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The two dozen vaccines recommended by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention for kids before age 2 do not cause any significant increase in the risk of health problems, a government-advisory body stated yesterday.

The U.S. is backsliding when it comes to tobacco control, the American Lung Association says. The group has just issued its annual report card on how well the federal government, states and cities are doing on cessation efforts, giving many Ds and Fs.
The report card grades the various authorities on how well they are doing in preventing tobacco use, helping smokers quit and protecting the public from secondhand smoke.

"The EU s new tobacco policy statement, ostensibly designed to promote public health, will have the opposite effect: Far from reducing the toll of tobacco, millions will be condemned to ongoing addiction to smoking, half of whom will die as a direct result.
The World Health Organization predicts that if current trends continue, the likely toll of tobacco will amount to one billion lives cut short worldwide.

While the flu epidemic rages, reminding us that this viral contagion is nothing to be messed with, an ongoing epidemic has taken a bit of a back seat. Pertussis, or whooping cough, struck the highest number of Americans in 2012 since the days of President Eisenhower.

Dr. Elizabeth Whelan, president and founder of the American Council on Science and Health, sent the following letter to the editor of the New York Post in response to their Dec. 23, 2012, article, Big pay, low payoff at NYC nonprofit.

Women who have migraines with aura pre-headache symptoms that include visions of flashing lights or zigzag lines, for example may face a higher risk for cardiovascular problems, a new study suggests.
The study, which will be presented at the American Academy of Neurology meeting in March, included data on close to 28,000 women enrolled in the ongoing Women s Health Study at Brigham and Women s Hospital and Harvard Medical School.

It may be beneficial to have the hearing of young children tested more frequently, according to a new study published in the Journal of Development and Behavioral Pediatrics. Currently, children are screened at birth and then just before entering kindergarten.

A randomized, controlled trial is known as the gold standard when it comes to medical research but electronic medical records are paving the way for wily scientists to conduct other types of research.

There has not been a day that has passed in the last few weeks where we have not been bombarded with news stories pertaining to the current flu season and the apparent epidemic. And most of these stories urge individuals to go out and get the flu vaccine if one has not yet done so. However, pertussis (whooping cough) has taken a backseat amidst all this hype, even though in 2012, it struck the highest number of Americans since the days of President Eisenhower, writes ACSH s Dr.

Patients can refuse a flu shot. Should doctors and nurses have that right, too? The answer to this thorny question is simple No. Sick and immunocompromised hospital patients should not need to fear being infected with the flu virus by those charged with ministering to them, and healthcare workers should not have to also deal with ill medical workers who didn t get immunized, nor bear their sick co-employees share of the burden.

A recent study examining racial differences in blood pressure and risk of stroke, revealed that African-Americans with hypertension are three times more likely to have a stroke than their white counterparts.
Dr. George Howard and colleagues reviewed files for 27,748 African-American and white men and women over 45 years old, and followed them for 4.5 years. The participants in the Reasons for Geographic and Racial Differences in Stroke (REGARDS) were the subjects of this study.

The use of complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) is becoming very common among children, especially those who have been diagnosed with chronic health conditions such as asthma, says a new study. But your child s pediatrician is not likely to inquire about these practices, and parents may not provide this information voluntarily either, increasing the potential for harmful interactions with conventional treatments.

Coca-Cola isn t taking the blame for America s obesity epidemic lying down. The world s biggest beverage company unveiled a new ad campaign yesterday that is airing on CNN, Fox News and MSNBC highlighting its low- and no-calorie drinks, marketing smaller servings of its beverages, and encouraging physical fitness. Entitled Coming Together, the ads encourage everyone to be careful about watching their weight.

Why are people so afraid of fracking? Regulators familiar with the technology seem positively serene about hydraulic fracturing, National Review Online columnist Deroy Murdock writes. In countering the hysteria stirred up by activists, Murdock thoroughly and systematically dismantles every argument against fracking.

With the flu season getting off to a fierce start, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo followed Massachusetts lead in declaring a public health emergency Saturday, suspending a state law that allows pharmacists to vaccinate only adults against influenza. But drug stores are proving reluctant to offer flu shots to kids.

A new diabetes drug called canagliflozin has been approved by a Food and Drug Administration advisory panel. The drug, developed by Johnson & Johnson, acts to lower blood sugar by increasing the excretion rate of sugar via the kidneys into the urine of patients with Type 2 diabetes. This is a new means of controlling blood sugar the majority of other diabetes drugs work by affecting the supply or use of insulin.

New recommendations from the American Cancer Society say that older current or former heavy smokers may want to talk to their physician about getting a yearly low-dose CT scan (also called spiral CT scans) of the chest to help detect lung cancer.

In an attempt to crack down on what Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg calls a citywide and national epidemic of prescription drug abuse, prescription painkillers will be restricted in the emergency rooms of New York City s 11 public hospitals. Under this new policy, public hospital patients will not be able to get more than three days worth of narcotic painkillers such as Vicodin and Percocet.

Americans live shorter lives and are in generally worse health than citizens of other wealthy nations, according to an extensive report released Wednesday by the National Research Council and the Institute of Medicine.

The European Union Health Commission is out with a new set of rules proposing more regulations on e-cigarettes and tightening the absurd ban on snus which ACSH's Dr. Gilbert Ross is doing his best to counter in the popular press.

The World Health Organization predicts that if current trends continue, the likely toll of tobacco will amount to one-billion lives cut short worldwide. By tobacco, however, anyone with knowledge of the spectrum of tobacco-related disease knows it s the inhalation of cigarette smoke hundreds of thousands of times over decades that would be responsible if that catastrophic prediction comes to pass the relative harm of non-combustible tobacco and nicotine-delivery products is in the order of one percent that of smoking.

This flu season is turning out to be a whopper. In Boston, Mayor Thomas Menino on Wednesday declared a public health emergency after city residents came down with 700 confirmed cases 10 times more than all of last season.

If we weren t infuriated before reading Dr. Marc Siegel s latest column arguing against making the flu vaccine mandatory for health care workers, we certainly are now. (Dr. Siegel is an associate professor of medicine and medical director of Doctor Radio at NYU Langone Medical Center).

Although this year soda has received much criticism for its high sugar content and suspected adverse health effects, diet soda has been a target of flawed criticism as well. Last year, for instance, a flawed study tied the consumption of diet soda to diabetes. Unfortunately, the study authors neglected to control for the weight of the subjects. Once this factor was considered, the correlation disappeared.

Binge drinking defined as consuming four or more alcoholic drinks at one time is a dangerous activity that can take a toll on anyone s health. And, as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention revealed in a new report, it is an activity that almost 14 million American women indulge in about three times a month.