A document the Department of Health and Human Services sent to lawmakers to support Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s decision to change U.S. policy on covid vaccines cites scientific studies that are unpublished or under dispute and mischaracterizes others.

One health expert called the document “willful medical disinformation” about the safety of covid vaccines for children and pregnant women.

“It is so far out of left field that I find it insulting to our members of Congress that they would actually give them something like this. Congress members are relying on these agencies to provide them with valid information, and it’s just not there,” said Mark Turrentine, a professor of obstetrics and gynecology at Baylor College of Medicine.

The new COVID-19 variant NB.1.8.1, which was linked to a large surge of hospitalizations in parts of Asia, could now make up more than 1 in 3 cases across the United States, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention projected this week.

Last month, the CDC's airport surveillance program had detected cases of the variant in arriving international travelers from several countries. The agency now says that nearly half of the COVID infections detected in that program the last week of May were the NB.1.8.1 variant.

The CDC cautioned that "precision in the most recent reporting period is low" for their estimates, meaning the projections carry a wide margin of error. Still, the estimated increase in prevalence in the U.S. highlights the variant's high transmissibility — something experts had warned about as soon as it began spreading in this country.

cross-posted from: https://lazysoci.al/post/28370226

About 2,400 CDC employees lost their jobs in a wave of cuts across federal health agencies in early April, according to a tally at the time.

More than 460 laid-off employees at the nation’s top public health agency received notices Wednesday that they are being reinstated, according to a union representing the workers.

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services confirmed reinstatement notices went out to the former Centers for Disease Control and Prevention employees, but provided few details.

About 2,400 CDC employees lost their jobs in a wave of cuts across federal health agencies in early April, according to a tally at the time.

KEY POINTS

Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. on Monday said he is “retiring” all 17 members of a crucial government panel of vaccine advisors.

Kennedy is removing all members of the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, or ACIP, which advises the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

It’s the latest move by Kennedy – a prominent vaccine skeptic – to change and potentially undermine vaccinations in the U.S. since he took the helm at HHS.

In short:

Australian researchers say a simple blood test could "revolutionise" the diagnosis of a common autoimmune disease.

A study has found the test is highly accurate in diagnosing coeliac disease, without patients having to eat gluten beforehand.

What's next?

Research is expanding across diverse populations, and there is hope the new test will be available within two years.

Though extremely rare, cancers of the appendix are being diagnosed at higher rates in Gen X and millennials compared with earlier cohorts.

Although they are very rare, cancers of the appendix are on the rise, a new study finds.

An analysis of a National Cancer Institute database found that compared with older generations, rates of appendix cancer have tripled among Gen X and quadrupled among millennials, according to the report, published Monday in the Annals of Internal Medicine.

“There is a disproportionate burden of appendix cancer among young individuals,” said the study’s lead author, Andreana Holowatyj, an assistant professor of hematology and oncology at the Vanderbilt University Medical Center and Vanderbilt Ingram Cancer Center.

Holowatyj’s earlier research was “the first to show that 1 in every 3 appendix cancers is diagnosed among adults younger than age 50,” she said in a phone interview. “That’s compared to 1 in every 8 colorectal cancers diagnosed among adults younger than age 50.”

Scores of National Institutes of Health researchers and staffers sign letter criticizing agency policies: ‘We dissent’

In his confirmation hearings to lead the National Institutes of Health, Jay Bhattacharya pledged his openness to views that might conflict with his own. “Dissent,” he said, “is the very essence of science.”

That commitment is being put to the test.

On Monday, scores of scientists at the agency sent their Trump-appointed leader a letter titled the Bethesda Declaration, a frontal challenge to “policies that undermine the NIH mission, waste public resources, and harm the health of Americans and people across the globe”.

It says: “We dissent.”

The drug, used to treat parasitic worms, has not been formulated or labeled specifically for over-the-counter use, like aspirin or an antacid.

