Efforts to eradicate polio in India pay off (Morning Read)

Current medical news and unique business news for anyone who cares about the healthcare industry […]

Current medical news and unique business news for anyone who cares about the healthcare industry

Polio eradicated in India? The Bill Gates Foundation’s efforts towards eliminating polio in India have paid off with no reported cases in the country in the past year. India led the world in polio until recently. Flooding in neighboring Pakistan stymied efforts to inoculate people there and led to fresh outbreaks of the disease. Now there is concern the virus could be brought back to India through cross border traffic.  The foundation has contributed $150 million a year in India to eradicate the disease.

Barbie as cancer role model. There is a Facebook campaign to persuade toymaker Mattell to produce a”bald and beautiful” Barbie to give young girls suffering from cancer who lose their hair from treatments an uplifting role model. It would mark a dramatic turn for fashion oriented doll who admittedly has led a rather sheltered life. So far, Mattell hasn’t indicated whether they move ahead with the idea.

Marathons no threat to heart. A new study says marathon running poses no increased risk of heart attacks despite the strenuous exercise. The New England Journal of Medicine spanned 10 years and about 11 million runners. It found that only 59 people had a cardiac arrest during a race, with the majority of them men.

Caution over fertility treatments. Women undergoing fertility treatments who have three or more embryos do not improve the odds of having a baby compared with women who get only two embryos, but they do have a greater chance of having multiple births. That was the finding of a new study on fertility treatments by Lancet. In the United States where the guidelines and regulation are much looser than Europe, there has been a rise in risky multiple births, including the famous “octomom” Nadya Suleman.

Photo from Flickr user Ramesh_Lalwani

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