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Daughter to get $10 M for amputations after ER

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SACRAMENTO, California (AP) - the family of a California toddler whose foot, the left hand and part of his right hand was amputated due to delay of the long emergency room has agreed to a settlement of $ 10 million malpractice.

Malyia Jeffers was 2 years old when her parents took her to the Methodist Hospital of Sacramento in November last with fever, skin colour, and weakness. According to court documents, the family said to wait.

"While in the waiting room, Malyia grows more ill and weak," according to the complaint filed in superior court in Sacramento, February 14. "The parents of several times asked Malyia and pray (workers of the hospital) treat their daughter.".

Rather, the hospital said to continue waiting and it was five hours before Malyia was first seen by a physician, said the document.

"Ryan Jeffers and Leah Yang saw their daughter get weaker and sicker as (workers of the hospital) hours chose to delay the treatment," said the complaint. "They have seen the bruises on his body increase, affecting her legs, the arms and face." "They were afraid that she would die in the waiting room".

Malyia was stolen from the Lucile Packard Children's Stanford University Hospital. Doctors concluded that the Streptococcus bacteria has invaded his blood and organs, and they performed amputations.

Court documents show that most of the money will be placed in a trust for the current needs of the Malyia and an annuity which will provide him $16 932 per month, when she turns 18. The monthly payment develops over time, so the time that malyia is 30, the monthly payment is almost double.

The settlement with the Hospital of Sacramento and its parent company, Catholic Healthcare West, ranks among the most important in the history of California, under the medical malpractice attorneys.

The family has signed a non-disclosure agreement and could not discuss the case, their attorney Moseley Collins said Friday.

"What we can say, is that Malyia has a new set of artificial legs and she is walking on those", said Collins. "We are pleased that we managed to resolve the case."

Malyia spent more than three months at Stanford, before being admitted to another hospital in Sacramento. It is still being processed and will need expensive medicines and custom prostheses, special clothing and wheelchairs for the rest of his life.

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Alcohol linked to better survival after heart attack

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n">(Reuters) - Women who drank anywhere from a few alcoholic drinks a month to more than three a week in the year leading up to a heart attack ended up living longer than women who never drank alcohol, according to a U.S. study.

The findings, which focused on more than 1,000 women and were published in the American Journal of Cardiology, add to mounting evidence that alcohol, regardless of the type of drink, can be good for the heart.

"One thing that was interesting was that we didn't see differences among different beverage types," said Joshua Rosenbloom, a student at Harvard Medical School who led the study.

"The most recent evidence suggests that it's the alcohol itself that's beneficial."

There was a similarly reduced risk of dying within the follow up period whether the women drank wine, beer or hard liquor, Rosenbloom and his colleagues found.

"One drink a day is a really good target, assuming that a person can be disciplined about that," said James O'Keefe, a cardiologist at St. Luke's Health System in Kansas City, Missouri, who was not involved in the study.

Researchers surveyed more than 1,200 women hospitalized for a heart attack. They asked questions about how many alcoholic drinks the women usually consumed, along with other health and lifestyle questions.

After at least 10 years of follow up, the team found that 44 out of every 100 women who had abstained from alcohol had died, while 25 out of every 100 light drinkers and 18 out of every 100 heavy drinkers had died.

This translated to about a 35 percent lower chance of dying during the follow up period for women who drank, compared to those who didn't.

In an earlier study including men and women, O'Keefe found that people who continued to drink moderately after having a heart attack had better health than those who abstained.

"You don't need to assume that people need to stop drinking once they develop heart disease," he said.

"The problem is that alcohol is a slippery slope, and while we know that a little bit is good for us, a lot of it is really bad." SOURCE: bit.ly/uU3Eor

(Reporting from New York by Kerry Grens at Reuters Health; editing by Elaine Lies)

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After knee repair, half can't play sports the same

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n">(Reuters) - After knee reconstruction surgery, half of people who played sports both competitively and just for fun don't perform as well as they used to, according to an Australian study.

Of more than 300 men and women who had the surgery, a third stopped playing sports entirely and 68 who were still active said they didn't play as well as before, researchers reported in the American Journal of Sports Medicine.

The anterior cruciate ligament, or ACL, is the ligament inside the knee that helps keep the joint stable. About 150,000 ACL injuries occur each year in the United States.

"Less than 50 percent of the study sample had returned to playing sport at their preinjury level or returned to participating in competitive sport when surveyed at 2 to 7 years after ACL reconstruction surgery," wrote Clare Ardern at La Trobe University in Victoria, Australia, who led the study.

Ardern and her colleagues followed more than 300 men and women for two to seven years. Participants had either played Australian-rules football, basketball, netball or soccer before their surgeries.

At 39 months post-surgery, 208 out of the 314 people who had the operation were still playing a sport, the researchers said.

