducted to determine the efficacy of vaccinating boys with Gardasil.
1 in 4 Teen Girls Get Cancer Shot -- Some Families Still Wary of Gardasil
Oct 10, 05:46 PM
ATLANTA - One in four teen girls have rolled up their sleeves for the relatively new vaccine against cervical cancer, federal health officials said Thursday.
The figures represent the government's first substantial study of vaccination rates for the Gardasil vaccine - Merck & Co.'s heavily advertised, three-shot series that targets the sexually transmitted human papillomavirus.
The vaccine protects against strains of the virus that cause about 70 percent of cervical cancers.
Health officials recommend that girls get the shots when they are 11 or 12, before they become sexually active. Also, age 11 is when kids are generally due for another round of vaccinations.
The survey only covered children in the 13-17 age range.
Vaccine proponents had been hoping for much higher vaccination rates, saying the shots could dramatically reduce the nearly 4,000 cervical cancer deaths that occur each year in the United States.
But many families are cautious about the safety of new vaccines, said Patti Gravitt, a Johns Hopkins University associate professor of epidemiology.
Other things about the vaccine may give some families pause. It is expensive, retailing for about $375, although many health insurers now cover it. And there are questions about whether it confers lifetime immunity or if a booster shot is needed.
"Some parents may be adopting the attitude with their daughters that, 'Well, you're still young. I can wait a couple more years before you're sexually active,'" said Gravitt, who was not involved in the research.
Originally published by Associated Press .
(c) 2008 Commercial Appeal, The. Provided by ProQuest LLC. All rights Reserved.
China's Poisoned Children
Oct 10, 02:46 PM
The tainted-milk scandal in China has gone far to damage the positive image so carefully cultivated by China's leaders at the Beijing Olympics. And it is a powerful reminder of how poorly capitalism, as well as socialism, blends with repressive one-party rule.
The facts are horrifying. Formula adulterated with melamine, an ingredient used in plastics and fertilizers, has sickened some 54,000 Chinese infants, killing at least three. Presumably added to cut costs, melamine can falsely inflate the protein content of watered-down milk. The Chinese pet-food ingredients that sickened so many U.S. dogs and cats last year contained melamine. Other recent, unhappy encounters here with the Chinese "product-safety" system include tainted seafood, toothpaste, toys and the blood-thinner heparin. And now we learn that melamine has been detected in Blue Cat Flavor Drink, which is imported from China. The Food and Drug Administration has begun a recall.
The United States bars importation of Chinese dairy products. Yet U.S. inspectors recently discovered melamine in a popular Chinese- made confection, White Rabbit Creamy Candy. The product has turned up in California and Connecticut, and may still be on some shelves. (While the Food and Drug Administration says that ingesting small bits of melamine is not harmful, except for infants, it prohibits the sale of foods to which it has been added.)
Perhaps because it wanted no negative reports during the Olympics, China was slow to admit to any milk problems. Though consumers had been complaining for months, it was not until mid- September that the government declared an emergency. It now seems likely that milk dealers, local officials and party propagandists conspired in a cover-up. Meanwhile, more and more babies were exposed to excruciating and even mortal illness. (Melamine attacks the kidneys.) Chinese journalists say they were ordered not to investigate.
The scandal spread from one large dairy, Sanlu Group, in a northern province, to some 30 others. Though headed by a local Communist Party official, Sanlu is partly owned by a New Zealand company, and pressure from New Zealand appears to have been instrumental in getting out the story.
Now China is going through its usual get-tough motions: Several officials have been fired or arrested. But without true political reform, little will change. Corruption is rampant, and the press is stifled by party rulers.
In response to these failures, Taiwan, Singapore, Japan, Malaysia, Brunei, Gabon, Vietnam, Russia and the Philippines have either banned or recalled Chinese milk products, threatening what had been an $18 billion (and growing) Chinese dairy industry.
Their children's endangerment has made the Chinese rightly furious. One couple is trying to sue the dairy it says sickened their child. It will be an epic breakthrough if the court allows the case to go forward. Now that so many have wealth, the Chinese increasingly are insisting on their rights. Until they get them, the safety of Chinese products will remain questionable.
(c) 2008 Providence Journal. Provided by ProQuest LLC. All rights Reserved.
Stem Cell Advance May Avoid Cancer Risk Non-Virus Method Called Safer, Simpler
Oct 10, 02:26 PM
By MARK JOHNSON
Japanese scientists have demonstrated a new way to reprogram cells without viruses, an important advance toward the goal of one day turning our own cells into a powerful tool to fight a wide range of diseases.
The new technique, reported Thursday in the journal Science, appears to be both safer and simpler than previous methods, bypassing the cancer risk associated with using viruses and genes that remain inside a cell.
