Imagine a sensor about the size of a grain of salt that, once swallowed, can transmit details about your heart rate and physical activity levels and track your adherence to a drug regimen. This technology, imagined by Proteus Digital Health, Inc., is now a reality that was approved just last month by the FDA.
Search
As breast cancer research continues to make news, take a moment to catch up on the latest in a two-part series of op-eds by our very own Dr. Ross, featured on Examiner.com.
You can read them both in their entirety here and here.
In April of this year, the FDA rejected a petition by the Natural Resources Defense Council to ban the use of bisphenol A (BPA) in food packaging. We at ACSH applauded the agency s decision, which was based on a research review finding that normal levels of exposure to this chemical used to protect canned foods from contamination and spoiling do not pose a health risk to humans.
In an op-ed in the current issue of JAMA, Dr. Howard K. Koh, assistant secretary for Health for the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), and HHS Secretary Kathleen G. Sebelius boast about the efficacy of various interventions in curbing the tobacco epidemic. Their piece specifically highlights the effectiveness of media campaigns, higher prices, and smoke-free policies in helping smokers quit. The news would be quite welcome if only it were true.
Nearly 67 million Americans are living with hypertension, according to the latest estimates from the CDC, and nearly half of those people do not have their condition under control. Those are the dismal findings published in a new Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report that was based on 2003-2010 data obtained from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey.
Every year the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports on state obesity rankings, and every year, a number of Southern states top the list.
In 2008, The American Academy of Pediatrics and the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute both recommended that yearly screening for high blood pressure should begin as early as age three. However, according to a recent study published in Pediatrics, pediatricians are still failing to take kids blood pressure at about one-third of routine check-ups.
If you re pregnant or even contemplating it I m sure you ve heard the mantra about drinking while gestating: Just Say No. Everyone knows that there s no amount of alcohol you can safely imbibe if you re pregnant. Right?
For years, breast cancer awareness campaigns have urged women not to miss their scheduled mammograms. Yet there are some women for whom a regular mammogram is not enough. The latest research shows that women whose breasts are composed mostly of dense tissue can have a mammogram year after year and still have their breast cancer go undetected.
It s official: The flu season is upon us, and ACSH would like to join the ranks of other leading health organizations in encouraging everyone over the age of six months to get their flu vaccine as early as possible.
And for those of you who may think that you needn t worry about getting immunized, given last year s mild flu season, we d like to remind you that the CDC reports that influenza-associated deaths range from 3,000 to nearly 50,000 each year. And, unfortunately, last year s vaccine will not offer much (if any) protection against this year s flu virus.
Providing women with free, long-acting contraception appears to be a good way to cut the U.S. rates of abortion and unintended teen pregnancy, a new study suggests. The nearly 10,000 women at risk for unintended pregnancy in the St.
An Inhalation Toxicology study found that very few chemicals in very low concentrations were detected.
Restricted-calorie diets of various types are known to be effective for accomplishing weight loss. Unfortunately, these results are often not maintained, as participants adherence tends to diminish over time.
Until recently, New York had seemed poised to approve the method of natural gas extraction dubbed fracking, which would have not only allowed access to vast amounts of safe and clean natural gas, but would also have provided an economic bounty for depressed New York State areas, including more jobs for struggling communities along the Pennsylvania border. But now Gov.
A late-stage study of Pfizer s Prevnar 13 pneumonia vaccine has met the main trial goal, the company announced.
A clinical trial that followed 14,641 doctors for over a decade has found those who took multivitamins were 8 percent less likely to get cancer but ACSH is very skeptical about this study, for reasons we ll get to later.
Every October 24, people around the world join together to shed light on the importance of eradicating the devastatingly crippling disease of polio.
The tide seems to be finally turning in California.
A decade after a huge federal study called the Women s Health Initiative (WHI) linked hormone replacement therapy (HRT) with higher rates of breast cancer, heart attack and stroke, new data are accumulating to suggest that the treatment actually
We d like to draw your attention to two recent articles that have shed light on the drastic increase in propaganda and junk science surrounding genetically modified organisms, such as an embarrassing scientific study from a team of French researchers who purported to find that GMO corn fed to rats caused them to develop tumors and die prematurely.
Ordering drugs over the Internet may seem convenient, but the Food and Drug Administration is warning that the vast majority of online pharmacies are fake and probably selling counterfeit drugs.
The long-awaited results of a clinical trial of the world s first potential malaria vaccine among infants are finally in and somewhat disappointing.
It s enough to make us crave our favorite In-And-Out burger. All future Mondays in the City of Angels are going to be officially meatless, the Los Angeles City Council has decided by a 12-0 vote, making it the biggest city in the nation to embrace the Meatless Mondays campaign, an initiative associated with John Hopkins University s public health school.
The nation's rate of premature births is the lowest in a decade. Dropping for the fifth straight year, the preterm birth rate in 2011 was 11.7 percent, giving the U.S. a C, according to the March of Dimes Report Card. The March of Dimes has set a goal of 9.6 percent by 2020.
ACSH sends kudos to the Los Angeles Times editorial board for their common-sense analysis and rejection of two proposed taxes on sodas. They rightfully state that when it comes to so-called sin taxes, tobacco is simple. Food and drink are complicated.
Pagination
ACSH relies on donors like you. If you enjoy our work, please contribute.
Make your tax-deductible gift today!