Of those 208, 68 said they played at a lower level than before their injury and 140 said they played about the same as before their injury. The remaining 106 participants either were not playing sports or did not complete the entire study.

"Although almost all people returned to playing some form of sport, they did not play continuously for many years after their surgery," Ardern told Reuters Health in an email.

She also noted there may be other reasons why people stopped playing sports, such as fear of getting injured again or less confidence in performing.

Of the 196 people who played competitive sports before their injury, 91 returned to their competitive sport.

"This is a big injury," said Edward McDevitt, a spokesman for the American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons, who was not part of the study.

"Many athletes who choose surgery have a long and difficult road to face. If you're not willing to go through it, then you might be better off just getting a brace."

He added that while knee surgery does allow people to return to their sport, they couldn't perform as well as doctors might wish.

People who tear the ACL can either opt for physical therapy and surgery or just physical therapy alone.

"Some people find that they are able to function well without surgery, provided they have adequate leg strength to support the injured knee," Ardern said.

"Other alternatives may be to avoid sports involving direction changes, jumping and landing or activities that make the knee feel unstable, or use knee braces and supports."

McDevitt speculates that after surgery, some athletes may not have the same range of motion, preventing them from playing as before.

"I tell my patients, 'I can't make you like before, I'm not God. But I'll do the best I can to restore you back to the way you were,'" he added. SOURCE: bit.ly/pWId18

(Reporting from New York by Linda Thrasybule at Reuters Health; Editing by Elaine Lies)

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Woman gives birth after marathon

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11 October 2011 Last updated at 01:28 GMT Amber Miller said she was happy but called it the "longest day of my life" after giving birth to a daughter following completing the Chicago Marathon

Instead of having a rest after completing the Chicago Marathon, pregnant Amber Miller gave birth.

Mrs Miller, who was nearly 39 weeks pregnant, said "it was the longest day of my life". She gave birth to a healthy 7.7lb (3.5kg) girl, June.

The marathon was the eighth for the 27-year-old, who already had one child. On her doctor's orders she ran half and walked half the distance.

"Lots of people were cheering me on: 'Go pregnant lady'," she said.

"For me, it wasn't anything out of the ordinary. I was running up until that point anyway," she told Associated Press news agency.

"I am crazy about running."

Because she half-walked the race, she finished the 26.2 mile (42.16km) course in 6:25 - slower than her usual pace.

"A few minutes after finishing, the contractions became stronger than normal and I understood what was going on," she said.

"When they became more regular, we had a sandwich and then we left for hospital," Mrs Miller added.

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Greece health warning after cuts

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10 October 2011 Last updated at 00:23 GMT By James Gallagher Health reporter, BBC News People outside the parliament building in Athens protest against any further budget cuts (19 June 2011)

People outside the parliament building in Athens protest against any further budget cuts (19 June 2011)

Will cuts affect the long-term health of Greeks? Researchers have issued a warning about the health of people in Greece in the wake of the financial crisis.

Writing in The Lancet, they said cuts to hospitals' budgets meant they were being overstretched.

More people were reporting "bad health" and HIV infections were on the increase, the authors warned.

While public health experts said the picture was "concerning" they said it could take several years for the true health implications to fully emerge.

Greece has been at the centre of the economic turmoil in Europe and researchers say the austerity measures have taken a toll on health services.

"There were about 40% cuts in hospital budgets, understaffing, reported occasional shortage of medical supplies, and bribes given to medical staff to jump queues in overstretched hospitals," they wrote.

At the same time there was a 24% increase in public hospital admissions, partly fuelled by fewer patients using private hospitals.

An analysis of data from EU Statistics on Income and Living Conditions, comparing 2007 and 2009, showed a 15% increase in people not going to a doctor or dentist, mostly due "to long waiting times".

The researchers said: "We noted a significant rise [14%] in the prevalence of people reporting that their health was bad or very bad."

They also reported a decline in the number of people eligible for sickness benefit.

New infections of HIV were expected to increase by 52% in 2011, with half due to intravenous drug use.

Their report concludes: "Ordinary people are paying the ultimate price: losing access to care and preventative services.

"Greater attention to health and healthcare access is needed."

However, there is no data on the actual health of Greek citizens.

Dr Alexander Kentikelenis, of the University of Cambridge, told the BBC: "Many implications will take longer to show. In the Great Depression it took five-plus years for the effects to show in health in the US."

