Archive for July, 2007
Doctors, Democrats scrutinize September 11 dust
Doctors, Democrats scrutinize September 11 dust
Last Updated: 2007-07-18 10:30:05 -0400 (Reuters Health)
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Pilar Albarado spent five months after September 11, 2001, cleaning pulverized building material from apartment buildings and offices near the site of the World Trade Center. A chronic cough developed two years later, and she is also battling asthma, memory loss and acid reflux.
Only now, almost six years after the attacks, is the extent of the medical toll on firefighters, police and others who worked on the cleanup coming to light, along with questions about how much the government knew of the danger.
Albarado, 44, cannot work because of her medical problems. Her acid reflux is so bad she cannot eat most foods.
She is being treated at the recently opened World Trade Center health clinic at Bellevue Hospital, but she said the medicines they give her do little to help.
"Our problems will be with us for life," she said during a protest outside congressional offices in June. "I will never be the same."
SICKENING DUST
Democrats in Congress say Albarado is one of thousands of people endangered when the Bush Administration knowingly played down the risks posed by the dust, which contained asbestos, lead and other contaminants.
Inhalation of dust-laden air has been implicated in at least two deaths -- from lung inflammation and scarring -- and connected to the respiratory illnesses and even cancers of thousands working and living within miles of Ground Zero, according to medical studies.
Mount Sinai Medical Center researchers found 69 percent of the nearly 10,000 first responders they examined had new or worsened lung problems after September 11, while doctors at New York University School of Medicine documented these problems in lower Manhattan residents.
The Bellevue program is currently treating more than 1,300 such patients, and others are on a waiting list.
Researchers are still working to understand the long-term effects of these exposures and how psychological distress from the event might contribute to physical problems.
"We're finding that there are respiratory problems that are persisting well beyond what we anticipated -- considering people were exposed six years ago," said Alison Geyh at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health in Baltimore. "The question is why."
The World Trade Center Health Registry, which includes more than 71,000 directly exposed New York City residents and workers, will track their physical and mental health for up to 20 years and may provide some answers, Geyh said in a telephone interview.
CLEARING THE AIR
Jerrold Nadler, a New York Democratic who headed a House of Representatives hearing on the issue in June, said the Environmental Protection Agency issued falsely reassuring statements about air safety and asbestos levels.
This led first responders to work with inadequate protective equipment and New Yorkers to return to "homes, schools and workplaces that had not been properly tested."
Congressional Democrats also faulted the EPA for failing to meet its clean-up responsibilities.
Then Environment Secretary Christie Whitman told the congressional hearings she did not regret her comments or her role in reopening Manhattan workplaces on September 17.
She added that she acted on the scientific information she had been given at the time. "I will believe the scientists when they tell me what is safe to breathe," Whitman said.
But according to Geyh, who was at Ground Zero collecting environmental hazard data immediately after the attacks, the complicated circumstances did not warrant such early assurances.
An August 2003 report by the EPA's inspector general found that some of these statements were made without scientific evidence, and also implicated the White House in mitigating health warnings.
Earlier this year, a federal judge ruled that Whitman knowingly lied to New York residents about their health risks. The case is now under appeal.
Copyright © 2007 Reuters Limited. All rights reserved. Republication or redistribution of Reuters content, including by framing or similar means, is expressly prohibited without the prior written consent of Reuters. Reuters shall not be liable for any errors or delays in the content, or for any actions taken in reliance thereon. Reuters and the Reuters sphere logo are registered trademarks and trademarks of the Reuters group of companies around the world.
Early trial suggests promise for glaucoma drug
Early trial suggests promise for glaucoma drug
Last Updated: 2007-07-18 13:44:37 -0400 (Reuters Health)
CHICAGO (Reuters) - An experimental drug to treat glaucoma appears promising based upon the results of early-stage trials sponsored by the drug's maker Alcon Inc., analysts said on Wednesday.
The results of the phase II study of anecortave acetate in glaucoma were presented at the World Glaucoma Congress in Singapore.
Glaucoma refers to eye diseases that affect the optic nerve and cause vision loss. Most of these diseases cause high pressure inside the eye, called intraocular pressure (IOP). Elevated IOP is the most important risk factor for the development of glaucoma.
Despite a high dropout rate in the trial, anecortave acetate "showed strong potential for sustained reduction of IOP," Mike Weinstein, an analyst with JP Morgan, wrote in a research note.
While statistical significance was not reached in the groups that received lower doses of the drug, significance was achieved in the group that received the drug at the highest dose.
Alcon, an eye-care products maker, said an additional larger study would be needed for approval and estimated it would file a new drug application with U.S. regulators in 2009 versus its earlier estimate of 2008.
(Reporting by Debra Sherman, editing by Jeffrey Benkoe)
Copyright © 2007 Reuters Limited. All rights reserved. Republication or redistribution of Reuters content, including by framing or similar means, is expressly prohibited without the prior written consent of Reuters. Reuters shall not be liable for any errors or delays in the content, or for any actions taken in reliance thereon. Reuters and the Reuters sphere logo are registered trademarks and trademarks of the Reuters group of companies around the world.
US food and drink companies will limit child ads
US food and drink companies will limit child ads
Last Updated: 2007-07-18 10:19:35 -0400 (Reuters Health)
NEW YORK (Reuters) - Some of America's largest food and drink companies, such as Coca-Cola Co. and General Mills Inc., will adopt stricter controls on advertising aimed at children under 12, according to media reports on Wednesday.