The Japanese team, led by Shinya Yamanaka of Kyoto University and the Gladstone Institute of Cardiovascular Disease, delivered the reprogramming genes into mouse cells with plasmids. Plasmids are essentially small, very stable circles of DNA.
Just two weeks ago, a team at Harvard showed another way to improve safety by using a different kind of virus that delivers reprogramming genes, then dilutes out of the cells along with the outside genes. Still, some scientists had suggested that it would be preferable to avoid using a virus at all, which is precisely what the Japanese team has now done.
"I think it's very significant," Alexander Meissner, an assistant professor at the Harvard Stem Cell Institute, said of the new paper. "It shows you really can make these cells without any use of viruses. . . . All of these things are the most basic biology that can be done."
"This is a major step forward," said Timothy Kamp, co-director of the Stem Cell and Regenerative Medicine Center at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
But Kamp also sounded a note of caution, saying: "The field is advancing very quickly. We need some time to study these cells in detail. I have to think we're still many years from this getting into clinical trials."
It was only two years ago that Yamanaka launched the reprogramming revolution when he and another scientist sent mouse cells back to the embryonic state by infecting them with a virus carrying four genes. Last November, groups led by Yamanaka and UW- Madison's James Thomson reprogrammed human cells, and in the last year others have sought to apply and refine the methods.
After years of ethical controversy surrounding the destruction of human embryos, reprogramming has re-energized this scientific field, demonstrating an avenue for obtaining cells similar to human embryonic stem cells. The reprogrammed cells appear able to multiply and become any cell in the body, and they avoid the use of human embryos entirely.
Already scientists have begun collecting skin cells from patients with ALS, Alzheimer's and other diseases in order to reprogram them and develop them into the cells that are damaged in these illnesses. By doing so they hope to learn more about the disease process and to test thousands of drugs to see if any will help the affected cells.
Still, many researchers have urged that work be allowed to continue with embryonic stem cells, since the new cells have raised safety concerns. Also, scientists have not firmly established that the new cells match the embryonic originals in all respects.
In the Science paper, Yamanaka and his colleagues say that the new cells do not appear to have any traces of the plasmids or the reprogramming genes. The plasmids dilute out with each cell division.
Up to now, scientists have worried that the insertion of viruses and outside genes could change the way a cell's native genes behave, turning on a harmful process or turning off a beneficial one. For example, there could be disastrous consequences if reprogramming stopped a gene that causes programmed cell death. Despite its ominous name, programmed cell death plays an important role in preventing the early formation of tumors.
Both the Japanese and Harvard studies were done using mouse cells, and other researchers have stressed the importance of now showing that these methods will also work with human cells. Some experts disagree about how challenging that transition should be.
"There's no major reason why this shouldn't work in humans," Meissner said.
Mouse cells easier
Beverly Torok-Storb, a researcher at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle, said that the mouse isn't a good model for translating therapies into the clinic. Mouse cells are easier to reprogram. And because humans are so much larger and live longer, transplanted tissue must produce many more cells. That means there is more opportunity for something bad to happen, for example, a rare instance in which the plasmid DNA somehow fails to dilute out and integrates into the cell.
Torok-Storb said the advances by the Harvard group and the Japanese team, "going to an adenovirus, going to plasmids, these are steps in the right direction."
However, she added, "I don't think the best method has been found."
She and her colleagues have been searching for small molecules that can trigger the reprogramming mechanism without inserted genes or viruses. So far they have screened "small numbers and had some promising hits," but they are preparing to screen hundreds of thousands.
Despite the rapid pace of discovery this year, she and other scientists believe that much work remains before reprogrammed cells can be used on humans in clinical trials. She said the cells will need to be tested first in larger animals, such as primates, dogs or pigs.
Meissner said scientists must also develop ways of ensuring quality control in reprogramming.
They will need to be sure that the new cells are fully reprogrammed. He said the fast pace of improvements in reprogramming should continue.
"We're not searching for something unknown," he said. "We're trying to optimize something that's known."
Copyright 2008, Journal Sentinel Inc. All rights reserved. (Note: This notice does not apply to those news items already copyrighted and received through wire services or other media.)
(c) 2008 Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. Provided by ProQuest LLC. All rights Reserved.
Hong Kong Finds Melamine in Biscuits
Oct 10, 10:45 AM
Text of report by Hong Kong newspaper South China Morning Post website on 10 October
Hong Kong's Centre for Food Safety issued a warning yesterday not to consume EDO Pack Almond Cacao Biscuit Sticks after melamine was found in a test.
The EDO product with a use-by date of May 17 next year contained 8.5 milligrams of melamine per kilogram. The limit is 2.5 milligrams per kilogram.
A centre spokesman said, however, a three-year-old child would have to eat about 10 packs of the product a day to reach a dangerous amount, and an average adult would have to eat 124 packs.
