New Vaccines to Treat Stomach Flu

Posted on February 20th, 2008 by Brain Mitel

The symptoms of Noroviruses, commonly called ?stomach flu? include 72 hours of vomiting and diarrhoea and could sometimes lead to death among the elderly and infants.

?One of the mysteries of medicine has been why do they keep infecting people when you?d think we?d be developing immunity,? said Lisa Lindesmith, one of the lead authors of the study.

After examining the relationship between the sequences of genes encoding the GII.4 norovirus strains that have been isolated over the past 20 years they found that the virus evolved irregularly.

?What we?ve found is that the GII.4 arm [of the noroviruses] keeps changing. Whenever we?re seeing big outbreaks of norovirus, we?re also seeing genetic changes in the virus,? she added.

?Noroviruses are very contagious. It may only take one or two viral particles to become infected.

?Good hand washing is critical when the virus is present. A vaccine may someday have an important role, too, especially among the elderly and other people particularly vulnerable to the effects of the illness,? she said.

Source-ANI
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Huge Drug Trafficking Operations Dismantled in UK

Posted on February 20th, 2008 by Brain Mitel

At least 500 officers were involved in raids on 30 homes and businesses in the British capital, The Mirror reported.

As part of the operation,

Metropolitan Police officers used a JCB digger to smash through a perimeter wall at a fortified thre million pound property in Hayes, West London, belonging to one of the suspects.

Several vehicles, including two Mercedes, a Hummer and a four-wheel drive Porsche parked outside the property were seized.

In another raid, 30 officers burst into a house in East Molesey and searched two cars outside. A 53-year-old man of Egyptian origin was arrested.

The tabloid quoted Detective Superintendent Steve Richardson as saying that the raids stemmed from a six-month intelligence-led inquiry.

Police had already seized almost three million pounds in cash, 70kg (155lb) of cocaine with a street value of 500,000 pounds and four guns, including one with a silencer.

Source-ANI
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Marijuana Impairs Cognitive Function in Multiple Sclerosis Patients

Posted on February 20th, 2008 by Brain Mitel

The study, conducted by researchers at the University of Toronto, is in the online edition of Neurology, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology.

?This is the first study to show that smoking marijuana can have a harmful effect on the cognitive skills of people with MS,? said study author Anthony Feinstein, MPhil, PhD, of the University of Toronto.

?This is important information because a significant minority of people with MS smoke marijuana as a treatment for the disease, even though there are no scientific studies demonstrating that it is an effective treatment for emotional difficulties,? he added.

In the study, Feinstein found that MS itself can cause cognitive problems.

?In addition, cognitive problems can greatly affect the quality of life for both patients and their caregivers,? he said.

For the study, the researchers interviewed 140 Canadian people with MS.

Out of those, 10 people had smoked marijuana within the last month and were defined as current marijuana users.

The marijuana users were then each matched by age, sex, the length of time they had MS, and other factors to four people with MS who did not smoke marijuana.

The participants were then evaluated for emotional problems such as depression, anxiety and other psychiatric disorders. The researchers also tested the participants? thinking skills, speed at processing information, and memory.

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New Protein Discovery may Widen Drug Design Options

Posted on February 20th, 2008 by Brain Mitel

The findings by researchers at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill have potential implications for drug development because they involve G

protein-coupled receptors (GPCRs), which are the target of 40 to 50 per cent of modern medicinal drugs?such as antihistamines and drugs for high blood pressure.

In humans, reactions to everything from taste and smell to stimulants like adrenaline or caffeine requires G-protein signalling.

So far, the only known way to turn on a G-protein was through a receptor sitting on a cell?s surface membrane, which accepts outside signals and relays them inside the cell.

Henrik Dohlman, a professor of Biochemistry and Biophysics, believes that discovering a protein that activates G-proteins from inside a cell may open up an entirely new pathway for drug development.

?No drug is 100 percent effective, 100 percent free of side effects and 100 percent safe. The more options we have biochemically, the more selective we can be in designing new drugs. If we can find another way of modulating G-proteins, we could expand the drug targets that are available to pharmacology,? said Dohlman, senior author of the study published online in the journal Current Biology

Mike Lee, a graduate student in the UNC School of Medicine?s department of pharmacology, identified the new protein called Arr4 in yeast cells. He employed a mutant form of G-protein to search for any messengers inside the yeast cell with an affinity for G-proteins.

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Drug Meant for Epilepsy is Not for Migraine

Posted on February 20th, 2008 by Brain Mitel

The study was conducted over 170 men and women at clinics across the United States. Half of the group received a daily dose of oxcarbazepine while the other half took placebo.

The findings revealed that both groups did not experience any change in the number of migraine attacks from the beginning to the end of the study.

Dr Stephen D. Silberstein, study author with Thomas Jefferson University in Philadelphia, and Fellow of the American Academy of Neurology said that the results do not support preliminary data suggesting oxcarbazepine was effective in preventing migraine

?While several epilepsy drugs have been used for decades to prevent migraine, oxcarbazepine did not prevent migraine in this study despite it being shown to be safe and well-tolerated,? he said.

The findings appear in the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology.

Source-ANI
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Chinese Gang Peddling Fake Anti-malaria Pills Busted

Posted on February 20th, 2008 by Brain Mitel

In a paper published in the US online journal the Public Library of Science (PLoS), the scientists describe an unprecedented undercover mission that led

to the arrest of a Chinese gang peddling fake anti-malaria pills.

Bogus treatments for malaria are rampant in Southeast Asia, placing lives at risk, they warn.

