Thalidomide may help as adjuvant therapy for hepatocellular carcinoma

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• Thalidomide may help as adjuvant therapy for hepatocellular carcinoma
• Healing touch for Sirohi's poor in pain
• AIDS welfare cost may effect growth: Report
• Many US women have children by more than one man
• The Population Bomb: How we survived it
• Latest hands-free electronic water faucets found to be hindrance, not help, in infection control
• SCOR sets up Insurance Risk and Finance Research Centre at NTU
• New insight into 'aha' memories
• REDD+, Technical, Socioeconomic and Political Dimensions
• Study: Emissions trading doesn't cause pollution 'hot spots'

Thalidomide may help as adjuvant therapy for hepatocellular carcinoma Posted: 02 Apr 2011 06:57 PM PDT ( From http://www.rxpgnews.com ) Thalidomide has shown potential to be used as the first adjuvant therapy for hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC), according to data presented at the International Liver Congress 2011. A new study found thalidomide gave HCC patients who had undergone grossly curative resection surgical removal of the cancerous part of the liver double the two-year disease free survival rate (65%) compared to placebo (33%). However, the study did find that the two-year overall survival rate was comparable between patients treated with thalidomide and patients given placebo – 84.2% and 85.7% respectively. Daniele Prati, EASL's Scientific Committee Member and Press Committee Chairman, commented: "Current options for adjuvant therapy in HCC are very limited and clinical trial results have been disappointing. Thalidomide has already been proven to work well in a number of other areas and this study shows it could potentially benefit HCC patients who are particularly difficult to treat. Overall, it is important to continue research in evaluating adjuvant therapy in HCC." Surgery is the main form of treatment for HCC, but is only possible for a small proportion of those afflicted. Even after curative resection, recurrence is common and is the main cause of death. Adjuvant therapy that is, chemotherapy after surgery – is thus attempted to try to improve outcomes. The study is promising because there is currently no adjuvant therapy for HCC patients following curative resection. Indeed, the most up-to-date Cochrane Review of adjuvant therapies for HCC (conducted prior to this thalidomide study) found insufficient evidence to show that previously investigated adjuvant therapies increased survival for HCC, and only limited evidence to suggest that adjuvant therapy was useful in disease-free survival. In the double-blind, placebo controlled, randomized, comparative phase-II study, 42 patients were given 200mg per day oral dose of thalidomide (Arm... http://www.rxpgnews.com

Healing touch for Sirohi's poor in pain Posted: 02 Apr 2011 10:21 AM PDT ( From http://www.rxpgnews.com ) Sirohi, April 2 - In a unique initiative launched by Rajasthan's Sirohi district administration, medical stores have been sought to contribute a certain amount of money every month to support the medical expenses of the poor and the needy here. The chemists will raise about Rs.15,000 every month, which will be provided to poor patients who are unable to bear their medical expenses. The district administration will identify the deserving patients, an official told IANS. The initiative, which was launched a few days ago, is the brainchild of Sriram Meena, the Sirohi district collector. 'Many people come to us every month pleading for help as they are not able to purchase the medicines the doctors prescribe,' Meena told IANS. He added: 'Many of them are not included in the BPL - category and so they can't avail themselves of government schemes available for the poor.' Some people, who get injured in accidents and need immediate treatment even before their relatives or friends arrive, find it difficult to buy the emergency medicine, Meena pointed out. 'We thought of a scheme where the chemists themselves pool in some money every month and use it to support the poor patients by providing them with free medicines,' the official said. The district administration approached the office-bearers of the chemists association in Sirohi and the response was positive. The chemists agreed to make every medical store owner here contribute a certain amount of money every month. The association will provide the district administration with 30 coupons of Rs.500 each every month. 'The district officials will provide these coupons to the people in ned. They can present it at the medical shop along with the doctor's prescription to buy the medicine,' the collector said. If the cost of the medicine is above Rs.500, the hospital itself will give the necessary coupon, he added. According to the official, the coupons have already been collected... http://www.rxpgnews.com