Some companies have agreed to curb advertising ahead of a Federal Trade Commission hearing on Wednesday that is expected to exert pressure on food and drink makers for more responsible marketing plans as a means to help address childhood obesity problems, the New York Times and Associated Press reported.
The scope of the self-imposed marketing controls varies from company to company, according to the reports.
The U.S. division of McDonald's Corp., for example, said it will advertise only two types of "Happy Meals" to children under 12 -- one with chicken nuggets, apple dippers with caramel dip and low-fat milk, or one with a hamburger, apple dippers and milk, said AP. The meals contain less than 600 calories, derive no more than 35 percent of calories from fat, and have no more than 35 percent total sugar content.
General Mills will cut its advertising of Trix cereal for the under-12 age group, according to the New York Times, but will continue to run marketing geared towards children for another of its cereal brands, Cocoa Puffs, which has one less gram of sugar per serving.
PepsiCo, which owns Frito-Lay, Quaker Foods and such drinks as Pepsi and Gatorade, will only advertise two of its products to children -- Baked Cheetos Cheese Flavored Snacks and its Gatorade line of energy drinks, AP said.
Other companies adopting varied restrictions on advertising to the under-12s include the Campbell Soup Co., Hershey Co., Kraft Foods Inc., and Cadbury Adams, the maker of Bubblicious chewing gum, according to the reports.
Copyright © 2007 Reuters Limited. All rights reserved. Republication or redistribution of Reuters content, including by framing or similar means, is expressly prohibited without the prior written consent of Reuters. Reuters shall not be liable for any errors or delays in the content, or for any actions taken in reliance thereon. Reuters and the Reuters sphere logo are registered trademarks and trademarks of the Reuters group of companies around the world.
Low glycemic index diets best for weight loss
"Lowering the glycemic load of the diet appears to be an effective method of promoting weight loss and improving lipid profiles and can be simply incorporated into a person's lifestyle," Dr. Elizabeth Elliott of The Children's Hospital at Westmead in New South Wales, Australia and her colleagues conclude.
There is little consensus on the best approach for helping overweight and obese people trim down, Elliott and her team note in the latest online issue of The Cochrane Library, adding that evidence on the effectiveness of low glycemic index diets has been mixed.
Glycemic index is a measurement of how a food affects blood glucose. High glycemic index foods, such as white breads, cause a rapid spike in blood sugar levels, while low glycemic index foods, such as vegetables and beans, which tend to be higher and fiber and contain more complex carbs, are metabolized more slowly and release a steadier, slower flow of glucose into the blood stream.
Elliott and her team evaluated six clinical trials, including a total of 202 people, which compared low glycemic index diets to other diet approaches. The diets lasted from five weeks to six months.
On average, the researchers found, people on low glycemic index diets lost 2.2 pounds more than those on other types of diets. They also cut their body mass index by an average of 1 to 2 points.
In two studies, obese subjects on a low glycemic index diet lost an average of 9.2 pounds. "Hence, low glycemic diets appear to be effective even in obese people who need to lose considerable amounts of weight," they write.
Reductions in total cholesterol and low-density lipoprotein, the "bad" cholesterol, also were greater among people on the low glycemic index diets.
Low glycemic index diets are easy to follow, Elliott and her colleagues note, and if people strictly limit themselves to low glycemic foods they can eat as much of them as they want. "This is more conductive to good quality of life than a very restrictive diet," they conclude.
Vitamin C useless for preventing or treating colds
The findings stem from a review of 30 published studies involving 11,350 people who took at least 200 milligrams of vitamin C each day.
Based on pooled data, regular ingestion of vitamin C did nothing to lower the risk of the common cold in the ordinary population, report reviewers in the latest issue of The Cochrane Library, a publication of the Cochrane Collaboration, an international organization that evaluates medical research.
There was a slight reduction in the duration and severity of common cold symptoms with vitamin C, compared with placebo, but the magnitude of the effect was so small its clinical usefulness is doubtful, the experts report.
Therefore, it is senseless for most people to take vitamin C every day to reduce their risk of catching a cold, according to co-author Harri Hemila of the University of Helsinki, Finland and her colleagues.
An exception appears to be when individuals are exposed to short periods of extreme physical stress. In six trials involving a total of 642 marathon runners, skiers, and soldiers taking part in sub-arctic exercises, vitamin C supplements reduced the risk of the common cold by 50 percent.
Vitamin C, for the average person, also failed as a "therapeutic" for the common cold. Trials of high-dose vitamin C taken after the onset of cold symptoms showed "no consistent" effect on either the length of a cold or the severity of symptoms.
Hemila and colleagues caution that there were only a few therapeutic trials and their quality varied. One trial showed a borderline benefit from downing an 8-gram dose of vitamin C at the beginning of a cold, and two trials using 5-day supplementation reported benefits.
More trials testing vitamin C as a possible treatment for the common cold are needed, the reviewers conclude.
The value of vitamin C in preventing and treating the common cold has been the subject of controversy for six decades. Nonetheless, vitamin C is widely sold and used for these purposes.
The authors of the Cochrane report conclude, based on the data at hand, that the routine use of vitamin C to prevent the common cold is "not rationally justified for community use. It could be justified in people exposed to brief periods of severe physical exercise or cold environments."