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Scientist wins Nobel 3 days after cancer death

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Family members of Nobel prize winner Ralph Steinman walk in front of a picture of Steinman during a ceremony honoring him at Rockefeller University in New York, Monday, Oct. 3, 2011. From left to right are daughter Lesley Steinman, wife Claudia Steinman and son Adam Steinman. Canadian-born Ralph Steinman, a cell biologist, was awarded the Nobel Prize in medicine on Monday for his discoveries about the immune system, but hours later his university said that he had died three days earlier. The Nobel committee had been unaware of his death. (AP Photo/Seth Wenig)

FILE - This is a Tuesday, Oct. 5, 2010 file photo of Professor Andre Geim, left, and Dr Konstantin Novoselov are seen outside Manchester University, Manchester, England. The scientists won the 2010 Nobel Prize for Physics. (AP Photo/Jon Super, File)

FILE - In this April 24, 2009 photo, Dr. Bruce Beutler of the Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla, Calif., speaks during a news conference in Albany, N.Y., The Nobel committee says American Bruce Beutler and Luxembourg-born scientist Jules Hoffmann have shared the 2011 Nobel Prize in medicine with Canadian-born Ralph Steinman on Monday, Oct. 3, 2011. Beutler and Hoffman were cited "for their discoveries concerning the activation of innate immunity." (AP Photo/Mike Groll)

FILE - In this April 24, 2009 file photo, Dr. Ralph Steinman of Rockefeller University speaks during a news conference in Albany, N.Y. Rockefeller University in New York says Ralph Steinman, co-winner of this year's Nobel Prize in medicine, has died. The university says Steinman was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer four years ago and died on Sept. 30, three days before the announcement. (AP Photo/Mike Groll, File)

Nobel prize winner Ralph Steinman's family, from left to right, daughter Lesley Steinman, wife Claudia Steinman, son Adam Steinman and daughter Alexis Steinman, speak at a ceremony honoring him at Rockefeller University in New York, Monday, Oct. 3, 2011. Ralph Steinman, a cell biologist, was awarded the Nobel Prize in medicine on Monday for his discoveries about the immune system but hours later his university said that he had been dead for three days. The Nobel committee had been unaware of Canadian-born Ralph Steinman's death. (AP Photo/Seth Wenig)eval("var currentItemd57851005a80479aaeeb90a12c70b9ff = 1;");eval("var nextd57851005a80479aaeeb90a12c70b9ff = 0;");eval("var previousd57851005a80479aaeeb90a12c70b9ff = 0;");

NEW YORK (AP) — Ralph Steinman, a pioneer in understanding how cells fight disease, tried to help his own immune system thwart his pancreatic cancer.

Steinman survived until Friday. Three days later, he was awarded the Nobel Prize for medicine.

The Nobel committee, unaware of his death, announced the award Monday in Stockholm. Steinman's employer, Rockefeller University in New York, learned of his death after the Nobel announcement.

Steinman's wife, Claudia, said the family had planned to disclose his death Monday — only to discover an email to his cellphone from the Nobel committee.

Friends and colleagues were stunned by his death.

"For the last five years, I've gotten up in the morning of the Nobel Prize announcement and rushed to the computer to see his name," said Olivera J. Finn of the University of Pittsburgh.

"And this morning I saw it, and I just totally shrieked with joy," she said. Then she heard the bad news from a friend in Singapore.

"I have been this whole morning ... out of breath like somebody punched me in the stomach," Finn said.

Experts disagree whether Steinman's research helped him live for 4½ years after he was diagnosed. A colleague in his lab thinks it did. The odds of making it even a year with his type of cancer are less than 5 percent.

Nobel officials said they believed it was the first time that a laureate had died before the announcement without the committee's knowledge.

"It is incredibly sad news," said Nobel Foundation chairman Lars Heikensten. "We can only regret that he didn't have the chance to receive the news he had won the Nobel Prize. Our thoughts are now with his family."

Since 1974, the Nobel statutes don't allow posthumous awards unless a laureate dies after the announcement but before the Dec. 10 award ceremony. That happened in 1996 when economics winner William Vickrey died a few days after the announcement.

However, the committee said Monday that Steinman's award would stand and that his survivors would receive his share of the $1.5 million prize.

The Canadian-born Steinman, 68, was awarded the prize along with American Bruce Beutler and French scientist Jules Hoffmann. They were honored for discoveries about the body's disease-fighting immune system.

Steinman discovered so-called dendritic cells in 1973. These cells regulate the activity of other cells — Steinman called them the conductor of the immune system.

"When he got sick, he realized he needed to call upon these cells to induce a strong enough immune response to fight his tumor, and that is what he did," said Dr. Sarah Schlesinger, clinical director for his lab.

Steinman tried eight to 10 experimental therapies approved by the federal government, focusing in various ways on revving up his immune system to fight his cancer, she said.

Colleagues came forward with their best approaches for other kinds of cancer, and Steinman analyzed what seemed the most promising for him.

In one approach, for example, samples of Steinman's own dendritic cells were loaded with protein markers from his tumor, and then reinjected into his body. The idea was that this would "teach his immune system how to respond to that tumor," said Rockefeller colleague Dr. Michel Nussenzweig.