AIDS welfare cost may effect growth: Report Posted: 01 Apr 2011 08:24 PM PDT ( From http://www.rxpgnews.com ) New Delhi, April 1 - Even as India has recorded a drop in the number of infections, a new report on HIV/AIDS by UNAIDS warns that the epidemic, if not contained in time, will have adverse effects on the nation's economic growth. The report 'Asian Economies in Rapid Transition: HIV Now and Through 2021', which makes a comparative study of five Asian nations, India, China, Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand and Vietnam, highlights that the welfare cost is high on the economies. 'Despite low prevalence of HIV and AIDS in the six countries of rapid transition, the welfare cost of the epidemic in terms of lost years of life of adults and the knock-on effects on loss of parenting for orphans, add up to substantial burden,' the report released Friday said. This may result in loss of several years of economic growth for India with the loss mounting in the case of India 'to a potential loss of several years of economic growth if the epidemic is not contained,' the report said. Over five million people are living with HIV and AIDS in Asia. According to the report, the number has tripled between 2004 and 2007. The report highlights that public health spending in the six countries falls short of amount needed to cover the current needs of the HIV/AIDS programme. It recommended making the present resources more efficient to get higher returns. 'With funding threatened by competing priorities...stakeholders need to focus more on 'making the money work' by allocating the resources in more efficient and targeted manner to achieve maximum impact,' said the report. According to the latest figures from National AIDS Control Organisation -, total estimated number of HIV/AIDS patients in India was 2.4 million in 2009. According to estimates, the number of new annual infections has declined by more than 50 percent over the past decade. The report says India has 1,58,000 people receiving the anti-retroviral treatment. http://www.rxpgnews.com

Many US women have children by more than one man Posted: 01 Apr 2011 05:00 AM PDT ( From http://www.rxpgnews.com ) ANN ARBOR, Mich.---The first national study of the prevalence of multiple partner fertility shows that 28 percent of all U.S. women with two or more children have children by more than one man. The study will be presented April 1 in Washington, D.C., at the annual meeting of the Population Association of America. I was surprised at the prevalence, said demographer Cassandra Dorius, a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Michigan Institute for Social Research. Multiple partner fertility is an important part of contemporary American family life, and a key component to the net of disadvantage that many poor and uneducated women face every day . While previous studies have examined how common multiple partner fertility is among younger women, or among women who live in urban areas, the research by Dorius is the first to assess prevalence among a national sample of U.S. women who have completed their child-bearing years. Dorius analyzed data on nearly 4,000 U.S. women who were interviewed more than 20 times over a period of 27 years, as part of the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth. The data included detail on individual men in each household, capturing what demographers call relationship churning. For nonresidential relationships, Dorius triangulated information from mother and child reports to establish common paternity. She found that having children by different fathers was more common among minority women, with 59 percent of African American mothers, 35 percent of Hispanic mothers and 22 percent of white mothers reporting multiple partner fertility. Women who were not living with a man when they gave birth and those with low income and less education were also more likely to have children by different men. But she also found that multiple partner fertility is surprisingly common at all levels of income and education and is frequently tied to marriage and divorce rather than just single parenthood. I was a year into... http://www.rxpgnews.com

The Population Bomb: How we survived it Posted: 01 Apr 2011 05:00 AM PDT ( From http://www.rxpgnews.com ) ANN ARBOR, Mich.---World population will reach 7 billion this year, prompting new concerns about whether the world will soon face a major population crisis. In spite of 50 years of the fastest population growth on record, the world did remarkably well in producing enough food and reducing poverty, said University of Michigan economist David Lam, in his presidential address at the annual meeting of the Population Association of America. Lam is a professor of economics and a research professor at the U-M Institute for Social Research. The talk is titled How the World Survived the Population Bomb: Lessons from 50 Years of Exceptional Demographic History. In 1968, when Paul Ehrlich's book, The Population Bomb, triggered alarm about the impact of a rapidly growing world population, growth rates were about 2 percent and world population doubled in the 39 years between 1960 and 1999. According to Lam, that is something that never happened before and will never happen again. There is virtually no question that world population growth rates will continue to decline, said Lam. The rate is only as high as it is because of population momentum, with many women of childbearing ages in developing countries because of rapid population growth in earlier decades. Lam discussed a variety of factors that have worked together to reduce the impact of population increases. Among the economic forces, he cited the green revolution, started by Nobel prize-winner Norman Borlaug, that increased per capita world food production by 41 percent between 1960 and 2009. We've been through periods of absolutely unprecedented growth rates, and yet food production increased even faster than population and poverty rates fell substantially, he said. The capacity of cities to absorb the growth in world population is another major reason that the world was able to double its population in the last 40 years without triggering mass starvation or increased poverty,... http://www.rxpgnews.com

