Category Archives: healthcare

Cuba has just eliminated HIV transmission between mother and baby – ScienceAlert

The World Health Organization has confirmed that Cuba has become the first country in the world to effectively eliminate mother-to-baby transmission of HIV and syphilis.

Source: Cuba has just eliminated HIV transmission between mother and baby – ScienceAlert

The New Generation Gap by Joseph E. Stiglitz – Project Syndicate

These three realities – social injustice on an unprecedented scale, massive inequities, and a loss of trust in elites – define our political moment, and rightly so.More of the same is not an answer. That is why the center-left and center-right parties in Europe are losing. America is in a strange position: while the Republican presidential candidates compete on demagoguery, with ill-thought-through proposals that would make matters worse, both of the Democratic candidates are proposing changes which – if they could only get them through Congress – would make a real difference.Were the reforms put forward by Hillary Clinton or Bernie Sanders adopted, the financial system’s ability to prey on those already leading a precarious life would be curbed. And both have proposals for deep reforms that would change how America finances higher education.But more needs to be done to make home ownership possible not just for those with parents who can give them a down payment, and to make retirement security possible, given the vagaries of the stock market and the near-zero-interest world we have entered.

Source: The New Generation Gap by Joseph E. Stiglitz – Project Syndicate

WitnessLA.com » Blog Archive » Report Alleges Deplorable Conditions, Misuse of Solitary Confinement, and Leadership Failure at LA County’s Juvenile Hall

OTHER FACILITIES MANAGE TO DO THINGS RIGHT In his report, Martinez made a point of praising some of the county’s other probation facilities for doing a consistently good job, including Barry J. Nidorf Juvenile Hall, located in Sylmar, and Los Padrinos Juvenile Hall, located in Downey. “Los Padrinos” he wrote, “has a daily graffiti inspection for both living rooms and bathrooms, and [the] rooms are spotless.” Martinez also noted that not all the units at Central Juvenile Hall were in the same condition of filth and disrepair as those units that caused him such concern. Certain other units were clean and graffiti free. So why were the bad units allowed to get so bad? SOLITARY FOR 16 HOURS BECAUSE OF A FOOD TRADE Another distressing part of Martinez’ Valentine’s Day report pertained to a boy who was sent for 16 hours to juvenile hall’s Special Housing Unit (SHU), which means solitary confinement. The boy’s offense was trading a carton of milk with another boy for a carton of orange juice—or vice versa. Food trading with other kids is evidently against the rules. But, there are plenty of ways to appropriately sanction a boy who simply wants a little more of healthful beverage. Sixteen hours in solitary confinement is not one of them. Furthermore, it is against the department’s own rules—which are reportedly to send a kid to solitary for no more than a few hours as a time out, barring an exceptional situation. Martinez wrote that the juvenile hall director he spoke with about the matter admitted that he didn’t believe that the boy should have been sent to the SHU to begin with for such a trivial infraction. Yet, it appears that the boy might have been in isolation far longer than 16 hours, had Martinez not specifically asked for him to be sent back to his home unit. Common sense suggests that, in all likelihood, if an abuse of solitary confinement for kids occurred during Martinez’ recent visit, it has also occurred in other instances. How many other instances, we have no way of knowing. The truth is, any one of a number of mid and high level supervisors in the department could or should have walked through juvenile hall and seen these entirely unacceptable problems.

Source: WitnessLA.com » Blog Archive » Report Alleges Deplorable Conditions, Misuse of Solitary Confinement, and Leadership Failure at LA County’s Juvenile Hall

Avian Flu Diary: FDA On Proposed Oxitec Mosquito Trials In The Florida Keys – Que  this is the end, my friends?

{Mosquitoes are not pests! They are one of nature’s vectors for passing on diseases whose purposes are to rebalance unbalanced ecologies or ecologies that have been dramatically disturbed. Most of the imbalances are caused by human expansion into new areas, deforestation, and industrialized monocultures of grains, fruits, vegetables. The really bad news? If we zap this vector rather than adjust how we disrupt the environment, another vector will take its place with perhaps a more deadly disease.}

Now, with the spread of Dengue, CHIKV and Zika in the Americas – along with the growing degree of insectacide resistance around the world – suddenly GM mosquitoes, Wolbachia, and other novel control methods are getting a lot of attention again.

Source: Avian Flu Diary: FDA On Proposed Oxitec Mosquito Trials In The Florida Keys

Johns Hopkins researchers identify TB’s natural resistance to antibiotics

Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine biophysicists recently found that the bacteria causing tuberculosis (TB) may be naturally resistant to antibiotics, called fluoroquinolones, which could help researchers strengthen TB drugs that have weakened over time. The biophysicists made this discovery using maps that showed 3-D details of the structure of the drugs while the medicines interacted with TB’s essential enzyme. “Front-line treatments for TB are eroding rapidly as more cases of multidrug-resistant TB arise worldwide,” Dr. James Berger, professor of biophysics and biophysical chemistry, said. “Our work helps show that we need not — and indeed should not — give up on fluoroquinolones, a longtime weapon in the fight against disease-causing bacteria in general. We’ve helped to identify several promising possibilities for developing new versions of these drugs that might even work against extensively drug-resistant TB.” The maps also showed the reason that some of the TB drugs are stronger while others are weaker. This could help scientists develop fluoroquinolones that are more efficient against the mutating disease “This result means the fluoroquinolones aren’t working in the most straightforward way, and that’s a challenge for drug developers,” Berger said. “We have to rethink the chemistry of these drugs, but doing so will likely open up new avenues for improvements.” The study is available in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Source: Johns Hopkins researchers identify TB’s natural resistance to antibiotics

