How Sleep Deprivation Decays the Mind and Body; Getting too little sleep can have serious health consequences, including depression, weight gain, and heart disease. It is torture

How Sleep Deprivation Decays the Mind and Body

Getting too little sleep can have serious health consequences, including depression, weight gain, and heart disease. It is torture. I know.

By Seth Maxon

I awoke in a bed for the first time in days.  My joints ached and my eyelids, which had been open for so long, now lay heavy as old hinges above my cheekbones. I wore two pieces of clothing: an assless gown and a plastic bracelet. Read more of this post

Why Everyone Seems to Have Cancer; As heart disease and stroke are beaten back (??), cancer vies to become the final killer

January 4, 2014

Why Everyone Seems to Have Cancer

By GEORGE JOHNSON

EVERY New Year when the government publishes its Report to the Nation on the Status of Cancer, it is followed by a familiar lament. We are losing the war against cancer. Half a century ago, the story goes, a person was far more likely to die from heart disease. Now cancer is on the verge of overtaking it as the No. 1 cause of death. Read more of this post

Supply, Demand and Heart Attacks

Supply, Demand and Heart Attacks

The U.S. health-care system, with its bizarre pricing mechanisms and convoluted relationship between supply and demand, is probably about as far from a free market as anything in the country’s economy gets. Yet according to two studies being presented at this weekend’s American Economic Association annual meeting in Philadelphia, market forces do operate in some way. Read more of this post

Beware the Thundering Pharma Herd

Beware the Thundering Pharma Herd

HELEN THOMAS

Jan. 5, 2014 5:21 p.m. ET

Crowds may have wisdom, but innovation is often the preserve of individuals. Investors have placed their bets on the health of pharmaceutical companies’ pipelines. The European sector now trades at close to 15 times forward earnings, up from about 10 times three years ago. But amid signs of a recovery in research-and-development productivity, is the industry displaying a herdlike mentality? Read more of this post

A Booster Shot for Vaccines; Amid Debate and Outbreaks, States Weigh Tougher Rules for Allowing Exemptions

A Booster Shot for Vaccines

Amid Debate and Outbreaks, States Weigh Tougher Rules for Allowing Exemptions

DONNA BRYSON and BETSY MCKAY

Jan. 5, 2014 7:02 p.m. ET

DENVER—Amid national outbreaks of measles, whooping cough and other preventable diseases, Colorado officials might make it harder for parents to exempt children from vaccinations for school and day care. Read more of this post

When Doctors ‘Google’ Their Patients

JANUARY 6, 2014, 1:59 PM

When Doctors ‘Google’ Their Patients

By HAIDER JAVED WARRAICH, M.D.

I remember when I first looked up a patient on Google. It was my last day on the bone marrow transplant unit, back when I was an intern. As I stood before the patient, taking her history, she told me she had been a painter and suggested I look up her work on the Internet. I did, and I found her paintings fascinating. Even though our paths crossed fleetingly, she is one of the few patients I vividly remember from that time. Read more of this post

Undertaking thousands of hours of work, researchers are working to create an interactive database of a healthy brain’s structure and activity, the first of its kind

January 6, 2014

The Brain, in Exquisite Detail

By JAMES GORMAN

ST. LOUIS — Deanna Barch talks fast, as if she doesn’t want to waste any time getting to the task at hand, which is substantial. She is one of the researchers here at Washington University working on the first interactive wiring diagram of the living, working human brain. Read more of this post

Teva: in need of a shot; Generic drugmaker is in need of a complete overhaul

January 6, 2014 4:02 pm

Teva: in need of a shot

Generic drugmaker is in need of a complete overhaul

The board of Teva Pharmaceuticals is a brains trust of scientific and medical knowledge. Shame that so few of its 16 members know anything about running a company. It has taken a shareholder – the Israeli entrepreneur Benny Landa – to point out the obvious: that the world’s largest generic drugmaker by revenue needs more than a new chief executive. It needs a new (or at least smaller) board, a new (or at least clearer) strategy, and a new chairman. Read more of this post

Umbilical Cord Draws Focus From More Scientists Seeking Cures; Researchers of Type 1 Diabetes, Arthritis, Cerebral Palsy Examine Stem Cells