Latest hands-free electronic water faucets found to be hindrance, not help, in infection control Posted: 31 Mar 2011 05:00 AM PDT ( From http://www.rxpgnews.com ) A study of newly installed, hands-free faucets at The Johns Hopkins Hospital, all equipped with the latest electronic-eye sensors to automatically detect hands and dispense preset amounts of water, shows they were more likely to be contaminated with one of the most common and hazardous bacteria in hospitals compared to old-style fixtures with separate handles for hot and cold water. Newer is not necessarily better when it comes to infection control in hospitals, especially when it comes to warding off potential hazards from water-borne bacteria, such as Legionella species, says senior study investigator and infectious disease specialist Lisa Maragakis, M.D., M.P.H. New devices, even faucets, however well intentioned in their make-up and purpose, have the potential for unintended consequences, which is why constant surveillance is needed, says Maragakis, director of hospital epidemiology and infection control at Hopkins Hospital and an assistant professor at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. Although the high-tech faucets cut daily water consumption by well over half, Johns Hopkins researchers identified Legionella growing in 50 percent of cultured water samples from 20 electronic-eye faucets in or near patient rooms on three different inpatient units, but in only 15 percent of water cultures from 20 traditional, manual faucets in the same patient care areas. Weekly water culture results also showed half the amount of bacterial growth of any kind in the manual faucets than in the electronic models. While the precise reasons for the higher bacterial growth in the electronic faucets still need clarification, the researchers say it appears that standard hospital water disinfection methods, which complement treatments by public utilities, did not work well on the complex valve components of the newer faucets. They suspect that the valves simply offer additional surfaces for bacteria to become trapped and... http://www.rxpgnews.com

SCOR sets up Insurance Risk and Finance Research Centre at NTU Posted: 31 Mar 2011 05:00 AM PDT ( From http://www.rxpgnews.com ) Global reinsurance company SCOR is establishing a research centre at Nanyang Technological University (NTU) that will promote and conduct applied research in insurance risk and related issues specific to the Asia-Pacific. A memorandum of understanding to set up the Insurance Risk and Finance Research Centre was signed today by SCOR and NTU's Nanyang Business School. Combining market insight with intellectual rigour, the centre aims to produce research that will help the insurance industry meet Asia's growing protection needs. It also seeks to encourage in the region a greater culture of study and dialogue of insurance and actuarial science issues. We are pleased for the opportunity to bolster our contributions to this vital area of research. Rapid economic and social development is raising and changing the demand for insurance cover in Asia. A growing middle class and longer life expectancies are among the prevalent trends that present both opportunities and challenges for the industry. We believe these are best met with knowledge and understanding through rigorous research, said Professor Gillian Yeo, Interim Dean of the Nanyang Business School (NBS). We are pleased to be partnering a global leader in the field. SCOR's international presence in underwriting both the life and general insurance markets will certainly enhance the depth, relevancy and currency of our collaboration, Professor Yeo added. The centre, which will be funded by SCOR, will undertake two to three research projects every year. Supervised by NBS faculty, these projects may tap on leading experts from external institutions when appropriate. The centre will also help fund PhD students at NBS for relevant research projects. The centre's findings will be shared at an annual high-level regional seminar. SCOR chief operating officer Julien Carmona said, The establishment of the Insurance Risk and Finance Research Centre supports our long-term commitment to... http://www.rxpgnews.com