Brushing teeth regularly could ward off Alzheimer’s disease – Telegraph

Brushing your teeth regularly could slow down the progression of Alzheimer’s disease after scientists found that gum disease speeds up mental decline by six times.Periodontitis, or gum disease, is common in older people and can get worse in old age as people struggle to maintain their oral hygiene. It is thought that periodontal bacteria increase levels of inflammation in the body, which has been linked to greater mental decline in people with Alzheimer’s disease. A new study by King’s College London and the University of Southampton followed 59 people with mild to moderate dementia for six months, monitoring the state of their gums.

Source: Brushing teeth regularly could ward off Alzheimer’s disease – Telegraph

Supreme Court blocks Louisiana law that would restrict abortion providers – LA Times

Supreme Court in a victory for abortion-rights advocates on Friday blocked Louisiana from enforcing a law that they said would have left the state with only one doctor licensed to perform the procedure. The justices, by a 7-1 vote, issued a brief order that restores an earlier judicial ban on enforcing the 2014 law. The court’s order is a good sign for abortion-rights groups in Louisiana and nationwide. Coming shortly after the justices debated a similar Texas law, the order shows a majority of the high court is unwilling to permit conservative states to enforce stringent regulations. A federal judge had blocked Louisiana from enforcing a rule that would require doctors performing abortions to have admitting privileges at a nearby hospital. The judge found most hospitals simply refused to consider extending these privileges to a doctor whose practice involved abortion.

Source: Supreme Court blocks Louisiana law that would restrict abortion providers – LA Times

Avian Flu Diary: Not Without Warning – The Return Of Mosquito Disease Threats

Zika, Dengue, and Chikungunya – at least outside of Africa and Asia – have no known non-human animal reservoirs, which means they have a harder time becoming endemic. But when enough people become infected, these viruses are  able to sustain themselves in an Urban Cycle, where transmission is strictly human-to-mosquito-to human. In the middle of the last decade we saw Chikungunya made a break from Africa, and jump to Reunion Island in the Indian Ocean where it reportedly infected about 1/3rd of that island’s population (266,000 case out of  pop.770,000) in a matter of a few months, before moving on to Southeast Asia. About the same time, Dengue began to turn up again in the United States after decades of absence. In January of 2009, in Outnumbered By A Competent Vector, we looked at reports of Dengue’s incursions into Texas and Queensland, Australia. In 2009, Dengue Resurfaced In Key West  after a 70 year absence, but even months before that, we saw a cautionary report from the Natural Resources Defense Council (see NRDC Report: Climate Change and Health Threats) warning that Dengue and other vector borne diseases could one day reestablish themselves in the United States.

Source: Avian Flu Diary: Not Without Warning – The Return Of Mosquito Disease Threats

Second Case Of Zika Virus Confirmed In L.A. County: LAist

A pregnant woman from Los Angeles County is infected with Zika virus after traveling abroad, according to a release from the L.A. County Department of Public Health. She’s the second Angeleno to be infected with the virus. The first case was reported in November: a young girl who traveled to El Salvador in November who has since recovered, according the L.A. Times. Though the virus usually presents only minor symptoms, Zika seems to be linked to a surge of microcephaly cases in Brazil. Microcephaly is a birth defect that causes babies to be born with abnormally small heads, leading to brain damage. L.A. County’s Public Health department has issued a travel warning for Angelenos headed to several Latin American and Caribbean countries where Zika infections are more widespread. So far, no one has actually picked up the disease in L.A. However, the Aedes mosquito, the species known to carry the virus, is found throughout the San Gabriel Valley. A total of 14 Californians have been infected with the virus since 2014, including six this year. Like other mosquito transmitted viruses like West Nile, the easiest way to keep risk to a minimum is to eliminate standing water.

Source: Second Case Of Zika Virus Confirmed In L.A. County: LAist

FAO – News Article: Pollinators vital to our food supply under threat

A growing number of pollinator species worldwide are being driven toward extinction by diverse pressures, many of them human-made, threatening millions of livelihoods and hundreds of billions of dollars worth of food supplies, according to the first global assessment of pollinators. However, the assessment, a two-year study conducted and released today by the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES), also highlights a number of ways to effectively safeguard pollinator populations. The assessment, titled Thematic Assessment of Pollinators, Pollination and Food Production and the first ever issued by IPBES, is a groundbreaking effort to better understand and manage a critical element of the global ecosystem.  It is also the first assessment of its kind that is based on the available knowledge from science and indigenous and local knowledge systems.

Source: FAO – News Article: Pollinators vital to our food supply under threat