Although he also underwent chemotherapy, "he didn't really want to take it because he wanted to be cured," Nussenzweig said. "And he felt the immune system would be the best way to effect a cure, as opposed to just living with the disease."

Dozens of scientists around the world pitched in on the effort, Nussenzweig said. "Ralph was a special person, and they were all eager to do anything to try to cure him."

The experimental therapy continued until just recently, he said, but "there's no way of knowing whether it worked or not."

Steinman was the only patient, with no control group — other patients with the same cancer for comparison, a scientific must for convincing evidence. "It's not the kind of experiment Ralph would have liked to have done."

Rockefeller University said "his life was extended" using the therapy of his own design. Schlesinger believes that, pointing to the poor survival odds for his tumor and his good quality of life during his treatment. Noting that he also got chemotherapy, she said, "I think it all worked together."

But Dr. Alan Venook, a pancreatic cancer specialist at the University of California, San Francisco, cautioned against drawing conclusions about the impact of the treatments.

He said surviving four years with pancreatic cancer "is a long time," but not out of the question, depending on the type and how advanced it was when it was found.

"It's a disservice to the field for anyone to say that his immune therapy prolonged his life," Venook added.

"The phones will be ringing off the hook" with desperate patients who mistakenly believe that these experimental treatments have been proved safe or effective when in fact they have not, he said.

Finn said Steinman used several experimental therapies based on the immune system "because he believed in that as a solution to the problem of cancer." She said she believed the approach prolonged his life.

Nussenzweig said Steinman was working on his laboratory research until just a week ago.

He was open and honest about his cancer and "talked about it with a lot of people," Nussenzweig said.

"He was incredibly heroic in how he handled his disease," Finn said. "It was something important to fight. He continued his science, his publications, his experiments. He appeared at all the meetings. He received multiple prizes. He traveled.

"He wasn't delusional in any way, but he was not going to let the disease change his life. Science was his life, and he stayed with it until the end."

Hoffmann, 70, headed a research laboratory in Strasbourg, France, between 1974 and 2009 and served as president of the French National Academy of Sciences in 2007-08.

Beutler, 53, holds dual appointments at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas and as professor of genetics and immunology at the Scripps Research Institute in San Diego. He will become a full-time faculty member at UT Southwestern on Dec. 1.

Beutler and Hoffmann were cited for their discoveries in the 1990s of receptor proteins that can recognize bacteria and other microorganisms as they enter the body, and activate the first line of defense in the immune system, known as innate immunity.

The work of the three men has enabled the development of improved vaccines against infectious diseases, and in the long term could yield better treatments of cancer, rheumatoid arthritis, Type 1 diabetes, multiple sclerosis, and chronic inflammatory diseases, Nobel committee members said.

The work could also help efforts to make the immune system fight cancer, the committee said. A new treatment, Provenge, uses this concept to attack advanced prostate cancer.

"I am very touched," Hoffmann said. "I'm thinking of all the people who worked with me, who gave everything. I wasn't sure this domain merited a Nobel."

Beutler said he woke up in the middle of the night, glanced at his cellphone and realized he had a new email message.

"And, I squinted at it and I saw that the title line was 'Nobel Prize,' so I thought I should give close attention to that," Beutler said in an interview posted on the Nobel website.

When he opened it, he saw that it was from Nobel committee member Goran Hansson, "and it said that I had won the Nobel Prize, and so I was thrilled."

The medicine award kicked off a week of prize announcements, with the physics prize on Tuesday, chemistry on Wednesday, literature on Thursday and the Nobel Peace Prize on Friday. The winners of the economics award will be announced Oct. 10.

The coveted prizes were established by wealthy Swedish industrialist Alfred Nobel — the inventor of dynamite — except for the economics award, which was created by Sweden's central bank in 1968 in Nobel's memory. The prizes are always handed out on Dec. 10, the anniversary of Nobel's death in 1896.

___

Associated Press writers Karl Ritter, Louise Nordstrom and Malin Rising in Stockholm and chief medical writer Marilynn Marchione in Milwaukee contributed to this report.

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Scientist wins Nobel for medicine days after death

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FILE - In this April 24, 2009 photo, Dr. Ralph Steinman of Rockefeller University speaks during a news conference in Albany, N.Y., Friday, April 24, 2009. The Nobel committee says American Bruce Beutler and Luxembourg-born scientist Jules Hoffmann have shared the 2011 Nobel Prize in medicine with Canadian-born Ralph Steinman on Monday, Oct. 3, 2011. Beutler and Hoffman were cited "for their discoveries concerning the activation of innate immunity." Steinman was honored for "his discovery of the dendritic cell and its role in adaptive immunity." (AP Photo/Mike Groll)

