Bioethics & Health News

December 16, 2005

December 16, 2005

Go-Ahead for First Full Face Transplants

British surgeons are preparing to carry out an unprecedented full face transplant operation next year after being granted ethical approval to actively seek patients. The 30-strong team headed by Peter Butler, a leading plastic surgeon at the Royal Free Hospital in Hampstead, London, was given the go-ahead by the hospital’s bioethics committee yesterday. The announcement follows the partial face transplant in France last month of a woman whose face was mutilated by a dog
(The Guardian)

Nurses Face Harassment From Patients

Nurse Sarah Andres is so used to male patients calling her “sweetie” or “cutie” – or even asking her for a kiss – that it rarely upsets her anymore.
(AP)

South Korean Cloning Expert Hits Back

South Korean cloning expert Hwang Woo-suk has stood by his apparently breakthrough research, despite claims some of the results were fabricated.
(BBC)

Scandal for Cloning Embryos: A Tragic Turn’ for Science

Last May, a stunning research paper in Science, one of the world’s most respected scientific journals, instantly changed the tenor of the debate over cloning human embryos and extracting their stem cells. A team of South Korean scientists reported in the paper that they had figured out how to do this work so efficiently that the great hope of researchers and patients – to obtain stem cells that were an exact match of a patient’s – seemed easily within sight.
(New York Times)

Study: Key Hormone Therapy Trial was Flawed

A 2002 study showing that hormone replacement therapy raises the risk of heart disease and breast cancer — scaring many women away from the drugs –was fundamentally flawed, according to new research.
(Reuters)

Drugs as Effective as Surgery for Chronic Reflux

A new review of available data has good news for the estimated 60 million Americans with gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD), concluding that drugs can be just as effective as surgery in managing disease symptoms.
(HealthDay)

EPA Fines DuPont $16.5M for Teflon Cover-Up

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency on Wednesday ordered chemicals giant DuPont to pay a record $16.5 million in penalties for withholding health safety data on toxins linked to its lucrative Teflon group of non-stick, stain-resistant compounds.
(HealthDay)

Studies: One Embryo Works as Well as Two for IVF

Using a single embryo for in-vitro fertilization is just as likely to result in a successful pregnancy as transferring two embryos, while reducing the chance of a higher-risk twin conception, according to research.
(Reuters)

Drug Duo: New Hope in Cancer Fight

Patty Holtz has been battling her cancer for 15 years. Now she’s confident that a one-two punch has knocked it out for good. An experimental two-drug combination has made it possible for Holtz to receive a successful transplant of her own stem cells after a previous attempt had failed.
(Kansas City Star)

Study: Eye Cell Implants May Ease Parkinson’s

People with Parkinson’s disease showed marked improvement after surgeons implanted in their brains chemical-producing cells taken from the eye of a dead donor, researchers said.
(Reuters)