Health & Fitness

A team of UK scientists has analyzed the complete genetic makeup of 12,000 tumors from NHS patients and discovered 58 new mutations that provide clues about their potential causes. The team, comprised of scientists from Cambridge University Hospitals and the University of Cambridge, used data from the 100,000 Genomes Project. That's a British initiative to sequence the whole genomes of patients with cancers and rare diseases.  Team leader Professor Serena Nik-Zainal said this is the largest study of its kind and that the vast amount of data her team worked with allowed them to detect patterns in the genetic alterations or "mutational signatures" found in the tumors. By comparing their results with other studies, they were able to confirm that 58 of the mutational signatures they found w...

Enlarge / Liver lesions in patient with chronic active hepatitis C. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released a health alert Thursday notifying clinicians of a US-based cluster of unexplained cases of liver inflammation in young children, which appear to be part of a puzzling international outbreak that now spans at least 10 countries and two US states. According to the CDC, Alabama has seen nine cases of unexplained liver inflammation—aka hepatitis—in children between the ages of one and six since October of last year. Two of the cases resulted in liver transplants, though no deaths have been reported. Health officials took notice of the unexplained illnesses after a cluster of five cases presented at one children's hospital in t...

Long-term antidepressant use did not improve physical or mental health in patients with depression according to a news study published in the journal PLOS ONE. Among people with depression, those using antidepressants had no better quality of life in the long run. Over time, using antidepressants is not associated with significantly better health-related quality of life, compared to people with depression who do not take the drugs. These are the findings of a new study published on April 20, 2022, in the open-access journal PLOS ONE by Omar Almohammed of King Saud University, Saudi Arabia, and colleagues. It is widely acknowledged that depressive illness has a major impact on patients’ health-related quality of life (HRQoL). While studies have demonstrated the usefulness of a...

Health authorities in North Carolina say they are investigating two cases of hepatitis in young children, making the state the second to report cases that appear to be linked to an outbreak that is being seen in a growing number of countries. Bailey Pennington, a spokesperson for the state’s Department of Health and Human Services, told STAT of the cases in an email on Thursday, saying the state is both conducting surveillance for other possible cases and working with its poison control center and epidemiologists to try to determine the cause of the illnesses. “Both North Carolina cases were in school-aged children. Neither required a transplant and both have since recovered,” Pennington said. advertisement The development came as health authorities in the United States and some European...

A U.K. patient with a severely weakened immune system had COVID-19 for almost a year and a half, scientists reported, underscoring the importance of protecting vulnerable people from the coronavirus. There’s no way to know for sure whether it was the longest-lasting COVID-19 infection because not everyone gets tested, especially on a regular basis like this case. But at 505 days, “it certainly seems to be the longest reported infection,” said Dr. Luke Blagdon Snell, an infectious disease expert at the Guy’s & St. Thomas’ NHS Foundation Trust. Snell’s team plans to present several “persistent” COVID-19 cases at an infectious diseases meeting in Portugal this weekend. Their study investigated which mutations arise — and whether variants evolve — in people with super long infections. It...

U.S. health officials have sent out a nationwide alert warning doctors to be on the lookout for symptoms of unexplained hepatitis in kids, after clusters of mysterious cases in the US and UK.  The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is expanding its probe after scores of young children came down with severe liver inflammation, but did not have the viruses hepatitis A, B, or C that usually cause it. In the alert on Thursday, the CDC said it is working with counterparts in Europe to understand the cause of the infections, and urged doctors across the country to report potential cases.  A common cold virus known as an adenovirus has been confirmed in several of the European cases, but not all.  In the UK, researchers have speculated that kids may have weakened immune systems due to ro...

Other researchers, including Dr. Lewis, argue that the benefits from antidepressants are significant enough to make a positive difference in people’s lives, at least for a few months. “There’s strong evidence that antidepressants can be effective for people experiencing a wide range of depressive symptoms,” she said. But, she added, the drugs “do not work for everybody.” And again, it’s unclear how helpful these drugs are when taken for more than a few months — which raises concerns for the many adults who have been taking the drugs for a long time. According to a Times analysis, 15.5 million Americans have been taking antidepressants for at least five years. Dr. Horowitz argued that the drugs will probably have increasingly smaller benefits the longer people take them, in part because pa...

Just as most Americans have caught wind of the BA.2 variant of Omicron — which overtook the original Omicron as the dominant strain in the U.S. less than a month ago — another possibly faster-growing version of Omicron is quickly making inroads. The new Omicron sublineage BA.2.12.1 now accounts for 19% of all new cases specifically sequenced for variants in the country, according to data released Tuesday by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control. That means the strain — barely on the national radar two weeks ago — is now being identified in close to 1 in 5 newly-sequenced cases, up from 1.5% less than a month before on 3/19. Given that, Americans trying to keep up may be experiencing a form of variant whiplash. A chart showing the recent growth of BA.2.12.1 (in or...

SPRINGFIELD, Ill. — The Illinois Department of Natural Resources is recommending residents stop using bird feeders and baths until the end of May due to an influenza strain that is impacting wild and domestic birds. The strain is called the EA H5N1 — which is a highly pathogenic avian influenza. Throughout the Midwest, infections from the strain are up, especially in waterfowl. During spring, wild birds will have ample food sources while bird feeders are removed, the IDNR said. The agency is recommending the following. Clean and rinse bird feeders and baths with a diluted bleach solution (nine parts water to one part bleach) and put away or clean weekly if they can’t be moved away from birds. Remove any bird seed at the base of bird feeders to discourage lar...

Just as most Americans have caught wind of the BA.2 variant of Omicron — which overtook the original Omicron as the dominant strain in the U.S. less than a month ago — another possibly faster-growing version of Omicron is quickly making inroads. The new Omicron sublineage BA.2.12.1 now accounts for 19% of all new cases specifically sequenced for variants in the country, according to data released Tuesday by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control. That means the strain — barely on the national radar two weeks ago — is now being identified in close to 1 in 5 newly-sequenced cases, up from 1.5% less than a month before on 3/19. Given that, Americans trying to keep up may be experiencing a form of variant whiplash. A chart showing the recent growth of BA.2.12.1 (in or...