All pregnant women should receive Tdap shots, a combination vaccine that protects against whooping cough (pertussis), tetanus and diphtheria, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced yesterday.

In its first official report on organic foods, the American Academy of Pediatrics said this week that organic and conventionally produced foods are nutritionally equivalent.

The Voice of the American Council on Science and Health (ACSH) presents a sampling of its press and internet media coverage from January 2012 June 2012.

People even many doctors think of heart attacks as something that strike mostly men, which may be one reason why women who suffer symptoms sometimes get delayed medical treatment, with deadly consequences. According to a presentation at the Acute Cardiac Care Congress meeting in Istanbul, Turkey, women are over twice as likely to die in a hospital from a heart attack than men.

The World Health Organization s Framework Convention on Tobacco Control is scheduled to take up the issue of e-cigarettes at its meeting next month in Seoul and it appears as though the deck is stacked against advocates of tobacco harm reduction. This means more bad news for addicted smokers.

Flu season is here and for the first time, health care workers in British Columbia will be required to get the influenza vaccine, an effort aimed to protect ailing patients with whom they might come into contact. In the past, flu shots have been voluntary and less than 50 percent of health care workers opted to receive it. The specifics of the regulations haven t been released yet, however, and a union representing workers is balking at the requirement.

With California getting ready to vote on Proposition 37, the fear-mongering ballot initiative that would require the labeling of certain foods made with genetically modified ingredients, a column in Forbes warns that the supposed grassroots movement is not what it seems.

With the growing popularity of energy drinks such as Pepsi s AMP, Living Essentials 5-Hour Energy and Monster Beverage s Monster Energy Drink, the caffeine content in such beverages continues to be a pressing issue.

Just as all of us here at ACSH were taking our regular seats at today s morning meeting, we became aware of two new studies on the dangers of sitting which made us all consider resuming the meeting in a slightly different way standing.

Recommendations for hormone replacement therapy (HRT) have come a long way since the abrupt end of the Women s Health Initiative (WHI) trial in 2002. Following the trial, HRT use steeply declined, as both women and their doctors became reluctant to use this therapy.