Umbilical Cord Draws Focus From More Scientists Seeking Cures

Researchers of Type 1 Diabetes, Arthritis, Cerebral Palsy Examine Stem Cells in Cord Blood

PETER LOFTUS

Jan. 6, 2014 7:21 p.m. ET

Researchers see new potential for using blood found in the umbilical cord of newborns to treat a range of diseases. Transplants using the stem-cell-rich blood have already become lifesaving treatments for certain cancers and disorders of the blood, but these studies focus on a wider range of conditions. Read more of this post

Global reach of India drug producers grows

January 5, 2014 2:37 pm

Global reach of India drug producers grows

By Andrew Jack in London

India is producing almost as many medicines for the UK as those manufactured within Britain itself, according to figures showing the growing influence of Asia in the global pharmaceuticals market. Read more of this post

Two Sides of the Coins; How has biotech finally boomed.

How biotech finally boomed

January 4, 2014

Test results: Sirtex, which is carrying out trials of a cancer treatment, has been a strong sharemarket performer and the focus of much investor interest.

Investing in biotech stocks is not for the faint-hearted – so much so that a lack of analyst depth and knowledge of the sector means that many professional fund managers try to avoid the sector altogether. But the collapse of the gold price and the ongoing implosion of the mining sector during the past year have prompted a steady flow of funds into the sector for the first time. Read more of this post

Researchers and drug companies are ganging up for a new push against cancer

Researchers and drug companies are ganging up for a new push against cancer

Jan 4th 2014 | From the print edition

“THERE is no treatment.” This is the conclusion of an Egyptian papyrus, written around 3000BC, that is the oldest known description of the scourge that is now called “cancer”. And so, more or less, it remained until the 20th century, for merely excising a tumour by surgery rarely eliminates it. Only when doctors worked out how to back up the surgeon’s knife with drugs and radiation did cancer begin to succumb to treatment—albeit, to start with, in a pretty crude fashion. Read more of this post

Make Those Cows Pay for Their Penicillin; America’s animals take more drugs than its people do. About 80 percent of the 51 tons of antibiotics consumed each day in the U.S. are used in agriculture and aquaculture

Make Those Cows Pay for Their Penicillin

America’s animals take more drugs than its people do. About 80 percent of the 51 tons of antibiotics consumed each day in the U.S. are used in agriculture and aquaculture. Read more of this post

FDA Crackdown on Antibiotics Relies on Unproven Steps

FDA Crackdown on Antibiotics Relies on Unproven Steps

A delegation of public-health advocates filed into the suburban Chicago headquarters of McDonald (MCD)’s Corp. last January to deliver a tough message: A decade after the fast-food giant’s groundbreaking promise to reduce medically important antibiotics fed to the animals it buys, the policy had glaring loopholes and questionable impact. Read more of this post

Trebling tobacco tax ‘could prevent 200 million early deaths’

Trebling tobacco tax ‘could prevent 200 million early deaths’

Wed, Jan 1 2014

By Kate Kelland

LONDON (Reuters) – Trebling tobacco tax globally would cut smoking by a third and prevent 200 million premature deaths this century from lung cancer and other diseases, researchers said on Wednesday. Read more of this post

Vitamin E Slows Decline in Patients With Mild Alzheimer’s

Vitamin E Slows Decline in Patients With Mild Alzheimer’s

Vitamin E can help slow the effects of mild to moderate forms of Alzheimer’s disease, a finding doctors should consider for treating patients, researchers said. Patients given high doses of vitamin E for about two years delayed progression of the degenerative brain disease by about 6.2 months, compared with those given a placebo, according to a study published today in the Journal of the American Medical Association. Doctors may want to discuss vitamin E as an option in early-stage Alzheimer’s treatments, the researchers said. Read more of this post

Cancer eclipsed as global donors focus on other diseases

December 30, 2013 2:11 pm

Cancer eclipsed as global donors focus on other diseases

By Javier Blas in Lilongwe

The paediatric ward at Kamuzu Central Hospital and the Baylor Clinical Centre of Excellence are not even 50 metres apart. A small gate and garden separate them within an overcrowded and decrepit hospital in Lilongwe, the capital of Malawi. Read more of this post

The hazy business of treating your hangover; Most medical experts agree that there is no real way to cure a hangover. So why are more and more companies getting into the hangover treatment business?