FILE - In this April 24, 2009 file photo, Dr. Bruce Beutler of the Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla, Calif., speaks during a news conference in Albany, N.Y. The Nobel committee said Monday, Oct. 3, 2011 that American Bruce Beutler and Luxembourg-born scientist Jules Hoffmann have shared the 2011 Nobel Prize in medicine with Canadian-born Ralph Steinman.(AP Photo/Mike Groll, File)

Nobel prize winner Ralph Steinman's family, from left to right, daughter Lesley Steinman, son Adam Steinman, wife Claudia Steinman and daughter Alexis Steinman, speaks to the media after a ceremony honoring him at Rockefeller University in New York, Monday, Oct. 3, 2011. Ralph Steinman, a cell biologist, was awarded the Nobel Prize in medicine on Monday for his discoveries about the immune system but hours later his university said that he had been dead for three days. The Nobel committee had been unaware of Canadian-born Ralph Steinman's death. (AP Photo/Seth Wenig)

The microscope that Ralph Steinman used in the early 70's to make his discovery about dendritic cells is displayed in his lab in New York, Monday, Oct. 3, 2011. Steinman, a cell biologist, was awarded the Nobel Prize in medicine on Monday for his discoveries about the immune system, but hours later his university said that he had been dead for three days. The Nobel committee had been unaware of Canadian-born Ralph Steinman's death. (AP Photo/Seth Wenig)eval("var currentItemd57851005a80479aaeeb90a12c70b9ff = 1;");eval("var nextd57851005a80479aaeeb90a12c70b9ff = 0;");eval("var previousd57851005a80479aaeeb90a12c70b9ff = 0;");

STOCKHOLM (AP) — A pioneering researcher was awarded the Nobel Prize in medicine Monday, three days after dying of pancreatic cancer without ever knowing he was about to be honored for his immune system work that he had used to try to prolong his own life.

The Nobel committee said it was unaware that Canadian-born cell biologist Ralph Steinman had already died when it awarded the prize to him, American Bruce Beutler and French scientist Jules Hoffmann.

Since the committee is only supposed to consider living scientists, the Nobel Foundation held an emergency meeting Monday and said the decision on the 10 million kronor ($1.5 million) prize will remain unchanged.

"The Nobel Prize to Ralph Steinman was made in good faith, based on the assumption that the Nobel laureate was alive," the foundation said.

Steinman, 68, died Sept. 30, according to Rockefeller University in New York. He underwent therapy based on his discovery of the immune system's dendritic cells, for which he won the prize, the university said.

"He was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer four years ago, and his life was extended using a dendritic-cell based immunotherapy of his own design," the university said.

Nobel committee members said the work by the three is being used to develop better vaccines, and in the long run could also help treatment of diseases linked to abnormalities in the immune system, such as rheumatoid arthritis, Type 1 diabetes, multiple sclerosis and chronic inflammatory diseases.

The work could also help efforts to make the immune system fight cancerous tumors, the committee said.

No vaccines are on the market yet, but Nobel committee member Goran Hansson told The Associated Press that vaccines against hepatitis are in the pipeline.

"I am very touched. I'm thinking of all the people who worked with me, who gave everything," Hoffmann said by telephone to a news conference in Paris. "I wasn't sure this domain merited a Nobel."

Beutler said he woke up in the middle of the night, glanced at his cellphone and realized he had a new email message.

"And, I squinted at it and I saw that the title line was 'Nobel Prize,' so I thought I should give close attention to that," Beutler said in an interview posted on the Nobel website. "And, I opened it and it was from Goran Hansson, and it said that I had won the Nobel Prize, and so I was thrilled."

Still, he was a "little disbelieving" until he checked his laptop, "and in a few minutes I saw my name there and so I knew it was real."

Before the statutes were changed in 1974 two Nobel Prizes were given posthumously. In 1961, U.N. Secretary-General Dag Hammarskjold was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize less than a month after he died in a plane crash during a peace mission to Congo. Swedish poet Erik Axel Karlfeldt won the Nobel in literature in 1931, although he had died in March of that year.

"The Nobel Foundation thus believes that what has occurred is more reminiscent of the example in the statutes concerning a person who has been named as a Nobel Laureate and has died before the actual Nobel Prize Award Ceremony," the foundation said following its meeting.

Nobel officials said the situation was unprecedented, and that Steinman's survivors would receive his share of the prize money. It wasn't immediately clear who would represent him at the ceremony in Stockholm.

Nobel Foundation chairman Lars Heikensten, who started his job in June, said he was stunned when he found out that Steinman was dead.

"My first thought was: 'Wow, this is a remarkable thing to happen now that I'm involved in this for the first time. How do we handle this now?'" he told AP.

Hansson said the medicine committee didn't know Steinman was dead when it chose him.

"It is incredibly sad news," he said. "We can only regret that he didn't have the chance to receive the news he had won the Nobel Prize. Our thoughts are now with his family."