In Shenzhen, melamine had been found in vegetables, but experts said the amount was too low to be of concern, the Zhejiang -based China Food Network reported yesterday. Mushrooms were found to have the highest levels.
Mushrooms could be planted on melamine-contaminated wooden floors, and some farmers might have used chemical additives to make the mushrooms looked fresher.
"Melamine has been used as a fertiliser, but absorption by plants would be difficult," an unidentified expert was quoted saying. "So we don't need to worry about it."
The Centre for Food Safety said it would follow the Shenzhen report, as the city was a key food supplier to Hong Kong.
Also, Singapore found traces of melamine in three more Chinese- made food products, including milk powder and Cadbury-brand candies, authorities said.
Singapore's Agri-Food and Veterinary Authority said samples of blueberry-and chocolate-flavoured Cadbury Choclairs and Panda Dairy- brand Whole Milk Powder imported from China had melamine.
"We would like to assure the public that the levels of melamine detected in the affected products are low and hence unlikely to result in any adverse health effect," the authority said in a statement.
"AVA will continue to suspend the import and sale of milk and milk products from China until we are very sure that such products are safe."
Originally published by South China Morning Post website, Hong Kong, in English 10 Oct 08.
(c) 2008 BBC Monitoring Asia Pacific. Provided by ProQuest LLC. All rights Reserved.
Burma Bans Nine Imported Milk Powder Products
Oct 10, 08:35 AM
Text of report in English by Japan's largest news agency Kyodo
Yangon, Oct. 10 Kyodo - Myanmar's junta has banned nine dairy products found to be contaminated with melamine, state-run newspapers reported Friday.
The official government announcement published in all three state- run newspapers said the nine brands of milk powders were contaminated with melamine and the government "hereby prohibited" their import, processing, distribution and use.
The official statement did not mention where the milk powders were imported from. However, it said the authorities took action after newspaper reports that "children in some countries including China are suffering from kidney stones after consuming tainted milk powder contaminated with melamine, and some children died."
Earlier this month, Myanmar's Food and Drug Authority found and destroyed 16 tons of formula milk powders imported from China.
Melamine is an industrial chemical, normally used in plastics, that is sometimes added to diluted milk to make it appear in tests to be higher in protein than it really is.
A least four Chinese infants have died and thousands of others have been sickened by the tainted milk, prompting many countries to ban milk powder and other milk products from China.
Originally published by Kyodo News Service, Tokyo, in English 1119 10 Oct 08.
(c) 2008 BBC Monitoring Asia Pacific. Provided by ProQuest LLC. All rights Reserved.
China Tests Find No Melamine in New Liquid Milk
Oct 10, 07:35 AM
China tests find no melamine in new liquid milk
BEIJING, Oct. 9 (Xinhua) -- The latest tests on Chinese liquid dairy products found no traces of melamine, the country's top quality control agency said on Thursday.
It was the eighth investigation on the industrial chemical following the tainted baby formula scandal that killed at least three infants and sickened more than 50,000 others, according to the General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine (AQSIQ).
The latest tests covered 855 batches of liquid milk, including yogurt, from 77 brands in 22 major and four mid-size cities, the agency said.
At present, 3,681 batches of liquid dairy products from 126 brands produced after Sept. 14 were tested and none contained melamine, it added.
Melamine, often used in the manufacturing of plastics, was added to sub-standard or diluted milk to make the protein levels appear higher.
China on Wednesday set limits on melamine content in dairy products. The limits were a maximum of 1 mg of melamine per kg of infant formula and a maximum 2.5 mg per kg for liquid milk, milk powder and food products containing at least 15 percent milk.
The agency had sent more than 5,000 inspectors to carry out round- the-clock scrutiny at dairy factories in effort to ensure quality and restore consumer confidence.
The Ministry of Finance on Thursday said it allocated 300 million yuan (43.9 million U.S. dollars) to dairy farmers in five major dairy producing provinces.
Farmers suffered losses as they disposed of raw milk because of a slump in dairy consumption following the scandal.
(c) 2008 Xinhua News Agency - CEIS. Provided by ProQuest LLC. All rights Reserved.
A Quarter of U.S. Teenage Girls Received Cervical Cancer Vaccine
Oct 10, 07:15 AM
By THOMAS H MAUGH II
By Thomas H. Maugh II
Los Angeles Times
About a quarter of U.S. teenage girls received the controversial cervical cancer vaccine Gardasil in its first full year of distribution, federal authorities said Thursday.
"For a new vaccine, 25 percent is really very good," Lance Rodewald, director of the division of immunization services at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said at a telephone news conference releasing the data.
But immunologist W. Martin Kast of the University of Southern California's Keck School of Medicine, said data released earlier in the year by Gardasil's manufacturer, Merck & Co., shows that only about 1 percent of Hispanic teenagers are receiving the vaccine, and "they are the population that needs it the most" because the frequency of infection is relatively high.
