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News Update
A fifth of world's children not vaccinated
One fifth of the world's children still do not receive routine vaccinations that could prevent 1.5m deaths a year from preventable diseases, the World Health Organisation says.
Billions have no access to surgery
Two-thirds of the world's population have no access to safe and affordable surgery, according to a study – more than double the number in previous estimates.
Warning on BMPEA diet supplements
The US Food and Drug Administration has warned five companies to stop selling dietary supplements containing an unapproved stimulant known as beta-methylphenylethylamine, (BMPEA). An investigation found nine out of 21 supplements containing Acacia rigidula also contained BMPEA, even though the plant itself does not contain the substance.
Dr Pieter Cohen, an assistant professor at Harvard Medical School said the warnings do not go far enough since they cover only those products that explicitly list BMPEA on the label. Many products use Acacia rigidula as code and do not mention BMPEA, which is an amphetamine-like substance that has been shown to raise blood pressure and heart rate in animals and is classified as a doping agent by the World Anti-Doping Agency.
US alert on Hep C, HIV and injection drug risk
US health officials alerted to watch for clusters of HIV and hepatitis C among injection drug users.
Warning on hepatitis C medicine risk
European health regulators have warned against using Gilead Sciences' and Bristol-Myers Squibb's hepatitis C medicines along with amiodarone, a drug used to regulate arrhythmia.
UK call for blanket ban on designer vaginas
A blanket ban should be introduced on so-called designer vagina surgery on under-18s to meet concerns that the British law which prohibits female genital mutilation is ambiguous, an influential group of MPs has found.
SA's scarcity of transplant donors
SA doctors report increasing difficulty in finding suitable donors, reports Business Day. The annual rate of heart transplants in SA has halved in the past 20 years, as public lack of awareness, deteriorating medical infrastructure and reservations among healthcare professionals 'combine with deadly effect'.
Non-invasive treatment for emphysema now in SA
Emphysema sufferers can now undergo a ground-breaking non-invasive procedure, known as Lung Volume Reduction Coil a procedure recently performed for the first time in Africa.
Condo ms in multi-flavours and colours
The SA government will be distributing multi-flavoured condoms in a bid to increase youth condom usage. They will be available in strawberry, banana and grape and it will also be brightly coloured
Measles sceptic ordered to pay up in Germany
A German biologist who offered €100,000 to anyone who could prove that measles is a virus has been ordered by a court to pay up. Stefan Lanka, who believes the illness is psychosomatic, made the pledge four years ago on his website.
Longer HIV survival triggers insurer payout
As people with HIV now live longer than expected, Old Mutual plans to release reserves it has built up in its funeral insurance policies, to the benefit of lower-income customers.
Project to find best drugs for HIV, TB and malaria
The Global Health Impact project was started approximately seven years ago with the mission to give people across the world access to the best drugs to fight HIV/Aids, tuberculosis and malaria.
Two-shot Ebola vaccine being tested
Scientists are to test a new two-shot Ebola vaccine using an experimental shot from GlaxoSmithKline, which is already in clinical trials in Africa, and a new kind of booster from Emergent BioSolutions.
Doubts raised over NHI feasibility
Four years into implementing National Health Insurance (NHI), the Department of Health has failed to persuade significant numbers of private sector general practitioners to work in its facilities, raising doubts about its feasibility, reports Business Day.
Free sugar intake must be reduced – WHO
Adults and children should reduce their daily free sugar – glucose, fructose, sucrose and table sugar – intake to less than 10% of their total energy intake, according to a new guideline from the World Health Organisation (WHO).
Tool visualises body SIV replication live
A non-invasive method has been developed to image simian immunodeficiency virus (SIV) replication in real-time, in vivo. This allows for the capture of viral dynamics of SIV, the animal model of human HIV infection.
Pakistanis refusing polio vaccine arrested
Pakistani authorities have conducted their first-ever mass arrest of parents for refusing to allow their children to be vaccinated against polio.
UK pioneers cell therapy for lung cancer
British patients will be the first in the world to receive a pioneering cell therapy that scientists hope will transform the treatment of lung cancer.
Ebola hero nurse faces misconduct scrutiny
The British nurse who risked her life treating Ebola victims and came close to death when she contracted the disease herself has been summoned for a hearing by the nursing regulator over whether her symptoms were concealed when she arrived back home.
