"Health News - Medicine, Diet and Fitness"

MPs have voted to extend a smoking ban in public places to all pubs and private clubs in England. The free vote in the House of Commons went 384 to 184 in the government’s favour last night to remove the exemption of private members’ clubs and establishments that serve food. MPs also voted to ban smoking in workplaces, including 106,000 licensed premises.

Health secretary Patricia Hewitt told MPs: “It is right to legislate to ban smoking.” She said she was “absolutely delighted”, describing the victory as “a historic day” for public health. “This is going to save thousands of people’s lives.”
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Pliva is to buy a Spanish subsidiary from Novartis’ generics division Sandoz. The Croatian firm will pay 21.5 million euros for Uso Racional (UR), a well known and established generic brand in Spain with expected sales of 12 million euros for 2006.

A Pliva spokesman said: “The acquisition of UR represents a strong strategic fit with Pliva’s current Spanish operations, which Pliva expects to help it significantly strengthen its position and performance on this market.” The move comes as Pliva leaves the proprietary focussing solely on the generics following GlaxoSmithKline’s purchase of its Croatian research and development institute for $50 million.
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The following breeds generally do well with people with allergies: Dogs and Allergies The following breeds generally do well with people with allergies:

Dog hybrid - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
All dog breeds were created for a particular purpose, usually some form the Labradoodle, for example, was first bred as a guide dog for visually impaired people with allergies ), and

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When it comes to low back pain, physicians generally advise exhausting nonsurgical options before resorting to surgery. But a new study shows that for degenerative spondylolisthesis with spinal stenosis, surgery provides significantly better results than nonsurgical alternatives.

The study, published in the May 31 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine, is the second in a series reporting findings of the Spine Patients Outcomes Research Trial (SPORT), a five-year, multicenter study supported by the National Institute of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases (NIAMS), a part of the National Institutes of Health.

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New figures show that the UK boom in medicines research could be under threat, according to the Association of the British Pharmaceutical Industry (ABPI). ABPI figures show that total expenditure on research and development (R&D) on new medicines by the UK-based pharmaceutical industry fell by two per cent in real terms to ?3,244 million in 2004 - unchanged in cash terms from the 2003 figure of ?3,241 million.
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Researchers at Children’s Hospital Boston report finding a new way to increase stem cells in blood, suggesting a possible treatment to help patients who undergo chemotherapy or bone marrow transplant for leukemia and other cancers recover their immune function more quickly. In the June 21 issue of Nature, they demonstrate that a stable analog of prostaglandin can enhance the blood-forming system, both during embryonic development and after it’s been damaged.

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While California Moves Forward, Bush Pushes Back on Health Care
Statement of CALPIRG Health Care Advocate Emily Clayton on President Bush’s planned health care proposals for the State of the Union

“Just as California and other states are preparing to take big steps forward on the path to better regulating the health insurance industry and expanding health care coverage, President Bush is set to propose some giant steps back in his State of the Union address tonight.

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Researchers have found that the probability of the breast cancer gene mutation BRCA among women with a history of breast cancer is greater when the number of older, female relatives in the family is smaller, according to a study in the June 20 issue of JAMA. This finding may challenge the accuracy of some breast cancer prediction models, which may not take family structure into account.

“Germline BRCA1 or BRCA2 gene mutations significantly increase a woman’s risk of breast cancer (50 percent - 85 percent) and ovarian cancer (16 percent - 50 percent),” the authors write. “Documented efficacy of screening and risk reduction interventions provides evidence for individualized risk management advice, making genetic cancer risk assessment (GCRA) a component of medically necessary care. Identifying appropriate candidates for GCRA is challenging.”

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New results from a substudy of the Women’s Health Initiative (WHI) Estrogen-Alone Trial show that younger postmenopausal women who take estrogen-alone hormone therapy have significantly less buildup of calcium plaque in their arteries compared to their peers who did not take hormone therapy. Coronary artery calcium is considered a marker for future risk of coronary artery disease.

Results of the WHI Coronary Artery Calcium Study are published in the June 21, 2007, issue of the New England Journal of Medicine. The WHI is sponsored by the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI) of the National Institutes of Health.

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GPs are more likely to prescribe headache drugs to middle-aged women than men, a study has claimed. Researchers at King’s College London found women aged between 45 and 54 were three times as likely to visit their GP about headaches while men were more likely to be referred to hospital.

Prescribing was most common for women aged 45 to 54, who were given 78 prescriptions for every 100 consultations. They also found one in three women were given migraine drugs compared to one in four men, while women aged 15 to 24 were the group most likely to see their GP about headaches. In a study of 253 GP practices over a nine-year period, it was found women’s consultation rate for headaches was 6.4 out of every 100 per year compared to 2.5 for men. Headaches are the most common neurological symptom seen by neurologists and family doctors. They also rank among the top ten reasons for consulting a doctor and account for 20 per cent of sick leave taken by workers.
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