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The sheer number of baby products on the market can overwhelm any new parent. But the Food and Drug Administration is cracking down on one in particular: the sleep positioner. Officials consider it dangerous to the infant, as its use has been connected to 12 fatalities to date. 

One religious group forecast an apocalypse a few weeks ago. They used the Bible as its source. More recently, a newer religion warned of their apocalypse. But those followers cited Science magazine. 

We get it. The actress hates guns. But please don’t use your high visibility to spread untruths about the medical profession, just to make a political point.

A working group with the American Association for the Advancement of Science released a new report stating that any claim of precision in identifying a specific person from a fingerprint is "indefensible" and has no scientific foundation.

It is hardly news that doctors and patients are battling insurance companies over money. In particular, patients may be forced to try and fail an older cheaper drug before being allowed access to a newer one. American Council friend Robert Popovian, Pfizer's VP of US Government Relations, discussed this issue in his latest editorial in Morning Consult. 

We often come across studies reporting that a diet or food is helpful, but shortly thereafter finding another stating the effect is either non-existent or even detrimental. So what's a person to believe? Strangely, sometimes both claims can turn out to be true – at least that might well be the case for soybeans and breast cancer.

Warning letters by the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) can be interesting to read. A recent one, from the end of September, is more interesting than most.
The facilities of Nashoba Brook Bakery, located in Concord, MA, were inspected by the FDA and a number of violations were found and documented. Actually, to be clear, Nashoba Brook Bakery was found to be - in one phrase - a hot mess. 

A Detroit mother was sentenced to seven days in jail for failing to comply with a judge's orders to vaccinate her son, as she had agreed to do in her divorce agreement. Falsely claiming a religious exemption, this woman is now a martyr for anti-vaccine propagandists.

In case you're keeping count, the science portion of this year's Nobel Prizes was given to nine scientists, seven of whom are American.

Researchers from Georgetown University recently published a study in the journal Tobacco Control demonstrating the potential to save millions of people from premature smoking-related deaths by switching to e-cigarette use.

When Sovaldi, the first in a family of drugs that cured hepatitis C came out, its maker Gilead came under fire for the price of the drug: $1,000 per pill x 84 pills. Now we have eight more direct-acting antivirals for hep C. They are not only getting better, but also cheaper. Competition in the pharmaceutical industry benefits all of us. 

Researchers from UCLA found that through mice experiments, decaffeinated black tea may promote some form of weight loss, which occurs when chemicals, known as polyphenols, produce changes in the gut bacterium.

A new report from the American Cancer Society says that deaths attributable to breast cancer have decreased by 39 percent, with improvements in mortality rates observed in all races and ethnicities. All told, nearly 323,000 fewer women have evaded the horror of this terrible disease.

The Centers for Disease Control notes that obesity-related cancers now comprise 40 percent of all cancers diagnosed. When scaremongering groups insisted chemicals were the problem, we noted this was happening.

Protecting foreign service members is one of the most important responsibilities of the U.S. State Department. So, reducing the number of American diplomats in Cuba – as well as expelling Cuban diplomats from Washington, to emphasize the situation's gravity – is entirely appropriate, especially since we still have no idea what actually happened.

Women are underpaid. That's because, in the workplace, they're not considered equal to their male colleagues. They come with other needs, most significantly from an economic point of view, a need for flexible hours – and a resulting penalty is assessed. But the marketplace is now reducing this disparity.

This year's announcement for the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine was like when the big movie that everyone's talking about fails to take home the Oscar. Just as when filmmakers understand why the small, indy film won, the same is true here.

With respect to the state of England's National Health Service and its rapidly eroding quality of care, the bad news just keeps coming. Recently, its new chief hospital inspector declared that, among other serious issues, current practices endanger patients.

Air pollution in China has a substantially negative impact on public health. But with the exception of central and southern California and the upper Midwest, the United States has extremely clean air. And in fact, most regions in this country would not benefit from tighter air pollution standards.

Tom Petty, the rock 'n roll guitarist who first gained fame in the late 1970's with his band, The Heartbreakers, and maintained his popularity ever since, went into cardiac arrest before dying Monday night. But what is cardiac arrest, and how does differ from a heart attack? We explain.

As great as is it, who would have expected the TV series Game of Thrones to be fodder for a chemistry lesson about electrons, oxidation, reduction and tin. But it is, thanks to (former) King Stannis Baratheon. Whoever said that chemistry wasn't magic?

A little girl sitting near the field at Yankee Stadium got hit in the face with a baseball travelling 105 miles an hour. This type of tragedy doesn't occur frequently, but when it does the results are catastrophic. And the solution – protective netting – is simple and extremely effective. It's time that all teams enact this public safety measure prior to the start of next season.

Hey, UCI administrators ... in the wake of receiving your recent $200 million gift, there's something pretty basic that you're still not getting. When it comes to alternative medicines you can't choose selectively among them. You're either practicing medicine or you're practicing something else. What's it going to be?

At last, a bit of science in the form of observational data. That science can more meaningly inform guidelines for prescribing opioids (at least by surgeons) than the unsupported advice of the Centers for Disease Control. 

The origin of life is a profound mystery. Once life arose, natural selection and evolution took over. But the question of how a mixture of various gases created life-giving molecules that arranged into structures capable of reproducing themselves remains unanswered.