Dramatic Increase of Deadly Dengue Fever in Mexico
A particularly deadly type of dengue fever is spreading rapidly in Mexico and other parts of Latin America, caused in part by climate changes and new migration patterns of mosquitoes that carry it.
The Associated Press reports that dengue fever, which causes high fever, nausea, severe joint pain and rashes, has increased by more than 600 percent in Mexico since 2001. To make matters worse, one-in-four cases of dengue is a particularly bad strain, a hemorrhagic type that causes both internal and external bleeding, increasing the chances of fatality.
In addition to the environmental changes, the wire service quotes Mexican health officials as saying that a failure in mosquito control has also caused an increase in dengue fever. An intensified effort to spray with insecticides in tourist areas before the Easter holiday season begins is being made, the A.P. reports.
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Biologic Drug Gets FDA OK to Fight Rare Clotting Disorder
Ceprotin, a protein-based biologic drug that combats a rare clotting disorder, has been given government approval.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration licensed Ceprotin, which the FDA describes as a concentrated form of Protein C, so it can attack a genetic defect that allows potentially life-threatening blood clots to form in the patient's body.
Ceprotin, made by Baxter Healthcare Corp. of Deerfield, Ill., prevents blood clots from forming in people who have the rare Protein C deficiency. According to an FDA news release, clinical trials demonstrated that Ceprotin was effective in stemming dangerous clotting in patients preparing for surgery and patients who were living with the Protein C deficiency.
About two newborns in every one million births have the deficiency, the FDA says, so the drug was granted "orphan drug" status, meaning that the pharmaceutical company was given special financial incentives to develop it.
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Mass. Gov to Ease Stem Cell Restrictions
Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick said he plans to reverse stem cell research restrictions put in place by his predecessor, Republican Mitt Romney.
Patrick, a Democrat, said Friday at a meeting of the Life Sciences Collaborative that he would ask the Public Health Council to change the stem cell research rules, the Associated Press reported.
"I believe that life sciences should be guided by science, not politics," Patrick said at the gathering of biotechnology officials.
The restrictions put in place last August by Romney, a presidential hopeful, said that embryos could not be created for the sole purpose of using them for research. That prompted complaints from researchers who said that could prohibit them from using some embryonic stem cells, the AP reported.
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HIV Cases in Asia Could Double in Five Years
Unless governments in Asia take action to halt the spread of HIV, the number of people infected with the virus could double within five years, experts warned Friday.
Currently, about 8.6 million people in Asia are infected with HIV, the virus that causes AIDS. If current levels of inadequate government response continue, that number could increase to about 20 million within five years, said the independent Commission on Aids in Asia.
The commission, which is funded by UNAIDS, issued the warning during a two-day workshop in Manila, Philippines, the Associated Press reported.
HIV/AIDS kills about 500,000 people a year in Asia and causes financial losses of about $10 billion a year. The commission said the economic cost could reach $29 billion a year if the epidemic is not brought under control within five years.
Despite the serious threat posed by HIV/AIDS, the commission noted that current spending on HIV control in Asia is only about 10 percent of the required $5 billion a year, the AP reported.
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Sedative Drugs Increase Risk of Early Death in Alzheimer's Patients
The inappropriate use of sedative drugs called neuroleptics to control the behavior of dementia patients in nursing homes is causing the early death of many of those patients, concludes a study released by the Alzheimer's Research Trust in the U.K.
A five-year investigation found that patients prescribed neuroleptics died an average of six months earlier than normal, BBC News reported. It's known that dementia patients who take these drugs are three times more likely to have a stroke.
Neuroleptics include chlorpromazine, haloperidol, risperidone, thioridazine and trifluoperazine. Guidelines recommend that these drugs be given to patients who are severely agitated or violent. But study lead researcher Professor Clive Ballard of King's College London said the drugs are used inappropriately in most cases and cause more harm than good.
He and his colleagues studied 165 Alzheimer's disease patients at more than 100 nursing homes who were being prescribed neuroleptics. The researchers switched half the patients to dummy (placebo) pills, while the other half kept taking neuroleptic drugs.
At 24 months, 78 percent of the patients in the placebo group were still alive, compared with 55 percent of those in the neuroleptic group. At 36 months, the survival rates were 62 percent vs. 35 percent and at 42 months, 60 percent vs. 25 percent, BBC News reported.
The findings were presented at the Alzheimer's Research Trust conference in Edinburgh.
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Investigators Mull NIH Conflict-of-Interest Policies
A wide-ranging review of conflict-of-interest policies at the U.S. National Institutes of Health being conducted by federal investigators could have a major impact on scientists who don't work for the agency but receive government funding for their research, the Associated Press reported.
Currently, NIH conflict-of-interest rules don't apply to grantees outside the agency. The institutions, such as universities, where those researchers work are expected to enforce their own ethics rules and report any conflicts of interest to the NIH.
In a letter to Rep. Joe Barton of Texas, the top Republican on the House Energy and Commerce Committee, Health and Human Services inspector general Daniel Levinson outlined the plans for the review, which will "determine the extent to which the NIH oversees grantee institutions' financial conflict-of-interest issues."
Taking a closer look at conflict-of-interest among government-funded scientists at outside institutions is necessary, experts said.
"Many senior scientists in academia supported by NIH also have well-paid private arrangements with drug companies, arrangements that may harm their medical research," Ned Feder, an investigator for the advocacy group Project on Government Oversight, told the AP.
In his letter, Levinson said criminal investigators in his office are also looking into potential conflicts of interest by 103 NIH scientists who received payments from drug and biotech companies and were previously the focus of internal NIH investigations last year, the AP reported.
In 2005, the NIH banned agency employees from consulting for drug companies.
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