December 19, 2007
Congress announced plans Tuesday to review the use of performance-enhancing drugs, with star-studded hearings scheduled next month and legislation to limit access to steroids and human growth hormone. (AP)
December 19, 2007
and The Case against Perfection: Ethics in the Age of Genetic Engineering
We sit on the cusp of a new world in which the ability to genetically engineer our children, as well as re-upholster our own organs, promises to become routine rather than exotic. Just as old definitions of life proved ethically … Read More
December 19, 2007
Nanotechnology, the manipulation of objects at a molecular or atomic level, is suffering from a lack of regulation, the world’s largest insurance market has warned. (Business News)
December 19, 2007
A wonderful opportunity for cancer prevention was lost earlier this year when the Government decided not to fund the new cervical cancer vaccine “Gardasilâ€, despite recommendations from the Immunisation Technical Working Group (ITWG) that it be prioritised for the 2008 … Read More
December 19, 2007
The European Commission wants people to have the right to health care across the EU if they are entitled to receive it in their own country. (BBC)
December 19, 2007
The VCU Life Sciences Survey is the first poll to reflect the discovery reported internationally in November that human skin cells can be used to create stem cells or their near equivalents. When asked about the implications of this development, … Read More
December 19, 2007
The latest edition of the CedarEthics Podcast, a production of the Center for Bioethics at Cedarville University, deals with the sticky ethical question of using the medical research data obtained during the Holocaust. Should we make use of the data … Read More
December 18, 2007
“Conscience Clause” laws that would permit pharmacists to refuse to fill birth control pill prescriptions or doctors to perform abortions, are growing in political prominence. By way of push back, some states are passing laws requiring pharmacists to dispense birth … Read More
December 18, 2007
Lawmakers in California’s lower house line up with Schwarzenegger in passing the first phase of a plan to extend medical insurance to almost all residents. Proposal still faces many obstacles, though. (Los Angeles Times)
December 18, 2007
A child on the gene therapy programme at Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children NHS Trust has developed leukaemia, two years after treatment. The child had been successfully treated for X-SCID, a condition which leaves the patient unable to fight … Read More
December 18, 2007
Gov. Jon S. Corzine signed into law Monday a measure that abolishes the death penalty, making New Jersey the first state in more than four decades to reject capital punishment. (Yahoo! News)
December 18, 2007
Navigenics, of Redwood Shores, CA, is developing a genetic test to help customers assess and respond to their risks of contracting numerous illnesses, including Alzheimer’s, type 2 diabetes, rheumatoid arthritis, and breast cancer. The genome-wide scan targets 20 diseases so … Read More
December 18, 2007
The stem cell wars are not over, say leading researchers at Harvard and other universities who believe that the cloning of human embryos still represents the key to developing effective treatments for an array of horrific diseases. (Boston Globe)
December 18, 2007
For decades, scientists have been interested in developing a technique for interpreting brain activity to motor output — in other words, decipher the brain’s electric patterns and convert them into coherent thought. (TFOT)
December 18, 2007
New publications, experiments and breakthroughs in nanotechnology–and what they mean. (Technology Review)
December 18, 2007
Hwang Woo-suk is part of a team that requested the Health Ministry last week for permission to carry out research on embryonic stem cells using human eggs, said Jung Tae-gil, an official handling the case at the ministry. (International Herald … Read More
December 17, 2007
Brave New Britain is showing us the future of eugenic procreation unless we are very careful, the perceived right to only have children who pass health–and eventually attribute–muster. Where once pre-implatation genetic diagnosis was reserved to prevent babies from being … Read More
December 17, 2007
A British couple have won the right to test embryos for a gene that leads to high cholesterol levels and an increased risk of heart attacks, The Times has learnt. The decision by the fertility watchdog will reopen controversy over … Read More
December 17, 2007
A new buzzword entered the medical lexicon in 1992 when the Evidence-Based Medicine Working Group published one of the first articles on the phenomenon in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA). In the years since, the role that … Read More
December 17, 2007
In the fall of 2005, I started my first online relationship. He was a 62-year-old retiree from Canada; I was a 49-year-old psychiatrist living in Washington. Beginning in early October of that year, we talked or e-mailed several times a … Read More
December 17, 2007
Hospice care helps terminally ill patients prepare for death, treating their symptoms and pain and preparing them — and their families — for the end. (HealthDay)
December 17, 2007
For the first time, doctors have used stem cells from liposuctioned fat to fix breast defects in women who have had cancerous lumps removed. (AP)
December 17, 2007
When California’s US$3 billion Stem Cell Research and Cures Act, Proposition 71, was approved by voters in November 2004, the crucial paragraph did not mention embryonic stem cells (ES cells). (Nature)
December 17, 2007
Each day, Sam Hutchison swallows 44 pills, most of which weren’t prescribed by his physician. They were chosen by Sam’s father, who devised the treatment cocktail — and tests many of the medicines on himself — in a desperate effort … Read More
December 17, 2007
It has been 50 years since scientists first created DNA in a test tube, stitching ordinary chemical ingredients together to make life’s most extraordinary molecule. Until recently, however, even the most sophisticated laboratories could make only small snippets of DNA … Read More