These pills are unlikely to contain enough artesunate — the active ingredient that kills resistant malaria parasites in the blood — and may even contain toxic substances that could sicken or kill the patient.

The investigation, dubbed Operation Jupiter, was coordinated with the help of Interpol and the World Health Organisation (WHO).

Lab experts with Britain’s University of Oxford and Wellcome Trust analysed 391 samples of genuine and counterfeit artesunate, collected in Myanmar, Laos, Vietnam, Cambodia and on the Thai-Myanmar border.

They used a spectrometer to get a chemical ID of the pills and found that 195 out of 391 samples — 49.9 percent — had no or only small amounts of artesunate.

They also put the pills’ packaging through a battery of tests, finding changes in hologram seals that, only to the expert eye and with the help of a microscope and ultraviolet light, pointed to fakery.

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UK Doctors Prescribe High Dose Drugs That may Make Patients Addictive

Posted on February 20th, 2008 by Brain Mitel

According to these MPs, painkillers, sleeping tablets and anti-anxiety pills are being handed out to patients “unwittingly” and in complete ignorance of official advice.

According to a report in The Guardian, the British Home Office says this misuse of drugs has led to the death of 17,000 people since the Sixties.

The parliamentary inquiry says that it is quite concerned about the prescription of benzodiazepines, and has recommended guidelines that they not be taken continuously for longer than four weeks.

The paper quoted Dr. Brian Iddon, the Labour MP and former chemist who chaired the group, as telling The Observer: “Some GPs are addicting people by giving them repeat prescriptions without checking to see how long they’ve been on the drugs in the first place. They are not stopping patients from getting any more of them after the set amount of time.”

Dr Steve Field, chairman of the Royal College of General Practitioners, said it would take on board the MPs’ findings.

Medical experts told the inquiry that an unknown, but growing, number of people had become addicted to painkillers, and according to the MPs, Solpadeine and Nurofen Plus are the two most widely misused such substances.

“Although the reclassification of some substances from prescription-only to over-the-counter has resulted in often significant cost savings for consumers, the abuse or misuse of these substances can result in serious side-effects, such as dependency, addiction, hospitalisation and potentially even death,” the MPs have concluded in their report.

Source-ANI
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Thailand to Review the Generic Drugs Scheme: Minister

Posted on February 20th, 2008 by Brain Mitel

“My position is that I am not going to cancel CL,” Public Health Minister Chiya Sasomsub said, referring to so-called compulsory licenses, which temporarily

suspend patent protections and allow production of copycat drugs.

The generic drug programme was one of the most contentious policies of Thailand’s just-departed military regime, angering Western pharmaceutical giants as it allows governments to override patent protections.

The army-backed government already overrode patents for popular heart drug Plavix and two key AIDS medicines — Kaletra and Efavirenz — and was planning to expand the programme to include cancer drugs.

Apart from the three drugs, the previous government struck a last-minute deal with Swiss pharmaceutical giant Novartis, which agreed to give its leukaemia medicine Glivec to most Thai patients for free.

While drug makers have derided the generic drug scheme as an infringement on their intellectual property rights, activists have hailed it as a “beacon” for other developing nations seeking to provide treatments to the poor.

But soon after taking office on Wednesday, Chiya said he would review the scheme, alarming local activists.

On Friday, Chiya met with about 50 Thai health and consumer activists, who urged the new minister to press ahead with the copycat drug programme.

Following the meeting, Chiya said he would keep the scheme for now but stopped short of saying whether the new government would expand it to include more drugs.

Source-AFP
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End of Wheat Fortification in Indonesia Dangerous: UNICEF

Posted on February 20th, 2008 by Brain Mitel

A flour fortification programme in Indonesia started in the early 1980s and is today practised in more than 50 nations. Iron, zinc, thiamine, riboflavin

and folic acid are typically added.

Indonesia’s ministry of industry lifted a 2001 law on the mandatory fortification of all flour traded in the world’s fourth most populous nation last month in a bid to reduce the market price of flour, UNICEF said.

The move would permit the importation of unfortified wheat flour, despite fortification being the cheapest and most sustainable way of addressing malnutrition, it said in a statement.

“The cost of fortification is just pennies per metric ton and the benefits of investment in micronutrient fortification far outweight the cost,” the agency said, noting that young children and reproductive-aged women have the highest risk of developing deficiencies.

“Indonesia will miss an opportunity to protect high risk groups from micronutrient deficiencies which can lead to higher susceptibility for morbidity and mortality, impaired mental and physical development as well as higher prevalence of neural tube defects at birth,” UNICEF added.

Rice or sago are typical staples across Indonesia, but annual wheat flour consumption per capita is predicted to increase from 15 to 30 kilogrammes (33 to 60 pounds) in the next decade, the agency said.

Source-AFP
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US Marijuana Vending Machine Alarms Drug-monitoring Agency

Posted on February 20th, 2008 by Brain Mitel

“We know that the use of cannabis is illegal under federal law of the United States and we trust the authorities will stop such activities, which contravene

the international drug control treaties,” INCB president Philip Emafo said in the statement.

The Los Angeles Daily News reported in late January that patients with a special authorisation could obtain up to one ounce (28 grammes) of marijuana per week from special vending machines located in and around Los Angeles.

But the INCB, which monitors the implementation of UN drug conventions, noted: “So far, the results of research regarding the potential therapeutic usefulness (of cannabis) have been limited.”

California is one of 11 US states to allow the use of marijuana for medical purposes, it added.

Source-AFP
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