The hazy business of treating your hangover

December 30, 2013: 1:55 PM ET

Most medical experts agree that there is no real way to cure a hangover. So why are more and more companies getting into the hangover treatment business?

By Caroline Fairchild, reporter

FORTUNE — On the eve of one of the biggest drinking nights of the year, we have some bad news. There is likely no cure for the hangover that you will inevitably wake up with come January 1st. Read more of this post

Researchers Aim to Speed Cures to Patients; Progress Is Slow in Developing New Drugs for Cancer, Other Diseases

Researchers Aim to Speed Cures to Patients

Progress Is Slow in Developing New Drugs for Cancer, Other Diseases

SHIRLEY S. WANG

Dec. 30, 2013 7:00 p.m. ET

Hoping to speed development of treatments for cancer, Alzheimer’s and other diseases, scientists are testing new methods to research promising medications. Bringing a new drug to market typically costs upward of $100 million and can take as many as 15 years of research, testing and regulatory review. As a result, health experts worry that not enough innovative medicines are being developed, or that the progress is too slow. Read more of this post

‘Pain Free’ After Surgery Is New Goal at More Hospitals

‘Pain Free’ After Surgery Is New Goal at More Hospitals

JESSICA HOLZER

Dec. 30, 2013 7:04 p.m. ET

German hospitals, dogged by a cultural grin-and-bear-it attitude toward pain, are starting to change.

About 120 hospitals in the country now carry “pain-free” certifications—essentially a pledge to keep patients’ pain at bearable levels. Meanwhile, 170 German hospitals are participating in a multinational registry known as Pain Out to swap information on patients’ satisfaction with their pain control, in effect drawing a map of pain management in the country and highlighting particularly effective approaches. Read more of this post

Cancer eclipsed as global donors focus on other diseases

December 30, 2013 2:11 pm

Cancer eclipsed as global donors focus on other diseases

By Javier Blas in Lilongwe

The paediatric ward at Kamuzu Central Hospital and the Baylor Clinical Centre of Excellence are not even 50 metres apart. A small gate and garden separate them within an overcrowded and decrepit hospital in Lilongwe, the capital of Malawi. Read more of this post

A Resisted Pill to Prevent H.I.V.; Truvada’s use to prevent H.I.V. has been approved by the F.D.A. and hailed by experts

December 30, 2013

A Resisted Pill to Prevent H.I.V.

By DAVID TULLER

SAN FRANCISCO — Over a cup of tea at a downtown Starbucks, Michael Rubio recalled how four friends became H.I.V. positive through unprotected sex, all within a year. The news shocked Mr. Rubio, a 28-year-old gay man, into trying a controversial new form of H.I.V. prevention: a daily pill that studies show is highly effective in protecting people from infection. Read more of this post

Hong Kong New Air Quality Index Shows Very High Health Risk

Hong Kong New Air Quality Index Shows Very High Health Risk

A new Hong Kong air quality index introduced yesterday as part of the city’s efforts to combat pollution registered “very high” a day after the guage reached its highest level. Read more of this post

Hong Kong Regulator Takes Measures to Stem Counterfeit Banknotes

Hong Kong Regulator Takes Measures to Stem Counterfeit Banknotes

Hong Kong’s banking regulator introduced more measures to stem counterfeiting after fake HK$1,000 ($129) notes were found in the city and Macau in the past two weeks. Read more of this post

Bird Flu Subtype Reemerges in Hong Kong: Official

Bird Flu Subtype Reemerges in Hong Kong: Official

By Agence France-Presse on 7:13 pm December 30, 2013.
Hong Kong. An elderly man has contracted a mild form of bird flu in the first case of its type for four years, Hong Kong officials said on Monday. “We are now investigating a confirmed human case of influenza A H9N2, affecting a man aged 86,” Leung Ting-hung, controller of the city’s Center for Health Protection, told reporters. Read more of this post