Beutler, 53, holds dual appointments at University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas and as professor of genetics and immunology at the Scripps Research Institute in San Diego. He will become a full-time faculty member at UT Southwestern on Dec. 1.

Hoffmann, 70, headed a research laboratory in Strasbourg, France, between 1974 and 2009 and served as president of the French National Academy of Sciences between 2007-08.

Steinman had been head of Rockefeller University's Center for Immunology and Immune Diseases.

"We are all so touched that our father's many years of hard work are being recognized with a Nobel Prize," Steinman's daughter, Alexis Steinman, said in the Rockefeller University statement. "He devoted his life to his work and his family, and he would be truly honored."

Hoffmann's discovery came in 1996 during research on how fruit flies fight infections. Two years later, Beutler's research on mice showed that fruit flies and mammals activate innate immunity in similar ways when attacked by germs.

Steinman's discovery dates back to 1973, when he found a new cell type, the dendritic cell, which has a unique capacity to activate T-cells. Those cells have a key role in adaptive immunity, when antibodies and killer cells fight infections. They also develop a memory that helps the immune system mobilize its defenses next time it comes under a similar attack.

The medicine award kicked off a week of Nobel Prize announcements, and will be followed by the physics prize on Tuesday, chemistry on Wednesday, literature on Thursday and the Nobel Peace Prize on Friday. The winners of the economics award will be announced on Oct. 10.

Last year's medicine award went to British professor Robert Edwards for fertility research that led to the first test tube baby.

___

Associated Press writer Malin Rising contributed to this report.

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Solar Titan Faces Funding Worries After Solyndra

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Solar Titan Faces Funding Worries After Solyndra

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Decade after anthrax attacks, worry over stockpile

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WASHINGTON (AP) — Anthrax vaccine — check. Antibiotics — check. A botulism treatment — check. Smallpox vaccine — check.

Ten years after the anthrax attacks brought home the reality of bioterrorism, the nation has a stockpile of some basic tools to fight back against a few of the threats that worry defense experts the most.

These defenses are not just gathering dust awaiting the next attack. In August, a Minneapolis hospital dipped into the stockpile to treat a critically ill patient — a tourist who, somewhere on his Midwest vacation, had the extraordinary bad luck to breathe anthrax spores that naturally linger in the dirt in parts of the country. The man, who survived, received a kind of medication not available in October 2001 when anthrax spores sent through the mail killed five people and sickened 17.

But there's wide concern that the nation's arsenal hasn't grown fast enough. A decade later, there are no treatments for a number of bugs on the worry list, and little to offer for other threats like a radiation emergency. Even a long-promised next-generation anthrax vaccine, that would be easier to produce, hasn't arrived yet. Nor is there information on how to treat children.

"Where are the countermeasures?" advisers to the Department of Health and Human Services asked in a critical report last year.

There are some: There's enough smallpox vaccine for everyone, plus some of a specially formulated version safe for cancer patients and others with weak immune systems. There's an improved version of the decades-old anthrax vaccine used in 2001. There are a few treatments for the toxins produced by anthrax and botulism, and a smallpox treatment is due soon.

But federal health officials are working to jumpstart production of more countermeasures and they say that more than 80 candidates are in advanced development. Over the past year, the goal has evolved into a push for more multiuse therapies, products that work not just for biodefense but for everyday health problems, too.

That's a major shift that should entice more big drug companies to the field, says Dr. Robin Robinson, who heads the federal Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority, or BARDA. It funds late-stage research of promising countermeasures.

Consider: BARDA just agreed to help pay for drug giant GlaxoSmithKline's testing of a novel antibiotic that might fight bioterrorism germs like plague — as well as certain hospital-spread bacteria that cause such problems as pneumonia in the already seriously ill.

So-called broad-spectrum antibiotics that can kill more than one kind of bacteria aren't unusual — this one just targets some hard-to-treat types in a new way.

The next step: Scientists are beginning to create the first broad-spectrum antivirals, medicines that would treat more than one kind of virus. Rather than having an anti-flu drug and a separate anti-AIDS drug, the goal is to have a single injection that could treat those viruses plus the gruesome Ebola virus and a few more for good measure.

It's early work, still years away, cautions Dr. Michael Kurilla, biodefense research chief at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. But one of the antivirals is a direct result of biodefense research to understand how viruses infect — specifically, the Nipah virus that was the model for the even-scarier fictional bug in the new movie "Contagion."

And these multipurpose antivirals are a huge goal because if they pan out, the next time a brand-new virus emerges — like the respiratory SARS bug in 2003 — treatments might not have to be started from scratch.

"We feel very excited and confident that what we're working on ... can change the whole paradigm of how we approach infectious diseases," Kurilla says.

The U.S. has invested $67 billion in biosecurity since 2001, according to research by the Center for Biosecurity at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center.

