by revere, cross-posted at Effect Measure I’m (more than) pleased to say the public health conversation is starting. I assume it was already going on but not where we could all hear what others were saying. So let me continue by responding to a point raised at The Pump Handle (TPH) that was also the subject of offline […]
by revere, cross-posted at Effect Measure Yesterday Flu Wiki founding editor and DailyKos frontpager DemFromCT reviewed three recent report cards on public health, one each by the American Public Health Association (APHA), The Trust for America’s Health (TFAH) and the American College Of Emergency Physicians (ACEP). It was a great a service in two ways. […]
by revere, cross-posted from Effect Measure I vaguely remember a medical school lecture about dracunculiasis, also known as Guinea Worm Disease. Also called the “fiery serpent” these are very long worms that grow in people and then the females get hungry and start to burrow out of them, sort of like Alien but not quite […]
In case yesterdayâs post didnât convince you to get a flu shot, you should check out Maryn McKenna at Superbug‘s report on the growing problem of deadly staphylococcus infections hitting flu sufferers. She highlights the sad case of Robert Sweitzer, a 39-year-old man who was healthy until he came down with the flu â and then […]
The CDC has declared this week to be National Influenza Vaccination Week, and is working to raise awareness about the seriousness of influenza and the importance of vaccination. The agency reminds us that each year in the U.S., 5-20 %of the population gets the flu, and approximately 36,000 people die from it. Many of these […]
The official figure for cholera deaths in Zimbabwe is 565, but The Independent cites a senior health officialâs report that the death toll is closer to 3,000. On Wednesday, riot police in Harare used batons to disperse and beat a group of doctors and nurses expressing anger over the outbreak. Barry Bearak summarizes the countryâs […]
Today is the 20th annual World AIDS Day, and World Health Organization Director-General Margaret Chan reflects on what the global community has achieved over the past two decades:
We’ve mentioned before that the Obama administration will soon be focusing on developing new approaches to consumer-product safety. It’s worth remembering some of the solutions that have been proposed over the past couple of years, as high-profile problems with contaminated food and drugs have raised concerns about the ability of the Food and Drug Administration […]
Yesterdayâs Boston Globe features an interesting article on the vastly different fees that different Massachusetts hospitals charge to insurance companies. The Globe reporting team â Scott Allen, Marcella Bombardieri, Michael Rezendes, Liz Kowalczyk, and Jeffrey Krasner, with editor Thomas Farragher â analyzed private insurance data and found that one hospital can earn two or three […]
By Myra L. Karstadt, Ph.D  Did you enjoy your acesulfame today? How much did you eat? Do you know whether acesulfame is safe to eat?  Those are not trick questions. Acesulfame is currently one of the best-selling artificial sweeteners in America, but itâs likely that very few people even know that acesulfame is in […]