Medicine and Health
US and Europe renege on AIDS pledges
By Richard Tyler, July 22, 2003
Pledges made by US president George W. Bush and European Union Commission president Romano Prodi to each provide $1 billion for the global fight against AIDS were proved worthless last week.
Hormone replacement therapy: Study reveals increased dementia risk
By Joanne Laurier, June 4, 2003
Postmenopausal women over the age of 65 using combined hormone therapy face significantly increased risks of dementia and strokes, according to new findings from a sub-study of the Women’s Healt...
The science and sociology of SARS
Part 2: Science, internationalism and the profit motive
By Joseph Kay, May 13, 2003
The outbreak of a new virus responsible for what is known as severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) raises a number of scientific, medical and social problems. Thanks in part to the quick response a...
The science and sociology of SARS
Part 1: Viruses and the nature of present outbreak
By Joseph Kay, May 12, 2003
The outbreak of a new virus responsible for what is known as severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) raises a number of scientific, medical and social problems. Thanks in part to the quick response a...
WHO report: alarming increase in cancer rates
By Joanne Laurier, April 26, 2003
Global cancer rates are expected to increase 50 percent by the year 2020, according to the latest report from the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC), a branch of the World Health Organ...
Bush uses AIDS funding as an instrument of foreign policy
By Barry Mason, February 18, 2003
US President George W. Bush announced $15 billion to fight HIV and AIDS in his State of the Union address on January 28. The proposed funds are to be spent in the African countries of Botswana, Ivory ...
US blocks cheap drugs for undeveloped world
By Barry Mason, January 17, 2003
World Trade Organization (WTO) talks on the provision of generic drugs to underdeveloped countries broke down as the United States, on behalf of the major pharmaceutical companies, blocked agreement a...
UN fund says money running out to fight AIDS
By Barry Mason and Ann Talbot, November 11, 2002
The Global Fund to Fight Aids, TB and Malaria has announced that unless donations double it will have to stop processing grant applications because requests for help have outstripped the money availab...
Alarming breast cancer rates in northern California county
By Joanne Laurier, October 31, 2002
Women in northern California’s Marin County are presently being diagnosed with invasive breast cancer at a rate approximately 40 percent higher than the officially recorded national average. In ...
Do cellular phones represent a health risk?
By Joanne Laurier, July 11, 2002
A major study carried out by scientists in Finland suggests that radiation from mobile phones causes changes to the brain. Professor Darius Leszcynski headed up the two-year program at Finland’s...
Human organs: the next futures market?
By Joanne Laurier, April 26, 2002
Recent advances in human tissue transplantation have created an exploding commercial industry for the purpose of supplying hospitals and clinics with transplantable human tissue. The business of proce...
Britain: Report highlights BSE danger from infected sheep
By Barry Mason, January 21, 2002
The risk to humans developing variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease (vCJD) could be far greater if the brain-wasting disease Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (BSE) has entered the sheep population. This w...