Most of that wasn't solely for biodefense but went to broader health programs that are as crucial for dealing with natural crises — like the 2009 swine flu global epidemic — as for dealing with manmade ones, says center director Dr. Thomas Inglesby. These include scientific research, beefing up struggling public health departments to better detect and treat emerging outbreaks, and training hospitals in disaster preparedness.

Inglesby worries that the economic crisis imperils those gains — public health funding already has been cut — and will further slow the countermeasure hunt. A program named BioShield that buys countermeasures for the stockpile expires in 2013 unless Congress reauthorizes it. It's time, he says, for the government to spell out its countermeasure priorities and how to reach them.

Meanwhile, what if another anthrax attack happened? No more scrambling to buy antibiotics: 60 million 60-day treatment courses are stockpiled, Robinson says, and the plan is for the U.S. Postal Service to deliver some of those first doses to people's homes.

Sometimes antibiotics aren't enough. In a severe infection, the germs can produce dangerous toxins that spread in the bloodstream. So also in the stockpile are two experimental toxin-clearing treatments, to be used if the immune system alone can't battle the toxin.

In August, Minnesota's sick tourist became the 19th person in the world ever treated with one of them — immune globulin culled from the blood of anthrax-vaccinated soldiers, says Dr. Mark Sprenkle of Hennepin County Medical Center. It's hard to know how much the drug contributed to the man's recovery, Sprenkle says, but his patient's toxin levels did drop more quickly after he began using it.

___

EDITOR'S NOTE — Lauran Neergaard covers health and medical issues for The Associated Press.

Associated Press

Too Good To Be True? Anti-Aging Proteins Not So Potent After All

09.49 egaoart No comments

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New research suggests that the promising longevity gene may not lead to longer lives after all.

In recent years, studies have led some scientists to believe that the genes that make sirtuins, proteins that affect cell metabolism, could yield new targets for drugs that would extend life.

Early work in worms and fruit flies suggested that boosting sirtuins could extend life by up to 50%. Other experiments in lab animals also suggested that the proteins were responsible for the life-extending effects of calorie restriction. And even more encouraging for people, it turned out that resveratrol, a compound found in red wine, could activate the proteins.

The results were robust enough to convince some of the proteins' earliest advocates, researchers from Harvard and Massachusetts of Institute of Technology, to found a company, Sirtis, to begin testing sirtuin-boosting agents.

MORE: A Drug to Live Longer? Yes! (But Only If You're a Fat Mouse)

But in a new report in Nature, scientists at the Institute of Health Ageing at the University College London say the foundational work connecting sirtuins to longer life in animals was flawed. The main problem, the authors write, is that the experiments didn't take into account the effects of other genes that might have in influencing longevity. And some of these effects, they say, might differ between lab-bred animals and their naturally occurring, or 'wild' counterparts.

When the authors of the Nature paper, led by David Gems, reproduced the early studies in worms and flies and accounted for other genetic factors that could impact longevity, the effect of sirtuins disappeared.

The researchers also tested whether fruit fly sirtuin could be activated by resveratrol — with no luck. And they concluded that the life-extending effect of calorie restriction was not in fact due to sirtuins.

"Studies on yeast lifespan were the first to cast doubt on the role of sirtuins in longevity," noted the authors of an accompanying commentary in Nature, reported the AFP. The new study "puts a final nail in the coffin."

MORE: Even More Evidence for the Health Benefits of Drinking

In a second paper published Nature, however, one of the discoverers of sirtuins attests that the proteins do extend life in worms, just not as much as previously thought. Reuters reported:

Leonard Guarente, a professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and co-chair of the Scientific Advisory Board of Sirtris Pharmaceuticals, owned by GlaxoSmithKline, wrote that the first research on sirtuins "overestimated the extension of lifespan" in a worm with high levels of the proteins. Now, his team calculates, making a lot of sirtuins seems to increase a worm's lifespan by about 10 to 14 percent, all else being equal.

Guarente's group argues that sirtuins may still play an important protective role in mammals, shielding cells from the metabolic damage of daily living and safeguarding against age-related disease. He told Reuters: "I feel that the sirtuins are really the most important and actionable thing to come out of aging research, and I'm very hopeful that we will have drugs in the future based on this work to treat the major diseases of aging."

Gems also acknowledges that the proteins may prove useful in human health in some way — potentially aiding in the development of treatments for metabolic diseases like diabetes — but that their importance in extending life may not be as strong as scientists had claimed. Researchers "got carried away" with their excitement on that front, he told Reuters.

Alice Park is a writer at TIME. Find her on Twitter at @aliceparkny. You can also continue the discussion on TIME's Facebook page and on Twitter at @TIME.

