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Chemoimmunotherapy versus chemotherapy for metastatic malignant melanoma

The addition of immunotherapy to chemotherapy for malignant skin cancer that has spread does not improve survival rates, researchers have found, and patients have more serious side effects, such as anemia, when the two treatments are combined.

1 Mar 2007

Health-care workers should undergo preventive drug treatment if exposed to HIV on the job

Doctors, nurses and other health-care providers have worried about HIV exposure since the AIDS epidemic first began in the early 1980s. Since the virus that causes AIDS is transmitted through blood, a simple needle stick could infect anyone treating a patient.

1 Mar 2007

Drug-enriched salt could prevent elephantiasis

Though little known outside the developing world, the disease called lymphatic filariasis wreaks havoc on millions of people by causing their limbs and genitals to fill with fluid and swell monstrously - the symptom commonly known as elephantiasis.

1 Mar 2007

New clues may explain why Graves' disease attacks muscle tissue behind eyes

UCLA researchers have uncovered new clues that may explain why Graves' disease (GD) attacks the muscle tissue behind the eyes, often causing them to bulge painfully from their sockets, as in the late actor Marty Feldman.

1 Mar 2007

NHS crisis in cabinet's back yard

Every one of the government's 21 elected cabinet ministers faces severe NHS cuts in or affecting their own backyard, according to a new report published by UNISON today.

1 Mar 2007

New understanding of drug addiction

The reason why some individuals may be predisposed to drug addiction has been discovered by scientists from the universities of Bristol and Cambridge.

1 Mar 2007

New insight into brain disorders

The function of an enzyme in the brain - strongly linked to a number of major brain diseases such as Alzheimer's, schizophrenia and bi-polar disorder - has been identified for the first time by researchers at the University of Bristol.

1 Mar 2007

Virtual Iraq to aid traumatised soldiers and military staff

The virtual Iraq simulation, developed at the University of Southern California (USC) but now being put into practice at Reading, is "fully-immersive" and designed as part of an exposure therapy programme which allows soldiers suffering post-traumatic stress disorder to relive and confront psychological trauma - and it has produced promising results for the first handful of patients treated.

1 Mar 2007

Sunitinib halts progress of metastatic kidney cancer

Research has shown the efficacy of a pharmaceutical drug known as sunitinib which halts progress of metastatic kidney cancer.

1 Mar 2007

British Government to ask public what they think of stem cell science

Britain's Science and Innovation Minister Malcolm Wicks has announced that the UK's two major public funders of stem cell research will run a national public discussion about this cutting-edge area of science.

1 Mar 2007

Fox Chase Cancer Center and Cancer Research Technology initiate drug discovery collaboration

Cancer Research Technology Inc. (CRT Inc.) and Fox Chase Cancer Center have announce the initiation of an oncology-focused drug discovery collaboration.

1 Mar 2007

Salty British bread puts 7,000 lives at risk

Health campaigners in Britain say high levels of salt in bread sold in supermarkets is placing 7,000 lives a year at risk.

1 Mar 2007

Warning about the indiscriminate use of diet drugs

The United Nations (UN) has issued a warning about the rise in a number of countries of the use of diet drugs to lose weight.

1 Mar 2007

One billion battling with neurological disorders

According to a new report by the World Health Organization (WHO), neurological disorders ranging from migraines to epilepsy and dementia, affect up to 1 billion people worldwide and that number is destined to rise as populations age.

1 Mar 2007

Increasing number of hospitals banning gift bags containing samples of infant formula

An increasing number of hospitals across the U.S. in an effort to promote breast-feeding are banning free gift bags that contain samples of infant formula, which often are given to women when they leave the hospital after delivery, the Wall Street Journal reports.

1 Mar 2007

Lawmakers should not make HPV vaccination mandatory, CDC advisory panel chair says

Jon Abramson, chair of CDC's Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, recently said that he does not support mandating human papillomavirus vaccination for school attendance, the Washington Times reports.

1 Mar 2007

About 26% of U.S. girls, women ages 14 to 59 have HPV

Of U.S. women and girls ages 14 to 59, about 24.9 million women, or 26.8%, have the human papillomavirus, and about 2% of women and girls in the age group have HPV strains 16 or 18, which together cause about 70% of cervical cancer cases, according to a study published in the Feb. 28 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association, the Wall Street Journal reports.

1 Mar 2007

Fertility rate in Chinese county exempt from one-child policy lower than national average

The Chinese county of Yicheng, which has been exempt for the last 21 years from the country's one-child-per-family policy, has been found to have a lower fertility rate than the national average, the Christian Science Monitor reports.

1 Mar 2007

Federal Appeals Court rules in favor of U.S. policy requiring groups that receive HIV/AIDS funding to condemn commercial sex work

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia on Tuesday ruled that a U.S. policy requiring recipients of federal HIV/AIDS service grants to pledge to oppose commercial sex work does not violate the groups' First Amendment right to free speech, the AP/International Herald Tribune reports.

1 Mar 2007

New York reverses HIV/AIDS housing rent increase

The recently appointed New York state commissioner of temporary and disability assistance, David Hansall, on Tuesday reversed a state-ordered rent increase for HIV-positive people living in subsidized housing in New York City, the New York Times reports (Chan, New York Times, 2/28).

1 Mar 2007