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

Bird Flu Claims 7th Life in Asia

A Thai boy is the seventh person to die from bird flu as the outbreak has now spread to at least seven Asian countries, most recently Indonesia, CNN reports.

The 6-year-old boy was one of two Thai youths to be diagnosed with the disease. He joins the six people who have already died in hardest-hit Vietnam, where all but one of the fatalities were also children. Thai officials say at least 10 more cases in humans are suspected, and four of those people may have died from the disease. Vietnam and Thailand are the only countries to report bird flu among people.

Indonesia confirmed it is the latest nation whose poultry has been hit by the disease. Jakarta newspapers say the government may have covered up the outbreak for several weeks at the behest of wealthy Indonesian businessmen. Similar charges have been made against the government of Thailand.

Meanwhile, the virus seems to have mutated and a more effective vaccine probably won't be ready for at least six months, the World Health Organization said. Also worrisome: The virus caught by humans appears resistant to amantadine and rimantadine, cheaper anti-viral drugs used to treat regular influenza, according to wire service reports.

The virus has struck millions of chickens -- believed to be the source of the disease -- in four other countries -- Cambodia, Japan, South Korea and Taiwan. This has led to concerns that the bird flu might mutate, combine with regular influenza and trigger the next human flu pandemic, the Associated Press reports.

Asian health officials are said to be investigating whether the disease could be spread by migratory birds and carried to other nations, CNN says.

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Bush Resuscitates Plan to Cap Medical Malpractice Awards

President Bush says huge medical malpractice awards are inflating health-care costs for everyone, and he's revived a plan to impose limits on how much juries can award victims, the Associated Press reports.

"We can help control rising health-care costs by cutting down on frivolous lawsuits against doctors and hospitals," Bush said in his weekly radio address over the weekend.

The president made virtually the same appeal in 2003, but his plan was stalled by Senate Democrats, who argued the measure would help insurance companies at the expense of injured patients.

The legislation that Congress failed to pass last year would have limited pain and suffering awards to $250,000 and punitive damages to the same amount or twice a person's actual financial loss. It would have also limited lawyer fees and curtailed a patient's ability to file suit after a certain amount of time had passed, the AP reports.

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Hair Dye May Cause Cancer, Study Says

Researchers say they've uncovered more evidence that women who have been coloring their hair a dark color for years may run a greater risk of developing non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, a cancer of the lymph system.

A study involving more than 1,300 Connecticut women found that those who began coloring their hair before 1980 increased their chance of developing the disease by 40 percent. But the risk only appeared in women who used permanent rather than nonpermanent dyes; chose dark colors -- browns, reds and black; and dyed their hair eight times a year or more for at least 25 years, The New York Times reports.

The study was led by Dr. Tongzhang Zheng, an epidemiologist at Yale University, and appears in the new issue of the American Journal of Epidemiology.

"For those who used light colors, there was no such increase in risk," Zheng said.

The study also found no increased risk for women who began using dyes after 1980. One possible explanation: Hair dye makers stopped using certain "coal-tar ingredients" in the late 1970s that had been found to cause cancer in laboratory rodents, the newspaper reports.

The finding about the heightened risk might explain the reasons behind the doubling in the number of cases of the cancer since the 1970s.

The average woman in America has a 1-in-57 chance of developing non-Hodgkin's lymphoma; for a man, the risk is 1 in 48, according to the American Cancer Society.

Cancer experts note, however, that a person's chances of developing the disease are low. So doubling the risk still means a woman who colors her hair would be unlikely to develop the disease, according to news reports.

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West Nile More Common, Less Deadly in 2003

The West Nile virus struck more than twice as many Americans in 2003 as it did the year before, but the disease caused fewer deaths and cases of serious brain damage.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports that more than 9,000 people caught West Nile last year, the largest outbreak since the virus was first identified in the U.S. in 1999.

The Associated Press says that CDC officials still consider 2002 to be the most virulent year for West Nile. Although the nation registered 4,146 cases -- a far cry from 2003 -- it caused 284 deaths and 2,944 cases of serious brain damage.

In 2003, West Nile claimed 220 lives and caused 2,695 cases of neurological disease, the CDC says.

In 2004, "we are fully prepared to have another large outbreak," the AP quotes Dr. Lyle Petersen, acting director of the CDC's division of vector-borne diseases, as saying. "We can't predict what will happen, so we need to be prepared."

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New York City Mayor Ends Beef With Atkins' Widow

New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg has publicly apologized to the widow of the late Dr. Robert Atkins for poking fun at the diet guru last week at a public appearance in Brooklyn.

Bloomberg has offered to take Veronica Atkins out for a steak dinner -- minus the carbohydrate-laden potatoes frowned on by the Atkins diet -- and she has accepted, The New York Times reports.

Atkins had demanded a public apology from Bloomberg after he called her husband "fat" and expressed doubt about how Atkins died last year. News reports at the time said he slipped and fell on an icy sidewalk, striking his head.

Atkins says she's delighted with the apology, delivered by a Bloomberg spokesman over the weekend. She calls his dinner offer "gracious," the Times reports.

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