Public health

WASHINGTON — The National School Lunch Program and the School Breakfast Program should adopt a new set of nutrient targets and standards for menu planning, says a new report from the Institute of Medicine. The recommended targets and standards would update and improve the programs' abilities to meet children's nutritional needs and foster healthy eating habits.    » read more »

Agency Decides in Favor of Citizens and Environmental Groups

CHICAGO (October 19, 2009) - The United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) today issued an objection to the operating permit for BP North America’s refinery in Whiting, IN that will require the Indiana Department of Environmental Management to rewrite the permit.    » read more »

Washington, DC - 10/19/2009 - Sixteen Americans who have been directly affected by foodborne illness gathered at the White House recently to share their personal stories and meet Sam Kass, assistant White House chef, who cooks for the Obama family and is an advisor on food policy; Mariano-Florentino Cuellar, who is the lead staffer for the White House Food Safety Working Group; and David Lazarus, senior advisor to the Secretary of Agriculture, who coordinates with the White House on food safety issues.

Representing the millions of Americans who fall ill each year from contaminated food, the victims and relatives of victims appealed to the Obama administration to urge congressional lawmakers to pass food safety legislation this year.    » read more »

Participation in Stress Management Program Results in Increased Pregnancy Rate

Skillman, NJ (October 19, 2009) – Women who participated in a stress management program prior to or during their second IVF cycle had a 160 percent greater pregnancy rate than women who did not participate in a program, according to a study presented today at the American Society for Reproductive Medicine’s 65th Annual Meeting.    » read more »

October 19, 2009 -- While every flu season has the potential to cause sickness and visits to the doctor, this year we face not just the seasonal flu but also the H1N1 influenza virus. For this reason, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recommend that we take extra precautions to protect ourselves against the flu.    » read more »

10/15/2009 -- WASHINGTON - The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is seeking public comment on a plan to develop interim preliminary remediation goals (PRGs) for dioxin in soil at contaminated sites. The plan includes a review of current dioxin cleanup guidance that has been established by the EPA, states and other countries, including the latest fully peer-reviewed dioxin toxicity assessments.

EPA will release the draft interim PRGs for public comment in December 2009, and anticipates issuing the final interim PRGs in June 2010. EPA is currently undertaking a reassessment of dioxin, the results of which are expected to be released by the end of 2010.

More information on the plan and how to comment: www.epa.gov/superfund/policy/remedy/sfremedy/remedies/dioxininterimplan....    » read more »

WASHINGTON, Oct. 16, 2009 - Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack today announced that the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) National Veterinary Services Laboratories will be conducting confirmatory testing on swine samples collected at the 2009 Minnesota State Fair between August 26 and September 1. The pigs sampled at the time showed no signs of illness and were apparently healthy.

The samples collected were part of a University of Iowa and University of Minnesota cooperative agreement research project funded by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) which documents influenza viruses where humans and pigs interact at such as fairs.    » read more »

WASHINGTON, Oct. 15, 2009 – Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack today announced the selection of Princeton-based Mathematica Policy Research to conduct a major survey on food choices and expenditures by U.S. households – the National Household Food Purchase and Acquisition Study (NHFPAS).

"Helping American families improve their overall health is one of my top priorities," said Vilsack. "This ambitious 5-year effort will fill in critical gaps in existing data on the food purchases of U.S. households and be invaluable in assessing and enhancing the effectiveness of USDA's food assistance programs for low-income families."    » read more »

Results confirm immune response and tolerability

16 October 2009, London, UK -- GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) today announced results from a second clinical trial of its pandemic (H1N1) adjuvanted vaccine, which demonstrate that one dose of the vaccine can provide a strong immune response which exceeds criteria as defined by international licensing authorities using the lowest dose of antigen available in pandemic vaccines. The data from GSK’s H1N1 trials announced to date demonstrate the vaccine is generally well tolerated. The vaccine in this trial contains 3.75 µg of H1N1 antigen, which is the EMEA approved final formulation.    » read more »

According to public health officials, low income countries carry more than 90% of the global disease burden and have less than 10% of funds from public and private sources to deal with them[1]

Basel, October 19, 2009 - Leading Dengue and TB scientists from the Novartis Institute for Tropical Diseases (NITD) are meeting today at a symposium at NEHCRI (Novartis - Eijkman Institute - Hasanuddin University Clinical Research Initiative) in Makassar, Indonesia, to discuss the initiative's clinical research updates. NEHCRI is a unique collaboration comprised of a specialized network of institutes that are focused on drug discovery, capacity building and training local Indonesian scientists.    » read more »

October 16, 2009, WASHINGTON, D.C. – U.S. Rep. Bart Gordon’s bill to ban imports of nuclear waste got a boost today when an official from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission confirmed the agency currently lacks the power and authority to stop imports and disposal of foreign-generated radioactive waste in the United States.    » read more »

As of 11 October 2009, worldwide there have been more than 399232 laboratory confirmed cases of pandemic influenza H1N1 2009 and over 4735 deaths reported to WHO.

As many countries have stopped counting individual cases, particularly of milder illness, the case count is significantly lower than the actually number of cases that have occurred. WHO is actively monitoring the progress of the pandemic through frequent consultations with the WHO Regional Offices and member states and through monitoring of multiple sources of data.    » read more »

Oct. 15, 2009 -- WASHINGTON -- Smoking bans are effective at reducing the risk of heart attacks and heart disease associated with exposure to secondhand smoke, says a new report from the Institute of Medicine. The report also confirms there is sufficient evidence that breathing secondhand smoke boosts nonsmokers' risk for heart problems, adding that indirect evidence indicating that even relatively brief exposures could lead to a heart attack is compelling.    » read more »

More than 80,000 Doses Have Arrived; Thousands More On the Way

October 15, 2009 -- Connecticut Governor M. Jodi Rell today announced that vaccination clinics for the H1N1 virus – the so-called swine flu – are getting underway in Connecticut and more are expected to be scheduled over the next several weeks as shipments of the vaccine continue to arrive in the state.    » read more »

Lawmaker seeks answers on public exposure to radiation after medical procedures

October 14, 2009 -- WASHINGTON, D.C. – Representative Edward J. Markey (D-Mass.), chairman of the Energy and Environment Subcommittee of the Energy and Commerce Committee, today asked Nuclear Regulatory Commission Chairman Greg Jaczko, why its rules governing the treatment of patients with radioisotopes allow for much higher levels of public exposure to radioactive materials than those adopted by other countries, and whether these rules are being properly enforced.

“I am concerned that current NRC regulations….may result in some unnecessary, unwitting and inappropriate exposures of individuals to dangerous levels of radiation,” Markey wrote in a letter to Chairman Jaczko.    » read more »