Cardiothoracic surgical outcomes made public
The US Society of Thoracic Surgeons (STS) has for the first time made publicly accessible its database of surgical outcomes and ratings. 'We believe that our patients and their families have the right to know the outcomes of cardio-thoracic surgery procedures so that they can make well-informed decisions,' a spokesman said.
Too few black bone marrow donors in SA
Black South Africans make up about 47% of all cancer patients but only 5% of donors in the nation's bone marrow registry.
Global strategy to combat hepatitis C
Worldwide leaders have come together in Geneva, Switzerland at the World Health Organisation to begin to develop a five-year strategy to combat hepatitis C.
SA nursing shortage drives health costs
SA's critical shortage of nurses has serious implications for the implementation of a nurse-dependent National Health Insurance(NHI) system, but also appears to be a significant cost driver for the private hospital sector, according to a Mediclinic submission to an private healthcare costs inquiry.
Investment in 'neglected' tropical diseases
Scaling up investment to tackle leprosy, dengue fever, sleeping sickness and other neglected tropical diseases would improve the health and well-being of more than 1.5bn people, says a new World Health Organisation report.
R37m for university cancer research units
The SA Medical Research Council has committed R37m to three universities to establish research units geared towards specific types of cancer.
WHO call for 'smart syringe' use
Smart syringes that break after one use should be used for injections by 2020, is the call from the World Health Organisation (WHO). Reusing syringes leads to more than 2m people being infected with diseases including HIV and hepatitis each year.
Toxic enemas to 'cure' autism, malaria
Some parents are apparently trying to cure their kids autism – by giving them a 'miracle' solution enema in order to flush the vaccines out. In SA the quack product has been touted as a malarial cure.
HIV vaccine trial starts in SA
An NIH-led safety and efficacy trial of an experimental HIV vaccine regimen has begun in SA, with experimental vaccines from Sanofi Pasteur and Novartis.
Generics agreement on paediatric HIV med
The Medicines Patent Pool (MPP) has announced a generics licence with Merck for paediatric formulations of raltegravir, a key medicine approved for children living with HIV.
Hopes of a wholly artificial polio vaccine
An international team is to try to develop a wholly artificial vaccine to combat polio. The hope is that the new approach can address some shortcomings in an existing vaccine, and so help eliminate polio altogether.
UK obese refusing treatment may lose benefits
A UK Conservative government will attempt to ensure that tens of thousands of people who claim welfare on the grounds of obesity, drug or alcohol addiction are 'incentivised' to go back to work. Those who refuse treatment could lose their welfare benefits.Schools open in Liberia after Ebola
Schools have reopened in Liberia for the first time in six months after being closed as a precaution against Ebola.
Call to reinstate SA's HIV/Aids committee
SA civil society groups, including the Desmond Tutu HIV Foundation, have renewed their demand that the Joint Committee on HIV and Aids be reinstated. The committee, initially set up in 2012, was disbanded in 2014.
UK guidelines: No safe drinking in pregnancy
Updated Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists guidelines say women trying for a baby and those in the first three months of pregnancy should not drink any alcohol.It had previously said a couple of glasses of wine a week was acceptable.
Changing the vaccination rhetoric
Some US public health authorities are retooling their vaccination messages, toning down sometimes strident rhetoric, in order to convince often affluent anti-vaccination families.
SAMA accuses hospital groups of ‘collusion’
SA Medical Association (SAMA), representing more than 7,000 doctors, slammed the three biggest hospital groups, Mediclinic, Life and Netcare, and medical aid administrator Discovery Health. The association claimed that they colluded in deciding which treatments would be available in hospitals.
DoH pushes on patent meds price benchmarking
SA’s Department of Health has has instructed multinational drug firms that make patented medicines to disclose their prices in other countries. Business Day reports that this is the 'first concrete step towards implementing a mandatory international benchmarking system'.
SA's private hospitals blamed for high costs
Dominance by private hospital groups and their cosy relationships with specialist doctors and medical schemes, coupled with gaps in regulation and a lack of transparency, have been named in submissions to the Competition Commission as major causes of expensive private healthcare in SA.
Cancer bodies slam Johns Hopkins study
International cancer bodies have slammed a Johns Hopkins study suggesting that two-thirds of cancers were caused by chance and therefore could not be prevented, saying it is misleading and potentially harmful.
Increase in UK cancer diagnoses predicted
One in two people will be diagnosed with cancer in their lifetime, according to Cancer Research UK, up from previous estimates of one in three. The local estimate is that one in five South Africans will develop cancer in their lifetime.