Speaking of chemophobia...last week, we were exposed to breathless, semi-hysterical headlines alleging that pregnant women — and, of course, their unborn babies — are doomed to disease and premature death because of the chemical stew we are all living in.

In response to the growing level of chemophobia — the irrational fear of chemicals — among the American public, ACSH held a press conference today to announce the release of its newest position paper, Scared to Death: How Chemophobia Threatens Public Health.

In response to our January 12 Dispatch dissecting a study that implicates BPA in the cause of polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS), we received commentary from a reader who is an expert in such matters:

To prescribe or not prescribe? That is the question that pediatricians have been grappling with over many years as they debate whether to use antibiotics to treat acute otitis media, or ear infections, in toddlers or whether to adhere to the “watch and wait” approach.

Acetaminophen, the key ingredient used in over-the-counter (OTC) drugs like Tylenol and Nyquil, will be limited to only 325 milligrams per dose in prescription painkillers such as Vicodin and Percocet, the FDA announced yesterday.

After reporting yesterday on the looming threat of the spread of a drug-resistant form of falciparum malaria, we now bring brighter news of two phase II trials indicating that a leading candidate malaria vaccine (RTS,S/AS01E) provides protection against the parasitic disease for at least 15 months after inoculation.

The incidence of age-related macular degeneration (AMD), the leading cause of vision loss in people over the age of 50 — a result of damage to the center of the retina — has decreased in the last 15 years. A new study published in the Archives of Ophthalmology used data from the 2005 to 2008 NHANES database and looked at high-resolution pictures of the eyes of 5,533 U.S. adults over the age of 40.

An outlandish study from professors at the University of California, San Francisco, published today in the journal Environmental Health Perspectives, reports that almost all pregnant women harbor at least one out of 163 different “potentially harmful” chemicals in their blood, urine or serum.

Yesterday the World Health Organization (WHO) announced a $175 million plan to try and cut off the spread of a drug-resistant form of falciparum malaria which has emerged in South East Asia. Falciparum malaria is the most deadly form of the disease. Traditionally, doctors have fought malaria infections with a combination of drugs which includes artemisinin, known as ACT.

Tuesday brought word that EPA regulators sent a memo to public water systems calling for more thorough evaluation of water supplies for the heavy metal known as hexavalent chromium, or chromium-6. Regular readers of Dispatch may know our reason for dismay. At a time when a range of public health issues should be addressed, the EPA is engaged in what ACSH'S Dr.