New insight into 'aha' memories Posted: 31 Mar 2011 05:00 AM PDT ( From http://www.rxpgnews.com ) When we suddenly get the answer to a riddle or understand the solution to a problem, we can practically feel the light bulb click on in our head. But what happens after the 'Aha!' moment? Why do the things we learn through sudden insight tend to stick in our memory? 'Much of memory research involves repetitive, rote learning,' says Kelly Ludmer, a research student in the group of Prof. Yadin Dudai of the Institute's Neurobiology Department, 'but in fact, we regularly absorb large blocks of information in the blink of an eye and remember things quite well from single events. Insight is an example of a one-time event that is often well-preserved in memory.' To investigate how lessons we gain from insight get embedded in our long-term memory, Ludmer, Dudai and Prof. Nava Rubin of New York University designed a test with 'camouflage images' - photographs that had been systematically degraded until they resembled inkblots. When volunteers first viewed the images, they were hard pressed to identify them. But after the camouflage was switched with the original, undoctored picture for a second, the subjects experienced an 'Aha!' moment - the image now popped out clearly even in the degraded image. Their perceptions, says Ludmer, underwent a sudden change - just as a flash of insight instantly shifts our world view. To tax their memory of the insightful moment, participants were asked to repeat the exercise with dozens of different images and, in a later repeat session, they were given only the camouflaged images (together with some they hadn't seen before) to identify. The team found that some of the memories disappeared over time, but the ones that made it past a week were likely to remain. All in all, about half of all the learned 'insights' seemed to be consolidated in the subjects' memories. To reveal what occurs in the brain at the moment of insight, the initial viewing session was conducted in a functional MRI (fMRI) scanner.... http://www.rxpgnews.com

REDD+, Technical, Socioeconomic and Political Dimensions Posted: 31 Mar 2011 05:00 AM PDT ( From http://www.rxpgnews.com ) Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation 'Plus' (REDD+) is a climate change mitigation strategy that aims to financially compensate landowners and stewards for avoiding forest loss and degradation, as well as promoting forest conservation, sustainable forest management and the enhancement of forest carbon stocks. If designed and implemented correctly, REDD+ has the potential to generate a valuable stream of funding for initiatives that will conserve and restore important tracts of tropical forests. These efforts would not only contribute toward abating the effects of global warming, but also to protect biodiversity and ecosystem services, and support poverty alleviation and rural development. Alternatively, if the mechanism fails to adequately address potential pitfalls, REDD+ could compromise local livelihoods, affect traditional uses of forests, and enhance or catalyze corruption, among other problems. Currently, voluntary REDD pilot projects are in effect throughout the tropics and many countries are preparing themselves for the eventual development of a formal mechanism, a process known as REDD-Readiness. If approved within the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), REDD+ activities will go into effect after 2012 under a formal regulated system. Panama has been actively engaged in international negotiations and debates regarding REDD+. The country was selected in 2008 and 2009 as a recipient of funding and support for REDD+ Readiness under the United Nations Collaborative Programme on REDD in Developing Countries (UN-REDD) and the Forest Carbon Partnership Facility (FCPF) of the World Bank (WB), respectively. Government officials, indigenous communities, NGOs, and organizations of farmers, cattle ranchers, loggers and other agents of land transformation (i.e. colonos) have begun to take part in REDD+ discussions and/or training. ELTI, in collaboration with McGill University and... http://www.rxpgnews.com

Study: Emissions trading doesn't cause pollution 'hot spots' Posted: 30 Mar 2011 05:00 AM PDT ( From http://www.rxpgnews.com ) BLOOMINGTON, Ind. -- Programs that allow facilities to buy and sell emission allowances have been popular and effective since they were introduced in the U.S. two decades ago. But critics worry the approach can create heavily polluted hot spots in low-income and minority communities. A new study by Evan Ringquist, professor in the Indiana University School of Public and Environmental Affairs, finds the problem hasn't materialized -- that the efficiency gains of allowance trading have not come at the expense of equitable treatment of minorities and the poor. There is very little evidence that allowance trading causes 'hot spots,' Ringquist said. This study finds there is no inherent trade-off between efficiency and equity when using market-based instruments for pollution control. The study, Trading Equity for Efficiency in Environmental Protection? Environmental Justice Effects from the SO2 Allowance Trading Program, is scheduled for publication this spring in the journal Social Science Quarterly. It focuses on the sulfur dioxide allowance trading program (ATP) established by 1990 amendments to the Clean Air Act. The program created a market for trading pollution credits to reduce emissions of sulfur dioxide, which causes human health problems and acid rain that results in environmental damage. While the sulfur dioxide program is the largest and most established U.S. market, there are regional markets for other regulated pollutants, including nitrogen oxides, volatile organic compounds and carbon dioxide. Domestic markets have been proposed to curb mercury pollution. And an international carbon market would be an element of a cap and trade initiative to slow climate change. The idea behind emissions allowance trading is simple. Some firms and facilities can reduce their emissions by required amounts without facing excessive costs, but some can't. With a trading system, firms with low control costs will reduce pollution... http://www.rxpgnews.com

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