Health Glance
State officials in Colorado and Washington say they are struggling to prepare health and safety guidelines for recently legalized recreational marijuana.
Marijuana, like other agricultural commodities, is subject to mold, mites and pesticide residue in raw form, and salmonella and other safety risks in prepared form, NBC News reported Friday.
Colorado, Washington deal with marijuana health, safety standards
At chicken plants, chemicals blamed for health ailments are poised to proliferate
When Jose Navarro landed a job as a federal poultry inspector in 2006, he moved his wife and newborn son to a rural town in Upstate New York near the processing plant, believing it was a steppingstone to a better life.
Five years later, Navarro was dead. The 37-year-old’s lungs had bled out.
His death triggered a federal investigation that raised questions about the health risks associated with a rise in the use of toxic, bacteria-killing chemicals in poultry plants.
Another HIV vaccine fails as agency halts study
Bad news in the fight against the AIDS virus: The government is halting a large U.S. study of a possible HIV vaccine because the experimental shots are not preventing infection.
The study had enrolled about 2,500 people, mostly gay men, in 19 cities. Half received an experimental vaccine developed by the National Institutes of Health, and half received dummy shots.
A safety review this week found that slightly more volunteers who had received the vaccine later became infected with HIV. It is not clear why.
Grim rise in suicides by baby boomers
Although experts have long thought of midlife as a time of stability and emotional contentment, baby boomers are proving to be an unfortunate exception. Reversing a longtime demographic trend, midlife suicides are on the rise for the generation born between 1946 and 1964.
National figures from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention indicate that the suicide rate for people in this age group rose by almost 30 percent during the decade ending in 2010, even as the rate among people 85 and older – traditionally, the demographic most likely to kill themselves – dropped by 12 percent.
A quarter of children under the age of 5 worldwide permanently "stunted" from malnutrition
The United Nations Children's Fund says more than a quarter of children under the age of 5 worldwide are permanently "stunted" from malnutrition, leaving them physically and intellectually weak and representing a scandalous waste of human potential.
Anthony Lake, executive director of UNICEF since 2010, said organized provision of vitamins and clean water and a focus from birth on breastfeeding could have helped these 165 million children achieve normal brain and body development. But their lack of proper nutrition means instead they will suffer increased vulnerability to illness and early death.
Why Chemotherapy That Costs $70,000 in the U.S. Costs $2,500 in India
Why does Gleevec, a leukemia drug that costs $70,000 per year in the United States, cost just $2,500 in India?
It's seemingly simple. Gleevec is under patent in the U.S., but not in India. Accordingly, Novartis, its Swiss-based manufacturer, may prevent competitors from making and selling lower-cost versions of the drug in the U.S., but not in India.
Copper on ICU surfaces reduces infections such as MRSA by half
U.S. researchers say they found using copper objects in hospital intensive care unit rooms cuts healthcare-acquired infections by more than half.
Copper -- and brass -- don't spread germs because they kill microbes on their surfaces continuously.
Healthcare-acquired infections such as methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus and vancomycin-resistant Enterococcus often contaminate items within hospital rooms, allowing bacteria to transfer from patient-to-patient.
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