Nobody Cares about Your Health

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Here we go.

Nine unvaccinated people hospitalized as Texas measles outbreak doubles

All 24 cases are in unvaccinated people, 22 of which are under age 17.

arstechnica.com

An outbreak of measles in one of Texas' least vaccinated counties continues to rapidly expand, with officials reporting 24 cases Tuesday, up from just nine confirmed on Friday.

According to an update by the Texas Department of State Health Services (DSHS), all 24 cases identified in the two-week-old outbreak are in unvaccinated people. Nine of the patients (37.5 percent) required hospitalization.

Most of the cases are in children. DSHS provided an age breakdown that listed six cases as being in infants and young children between the ages of 0 and 4. This is the age group most vulnerable to measles because they have a heightened risk of complications from the disease and may be too young to be fully vaccinated with the Measles, Mumps, and Rubella (MMR) vaccine. Children are recommended to get two doses of the MMR vaccine, one between 12 and 15 months and the second between 4 and 6 years. One dose of MMR vaccine is estimated to be 93 percent effective against measles, while two doses are 97 percent effective.

 

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Evidence Is Growing That Ozempic Can Cause Blindness

As drugs like Ozempic and Mounjaro continue to skyrocket in usage, doctors are encountering more cases linking them to blindness.

futurism.com

As drugs like Ozempic and Mounjaro continue to skyrocket in usage, doctors are encountering more cases linking them to severe eye conditions.

Last year, Harvard scientists found a troubling link between semaglutide, the active ingredient in Ozempic, and a blindness-causing condition known as nonarteritic anterior ischemic optic neuropathy (NAION), which is essentially a stroke of the eye. In a paper published in JAMA Opthalmology, those researchers suggested that people who take semaglutide are between four and seven times as likely to develop NAION as those who don't take it.

Now, per a new paper published in that same journal, University of Utah researchers detailed the stories of several people who took either semaglutide or tirzepatide (the active ingredient in Eli Lilly's Mounjaro and Zepbound) who developed eye conditions NAION and a few others that can cause partial or temporary blindness.

 

[Isabeau]

RIDGE (@1av8ter.bsky.social)

bsky.app

 

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Horrible.

New Disease Spreading Rapidly, Killing Dozens, After Children Ate a Bat

A mysterious disease is spreading in the northwest of the Democratic Republic of Congo after kids ate the carcass of a bat.

futurism.com

A mysterious illness is spreading in the northwest of the Democratic Republic of Congo.

As the Associated Press reports, World Health Organization doctors say that the illness has already led to 419 cases, including 53 deaths, since the latest outbreak began on January 21.

A particularly harrowing detail: in the majority of cases, doctors say, death occurs within just 48 hours of the onset of symptoms.

While researchers are still trying to get a grasp on the situation, the WHO's Africa office has traced back the first outbreak in the town of Boloko after three children ate a bat carcass and died within two days, according to the AP. The children died after bleeding from the nose and vomiting blood.

The outbreak is frightening on its own, but also echoes the origins of the deadly COVID-19 pandemic, which is believed to have jumped from bats to humans in China before spreading worldwide and causing millions of deaths.

 

[Caete]

Hmmm maybe people shouldn't eat bats. Speaking of bats, Wuhan is tinkering around with HKU5-CoV-2. Not a fan of the Daily Mail's fear tactics headlines though.

Wuhan lab linked to Covid pandemic carrying out 'ominous' new research

 

[Free]

Cancer sucks, and pancreatic cancer is some horrible shit. This news is cool.

Derek Thompson (@dkthomp.bsky.social)

Unbelievable news. Pancreatic is one of the deadliest cancers. New paper shows personalized mRNA vaccines can induce durable T cells that attack pancreatic cancer, with 75% of patients cancer free at three years—far, far better than standard of care...

bsky.app

 

[Free]

Possible good news, everyone who accepts the science of vaccines.

Cancer Vaccines Are Suddenly Looking Extremely Promising

With the help of mRNA technology proven effective during the COVID era, researchers are now closer than ever to creating cancer vaccines.

futurism.com

In an interview with Wired, Lennard Lee, an oncologist with the United Kingdom's National Health Service (NHS) working on mRNA cancer vaccines, says he believes the groundbreaking research may prove to be a "silver lining" in the brutal COVID-19 pandemic.

Before COVID, as Lee told the magazine, "cancer vaccines weren’t a proper field of research."

"Pretty much every clinical trial had failed," the NHS oncologist said. "With the pandemic, however, we proved that mRNA vaccines were possible."

As with mRNA COVID vaccines, the logistics of these potential new cancer inoculations work by "giving the body instructions" to fight troublesome cells, as Lee detailed, ultimately providing the immune system with a how-to manual on fighting cancer.

"Going from mRNA Covid vaccines to mRNA cancer vaccines is straightforward," he told Wired. "Same fridges, same protocol, same drug, just a different patient."

 

[GoblinCampFollower]

Did a home sleep study Friday night (night before last) and between the awkward equipment and all the tornado sirens I couldn't sleep at all.... I waited the mandatory 6.5 hours I needed to wear the equipment for then took it off so I could sleep a few hours. I was having trouble sleeping when I first made that appointment back in early January but it mostly got better on it's own. I wasn't expecting the sleep study itself to be so disruptive. ...not sure they'll get any useful data from that.

So I collapsed and went back to sleep before 4pm yesterday and am now up and ready to go at 1AM! Really messed up my sleep schedule. I'm worried they'll want to do it again and I'll refuse.

 

[Free]

Possible good news on the Alzheimer's front.

