Home > News

Here are some of the latest health and medical news developments, compiled by editors of HealthDay:

Global Women's HIV Crisis Looms, U.N. Warns

Young women now make up 60 percent of 15-to-24-year-olds with the HIV virus, the United Nations announced Friday in warning of a looming health crisis.

Since 1985, the percentage of adult women with HIV has jumped to 48 percent of the world's cases from 35 percent, according to information from the U.N. Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM) cited by the Associated Press.

The U.N. report says women are regarded as socially inferior in many parts of the world. That, combined with a tendency to be less financially independent and a fear of domestic violence, has stripped them of most power to demand safe sex, the report concludes.

About 77 percent of the world's HIV-positive women live in sub-Saharan Africa, UNIFEM says. Its report speculates that Asia could become the next epicenter, due to similarities like widespread poverty, low levels of education, and the second-class status of women, the AP reported.

-----

4th Death Tied to Organ Donor With Rabies

After assuring the public last week that all transplanted organs and tissues linked to three rabies deaths in organ recipients were accounted for, doctors at Baylor University Medical Center announced on Thursday a fourth death tied to the same rabies-infected donor, reports HealthDay.

The victim in this latest case, who officials described only as hailing from North Texas, apparently contracted rabies after receiving a piece of artery necessary for the successful completion of a liver transplant. The liver came from a healthy donor, but the artery came from the rabies-infected donor whose organs were connected to the other three deaths.

In a heated press conference, Baylor doctors tried to explain why, after assuring the public last week that the deaths linked to the organ donor would be held to three, a fourth case was identified early Thursday by investigators at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The diseased organ donor, an apparently healthy male resident of Arkansas who did not know he had rabies, arrived at Christus St. Michael Hospital in Texarkana, Tex., in early May with "severe mental status changes" and a low-grade fever. Neurological imaging revealed a brain hemorrhage, and the man died 48 hours later. His family agreed to donate his organs. Although the organs were screened for a host of infectious agents, rabies, because it remains so rare in humans, was not part of that screen.

At Thursday's press conference, Baylor officials again assured the public that, at this point in time, all of the vessels and organs harvested from the rabies-infected donor have been destroyed, and there is no further danger to patients at Baylor or to the public at large.

It's not clear whether these deaths will trigger a change in donor-screening policies. Tests for rabies -- a disease that remains rare in the U.S. population -- take up to 24 hours to return results, the doctors pointed out, while transplants are of necessity often carried out within a few hours of the donor's death.

-----

FDA Squelched Data on Cardiac Device, WSJ Reports

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has decided to withdraw a medical journal article that expressed concerns about a new cardiac device after the product's maker threatened both the agency and the journal with legal action, the Wall Street Journal reported Friday.

The article, written in May 2004 by FDA researchers, focused on Medtronic Inc's AneuRx stent graft -- used to prevent arterial bulges, called aneurysms, from rupturing. The article suggested that over time, more invasive arterial surgery was a safer option, according to the Journal account.

Medtronic, based in Minneapolis, disputed the article's findings while claiming that the FDA used confidential data without permission, the Journal reported. According to the account, the company's lawyer also threatened the agency and the medical publication, the Journal of Vascular Surgery, with criminal and civil action if the article were published.

In June, the agency officially withdrew the article from publication, the newspaper reported. The FDA since issued a statement saying its decision "rested on substantial legal concerns" over the confidential information it had obtained about the device, and its legal obligation to protect that information, according to the newspaper.

For its part, Medtronic issued a statement saying it "has a proven and unequaled record" in releasing information about the product, which the statement said was a "safe and effective device," the newspaper reported.

-----

New Drug Stems HIV in Monkeys

An experimental new drug appears to prevent the AIDS-causing HIV virus from infecting monkeys, researchers at drugmaker Merck & Co. say.

The drug apparently thwarts the process by which HIV replicates within the body, according to a report from the Canadian Broadcasting Corp. (CBC).

The Merck researchers say their newly discovered compounds inhibit the production of so-called "integrase" enzymes that help the virus reproduce itself. The new medication seems to protect newly infected monkeys and help those that are already sick, the researchers write in the July 9 issue of the journal Science.

The drug, codenamed L-879812, is now being tested on a small number of human volunteers. It's likely to progress to larger trials if the small study is successful, the CBC report said.

-----

Syphilis Outbreak Hasn't Led to HIV

Health officials in San Francisco and Los Angeles braced themselves for the worst when they saw an explosion of syphilis cases in gay men, but the rise they expected to see in subsequent HIV infections hasn't materialized.

A new report from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention finds that, between 1999 and 2002, the increase in syphilis has "not had a substantial impact on rates of new HIV infection" among men who have sex with men.

In fact, researchers said, the number of new HIV cases declined slightly in both cities.

According to the article in the CDC publication Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, experts worried about a rise in HIV in this population because syphilis makes the acquisition and transmission of the AIDS virus easier.

-----

Lead Prompts Massive Recall of Toy Jewelry

Some 150 million pieces of imported toy jewelry sold in vending machines are being recalled because they may contain dangerous levels of lead, the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) says.

While only half of the affected rings, necklaces, and bracelets may actually contain lead, it is difficult to distinguish between the two types, a CPSC statement said.

No injuries associated with the products, all produced in India, have been reported. The four importers involved say they have stopped selling any jewelry that may contain lead, according to the CPSC. Consumers are urged to throw away any products that may have been recalled.

The jewelry was sold in vending machines nationwide from January 2002 through June 2004 for between $0.25 and $0.75. Photos are available at the Safe Jewelry Council.

Copyright © 2004 ScoutNews, LLC. All rights reserved.