Interest in using drugs or experimental treatments in unapproved ways has gained steam with Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s appointment as head of the Department of Health and Human Services. Kennedy recently said on a podcast that people should have access to controversial alternative therapies like stem cells and chelation therapy to remove heavy metals from the body. The FDA has warned that neither should be used without oversight from a doctor.

The hype has prompted lawmakers in 16 states, including Idaho, to propose and in some cases pass legislation to make the pills readily available for anyone without a prescription. While health insurance covers many prescription drugs, including ivermectin, it doesn’t cover over-the-counter medicines.

Federal health officials say a salmonella outbreak linked to a large egg recall has made dozens of people sick in seven states in the West and Midwest

The August Egg Company recalled about 1.7 million brown organic and brown cage-free egg varieties distributed to grocery stores between February and May because of the potential for salmonella, according to a posted announcement Friday on the Food and Drug Administration's website.

At least 79 people in seven states have gotten a strain of salmonella that was linked to the eggs, and 21 people have been hospitalized. the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said.

The recall covers Arizona, California, Illinois, Indiana, Nebraska, New Mexico, Nevada, Washington and Wyoming. A list of brands and plant codes or Julian dates can be found on the FDA and CDC websites.

Benjamin Han, a geriatrician and addiction medicine specialist at the University of California-San Diego, tells his students a cautionary tale about a 76-year-old patient who, like many older people, struggled with insomnia.

When the head of the Environmental Protection Agency announced a wide-ranging rollback of environmental regulations, he said it would put a “dagger through the heart of climate-change religion” and introduce a “Golden Age” for the American economy.

What Lee Zeldin didn’t mention: how ending the rules could have devastating consequences to human health.

The EPA-targeted rules could prevent an estimated 30,000 deaths and save $275 billion each year they are in effect, according to an Associated Press examination that included the agency’s own prior assessments as well as a wide range of other research.

The woman contracted a fatal infection caused by a brain-eating amoeba and died eight days after developing symptoms.

A Texas woman died from an infection caused by a brain-eating amoeba days after she cleaned her sinuses using tap water, according to a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention case report.

The woman, an otherwise healthy 71-year-old, developed "severe neurologic symptoms," including fever, headache and an altered mental status, four days after she filled a nasal irrigation device with tap water from her RV's water system at a Texas campsite, the CDC report said.

She was treated for primary amebic meningoencephalitis — a brain infection caused by Naegleria fowleri, often referred to as the "brain-eating amoeba." Despite treatment, the woman experienced seizures and died from the infection eight days after she developed symptoms, the agency said.

Research finds more than 15m in US, UK, Germany and France with MASH have not been diagnosed

More than 15 million people in the US, UK, Germany and France do not know they have the most aggressive form of fatty liver disease, according to research.

Metabolic dysfunction-associated steatotic liver disease (MASLD) – the formal name for non-alcoholic fatty liver disease – occurs in people who drink no or minimal amounts of alcohol whose liver contains more than 5% fat.

About two-thirds of patients with type 2 diabetes are thought to have the condition, which is also associated with obesity, heart and circulatory disease.

Approximately 5% of adults globally have the most aggressive form of MASLD. Metabolic dysfunction-associated steatohepatitis (MASH) causes fibrosis (scarring) and can lead to cirrhosis and is linked to greater risk of cardiovascular disease, chronic kidney disease and liver cancer.

Melbourne team demonstrates way to make the virus visible within white blood cells, paving the way to fully clear it from the body

A cure for HIV could be a step closer after researchers found a new way to force the virus out of hiding inside human cells.

The virus’s ability to conceal itself inside certain white blood cells has been one of the main challenges for scientists looking for a cure. It means there is a reservoir of the HIV in the body, capable of reactivation, that neither the immune system nor drugs can tackle.

Now researchers from the Peter Doherty Institute for Infection and Immunity in Melbourne, have demonstrated a way to make the virus visible, paving the way to fully clear it from the body.

It is based on mRNA technology, which came to prominence during the Covid-19 pandemic when it was used in vaccines made by Moderna and Pfizer/BioNTech.