FDA: Ozone-Unfriendly Asthma Inhalers Won't Be Available After 2011

09.07 egaoart No comments

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Spike Mafford / Getty Images

Asthma patients who rely on over-the-counter inhalers will need to switch to prescription-only alternatives as part of the federal government's latest attempt to protect the Earth's atmosphere.

The Food and Drug Administration said Thursday patients who use the epinephrine inhalers to treat mild asthma will need to switch by Dec. 31 to other types that do not contain chlorofluorocarbons, an aerosol substance once found in a variety of spray products.

The action is part of an agreement signed by the U.S. and other nations to stop using substances that deplete the ozone layer, a region in the atmosphere that helps block harmful ultraviolet rays from the Sun.

But the switch to a greener inhaler will cost consumers more. Epinephrine inhalers are available via online retailers for around $20, whereas the alternatives, which contain the drug albuterol, range from $30 to $60.

The FDA finalized plans to phase out the products in 2008 and currently only Armstrong Pharmaceutical's Primatene mist is available in the U.S. Other manufacturers have switched to an environmentally-friendly propellant called hydrofluoroalkane. Both types of inhalers offer quick-relief to symptoms like shortness of breath and chest tightness, but the environmentally-friendly inhalers are only available via prescription.

"If you rely on an over-the-counter inhaler to relieve your asthma symptoms, it is important that you contact a health care professional to talk about switching to a different medicine to treat your asthma," said Badrul Chowdhury, FDA's director of pulmonary drug division.

Chowdhury told reporters and doctors via teleconference that "in the worst case scenario we are looking at 1 to 2 million people using" Primatene, adding that most of those patients likely use multiple medications to treat their asthma.

—By MATTHEW PERRONE

Nyad resumes swim after jellyfish stings

05.30 egaoart No comments

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Nyad attempts Cuba-Florida swim againNEW: Nyad returns to the water to continue her swim She was pulled out after she was stung for a second time, her team says Her attempt will be considered a "staged swim," an official says

(CNN) -- Undeterred by stings, endurance swimmer Diana Nyad returned to the water early Sunday morning in her attempt to swim from Cuba to Florida.

She was accompanied by three shark divers, her team said in a blog post.

The 62-year-old was pulled out Saturday night after she was stung for a second time, this time by some kind of presumed jellyfish, her team said.

Later that night, an independent observer from the International Swim Federation said Nyad could still be in the running for a record.

"Diana may continue the swim if she has only been removed from the water for medical treatment. In other words, not simply to rest," her team said in a post. "Diana's swim will still be record breaking if she decides to continue."

Now that Nyad has decided to go on, her attempt will be considered a "staged swim," meaning that it occurred in stages rather than nonstop.

Nyad's first Cuba-Florida attempt, back in 1978, was brought to an end by strong currents and bad weather after almost 42 hours in the water.

She made a try in August, before she was pulled from the water after 60 miles, and almost 29 hours of swimming. She blamed a shoulder injury she suffered early in the journey, and an 11-hour-long asthma attack.

Her latest attempt began just after 6 p.m. Friday from Havana's Hemingway Marina. The former world champion swimmer expects the swim to take close to 60 hours.

There was a bit of excitement early Saturday afternoon. An oceanic whitetip shark swam near Nyad, but a diver on her team faced it off and it meandered away.

The swimmer improved her performance late Saturday morning after struggling to maintain her usual stroke rate, her support team said. Fortified by chicken soup, Nyad was making good progress until the Saturday evening incident.

The sting was the second of the day. Earlier in the day, a Portuguese man o' war stung her.

Nyad got back in the water at 12:20 a.m. Sunday.

CNN's Matt Sloane and Shasta Darlington contributed to this report.

Too Good To Be True? Anti-Aging Proteins Not So Potent After All

03.01 egaoart No comments

AppId is over the quota
AppId is over the quota

New research suggests that the promising longevity gene may not lead to longer lives after all.

In recent years, studies have led some scientists to believe that the genes that make sirtuins, proteins that affect cell metabolism, could yield new targets for drugs that would extend life.

MORE: A Drug to Live Longer? Yes! (But Only If You're a Fat Mouse)

MORE: Even More Evidence for the Health Benefits of Drinking

In a second paper published Nature, however, one of the discoverers of sirtuins attests that the proteins do extend life in worms, just not as much as previously thought. Reuters reported:

Leonard Guarente, a professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and co-chair of the Scientific Advisory Board of Sirtris Pharmaceuticals, owned by GlaxoSmithKline, wrote that the first research on sirtuins "overestimated the extension of lifespan" in a worm with high levels of the proteins. Now, his team calculates, making a lot of sirtuins seems to increase a worm's lifespan by about 10 to 14 percent, all else being equal.

Alice Park is a writer at TIME. Find her on Twitter at @aliceparkny. You can also continue the discussion on TIME's Facebook page and on Twitter at @TIME.