Researchers said the percentage of teens receiving two other relatively new vaccines also went up. About 32 percent of teens received the meningitis vaccine, up from 20 percent; and 30 percent received the tetanus, diphtheria and whooping cough vaccine, up from 19 percent.
Merck received Food and Drug Administration approval to begin marketing Gardasil in June 2006. Experts say it spent $100 million marketing it in 2007 and had sales of about $1.5 billion.
The vaccine protects against four strains of human papilloma virus that account for about 70 percent of all cases of cervical cancer in the United States.
But the vaccine has been criticized on a number of fronts. Some scientists argue that it is only modestly effective and that its safety has not been adequately proven. Conservative groups say that giving it to young girls implies approval of sexual activity. And consumer advocates bemoan its high price - $360 for a series of three shots.
The data, published in CDC's Morbidity & Mortality Weekly Report, came from the second year of the agency's annual National Immunization Survey for Teens. Researchers conducted telephone interviews with a representative sample of nearly 3,000 teens , then confirmed their answers with vaccination records .
Originally published by BY THOMAS H. MAUGH II.
(c) 2008 Virginian - Pilot. Provided by ProQuest LLC. All rights Reserved.
EDITORIAL: An Industry Takes Its Medicine: Decision to Stop Marketing Cold Remedies to Kids Under 4
Oct 10, 05:29 AM
By The Baltimore Sun
Oct. 10--Just in time for cold and flu season, manufacturers of popular over-the-counter cold and cough medicines have said they will stop marketing their remedies to children under age 4. It's the industry's latest response to a Baltimore-led push by health experts who note that there's no proof these drugs help young children -- but plenty of evidence that they harm kids through overdoses.
The announcement this week by the Consumer Healthcare Products Association is certainly welcome news. Questions persist, however, over whether such statements are sincere, and whether they go far enough. Public hearings last week kicked off what is expected to be a lengthy review of the subject by the Food and Drug Administration.
In January, the FDA urged parents to stop giving these medications to children under age 2, a position the industry association agreed with. The problem has been follow-through. Although medications targeting children under age 2 were pulled from shelves, other products have not been consistently relabeled to warn parents against giving them to babies and toddlers. Baltimore Health Commissioner Dr. Joshua M. Sharfstein and others who have shown leadership on this issue would like the FDA to go further; the American Academy of Pediatrics has concluded that cold and cough remedies are simply not appropriate for children under age 6. As Dr. Sharfstein noted in testimony to the FDA last week, the safety risks of cold remedies are amply documented. The Maryland Poison Center reported 900 overdoses in children under 5 during a single year, 2004. Worse, at least four deaths in recent years of Baltimore children under age 4 were linked to parents giving excessive doses.
It is possible, despite the lack of evidence, that these drugs do provide some modest relief. But the fact is, colds go away on their own. Given the risk of adverse effects and the scant evidence of benefits, the FDA should not rely on the industry's voluntary and thus far imperfect response to this problem; compliance will require monitoring by watchdog groups or government agencies.
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Copyright (c) 2008, The Baltimore Sun
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Cold Meds Makers Concede Too Risky for Kids
Oct 09, 11:45 PM
By RICARDO ALONSO-ZALDIVAR Associated Press writer
WASHINGTON - Children under 4 should not be given over-the- counter cough and cold remedies, drug companies said Tuesday in a concession to pediatricians who doubt the drugs do much good and worry about risks.
The voluntary change in advice to parents comes less than a week after federal health officials said they also saw little evidence that the drugs work. But government officials were afraid that taking the medicines off store shelves might prompt parents to give their children adult medicines.
The drug makers said they also will add a warning that parents should not give antihistamines to children to make them sleepy. These allergy medications often are found in medicines that combine several ingredients to treat a variety of symptoms.
The new measures "reflect industry's overall commitment to the continued safe and appropriate use of children's oral OTC cough and cold medicines," Linda Suydam, president of the Consumer Healthcare Products Association, said in announcing the changes on behalf of the companies.
LOCAL ANGLE
"I am very glad to hear about it," said Dr. Karla Kitch, a general pediatrician at Deaconess Gateway.
Kitch said children are not little adults, and their bodies do not break down the antihistamines the same way as adults.
"We cannot assume children are going to handle the medicines the same," Kitch said.
She offered alternatives:
n For a cough at bedtime, children 1 or older may take one-half teaspoon of honey. It is not safe to give honey to babies less than a year old.
n Babies under the age of one may use saline drops from the pharmacy.
n Cleaning and putting fresh water into a humidifier every day makes for a better, clean environment for children.
- Brandi Weyer
(c) 2008 Evansville Courier & Press. Provided by ProQuest LLC. All rights Reserved.