Scientists Announce Possible Breakthrough in Delaying Alzheimer's

Research announced today is the first of its kind to suggest that anti-amyloid drugs can delay or even stop the progression of symptoms in people with early-onset Alzheimer's.

gizmodo.com

We might be on the precipice of a pivotal moment in Alzheimer’s disease research. In clinical trial data released this week, scientists have presented early evidence that it’s possible to delay symptoms in people genetically fated to develop Alzheimer’s at a young age.

Researchers at the Washington University School of Medicine led the study, which aimed to test whether an experimental anti-amyloid drug called gantenerumab could help people with an inherited form of Alzheimer’s. In a subset of patients treated the longest, the drug appeared to reduce their risk of developing symptoms as expected, by 50%. The findings will require a follow-up, but outside experts are cautiously optimistic about what this could mean for the future of treating Alzheimer’s.

“The results make it clear that there is good hope that treatment of [Alzheimer’s] pathology in the preclinical stages of pathology may be effective at slowing or preventing disease onset,” Thomas M. Wisniewski, the director of the Center for Cognitive Neurology at NYU Langone Health, who is not affiliated with the research, told Gizmodo.

 

[Free]

Okay...

Students Concoct Ingenious Scheme To Grow Ozempic At Home

Student scientists have developed an incredible new way to synthesize drugs on plants — and they're using Ozempic as their test case.

futurism.com

In a press release, the University of Ottowa revealed that some of its undergraduate students have invented a process that they're calling "Phytogene" turn tobacco cousin Nicotiana benthamiana into a pharmaceutical factory for the popular weight-loss drug.

Though it could have lots of use cases in the future, Phytogene's first order of business is synthesizing glucagon-like peptide-1 (GLP-1) receptor agonists — the class of medications Novo Nordisk's Ozempic belongs to — which mimic the stomach's feeling of fullness to help patients lose weight and lower their blood sugar.

Building on so-called "biopharming," or the process of genetically engineering plants to produce pharmaceutical proteins, the group led by bioscience students Victor Boddy and Teagan Thomas was inspired by the recent Ozempic shortage to uncover sustainable and inexpensive alternatives.

"We aim to create a future where people can reliably grow their own treatments at home," Boddy said, "free from concerns about insurance, cost, or availability."

I look forward to the day when I can pick up a Nifedipine cactus or Ibuprofen spider plant at my local garden center.

 

[GoblinCampFollower]

This video was both hilarious and informative.

 

[Caete]

Michigan resident dies of rabies after undergoing organ transplant in Ohio: Officials

 

[Free]

Looks like I picked a bad time to keep eating.

FDA to suspend quality-control program for food testing due to staff cuts

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is suspending a quality-control program for its food-testing laboratories as a result of staff cuts at the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), according to an internal email seen by Reuters.

The proficiency testing program of the FDA’s Food Emergency Response Network is designed to ensure consistency and accuracy across the agency’s network of about 170 labs that test food for pathogens and contaminants to prevent food-borne illness.

The firing and departure of as many as 20,000 HHS employees has upended public health research and disrupted the agency’s work on areas like bird flu and drug reviews. Donald Trump hopes to slash as much as $40bn from HHS.

 

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Trump's brigade have slipped into the official Conspiracy Theory Administration.

Trump turns a COVID information website into a promotion page for the lab leak theory

A federal website that used to feature information on vaccines, testing and treatment for COVID-19 has been transformed into a page supporting the theory that the pandemic originated with a lab leak.

The covid.gov website shows a photo of President Donald Trump walking between the words “lab” and “leak” under a White House heading. It mentions that Wuhan, China, where the coronavirus first began spreading, is home to a research lab with a history of conducting virus research with “inadequate biosafety levels.”

The web page also accuses Dr. Anthony Fauci, the former director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, of pushing a “preferred narrative” that COVID-19 originated in nature.

 

[Free]

Sounds like a real genius...

Controversial doc gets measles while treating unvaccinated kids—keeps working

Ben Edwards has grown popular in Texas for providing unproven measles treatments.

arstechnica.com

A controversial doctor providing unproven measles treatments to unvaccinated children in West Texas recently contracted the highly infectious virus himself amid the mushrooming outbreak—and he continued treating patients while visibly ill with the virus.

The doctor's infection was revealed in a video posted online by Children's Health Defense (CHD), the rabid anti-vaccine advocacy organization founded and previously run by Robert F. Kennedy Jr., a long-time anti-vaccine advocate who is now the US secretary of health. Kennedy headed CHD until January, when he stepped down in anticipation of his Senate confirmation.

In the video, the doctor, Ben Edwards, can be seen with mild spots on his face. Someone asks him if he caught measles himself, and he responds, "Yeah," saying he was "pretty achy yesterday." He went on to say that he had developed the rash the day before but woke up that day feeling "pretty good." The video was posted by CHD on March 31, and the Associated Press was the first to report it.

 

[Free]

Next up on the MAGA/MAHA chopping block, tooth care.

Texas goes after toothpaste in escalating fight over fluoride

Colgate and Crest toothpastes are in the crosshairs.

arstechnica.com

 

[Noodles]

Why the hell has every idiot conspiracy theory nitjob decided that "Every piece of stupid bull shit I think. Is true Must be true." all at once.

 

[Free]

Why the hell has every idiot conspiracy theory nitjob decided that "Every piece of stupid bull shit I think. Is true Must be true." all at once.

When rushing to the lifeboats on the Titanic, it IS all at once.

 

[Free]

It must have cost the U.S. taxpayers, what? Trillions of dollars every month, at least, right?

Trump’s Latest NIH Purge Kills the National Cancer Hotline

Roughly 200 more employees at the National Institutes of Health will be laid off, reportedly to balance out recent rehires.

gizmodo.com