Sneaky cellular invasions, a DEA debate, and medical aid to Yemen blocked

Former DEA officials discuss controversial opioid law

Dozens of state attorneys general are urging Congress to repeal a law that they say hamstrings the DEA’s ability to go after opioid distributors suspected of wrongdoing. Today, former DEA officials are scheduled to attend a roundtable to talk about the law’s impact. The law, passed in 2016 through a special process that didn’t require an actual vote in either chamber, was billed as a way to balance the needs of patients with the work of law enforcement. But critics say that the law — which raised the standard the DEA must meet before freezing drug shipments — hampered the agency's work. Sen. Claire McCaskill, who launched an investigation into opioid makers earlier this year, introduced legislation to repeal the law and organized the roundtable discussion today.

Facing a diphtheria outbreak, Yemen receives much-needed medical supplies

The WHO has delivered drugs and medical supplies to Yemen, which is now facing a diphtheria outbreak amid a growing health care crisis. There have been 189 diagnosed cases and 20 deaths due to the infectious respiratory disease in the past three months, most of which were in children and young adults. Antibiotics and vaccines are critical to treating and preventing diphtheria, but efforts to deliver aid supplies to the war-torn country have been stalled for weeks by a sea and air blockade. Yesterday, UNICEF announced it was able to drop 1.9 million doses of vaccines into the country after working for weeks to get access.

Lab Chat: How cancer cells squeeze through barriers

a protrusion helps an invasive cell spread. (Kaleb Naegeli / Duke University)

New research finds that cells trying to break into other tissues deploy a sneaky strategy to launch their invasion. Scientists captured the cellular break-ins in C. elegans, a transparent worm that’s often used as a model for human biology. Here’s what biologist David Sherwood of Duke University had to say about the work, published in Developmental Cell.

What did you discover about how invasive cells spread?

We found that when an invasive cell in a worm spreads, it does so by basically bulging out a new membrane. It kind of acts like a balloon catheter to wedge into a tight spot and then slowly inflates to push aside the tissue to create a hole so that it can enter really dense tissue.

Where does this process happen in the body?

All the pigment in our skin is because there’s a population of cells that invades our skin to secrete pigment. This happens with immune cells as they wedge themselves in tight spots to track down pathogens. And this happens in cancer cells. This behavior that we find is very tightly regulated in development becomes very unregulated in cancer.… We are now trying to develop this worm to do chemical screens to find new compounds that block this kind of behavior.

FDA approves a new treatment for children with a rare blood cancer

Though rare in children, chronic myeloid leukemia is often more aggressive in younger people than in adults. Until recently, there have been few treatments available for pediatric patients, but the U.S. Food and Drug Administration has approved a new option to help address the unmet needs of children with Philadelphia chromosome-positive chronic myeloid leukemia in chronic phase. Learn more about this new treatment.

729US1703350-01-01 11/17

Inside STAT: Researchers work to make phage therapy less of a long shot

Jessica Sacher, a graduate student studying bacteriophages at the University of Georgia, couldn’t get Mallory Smith’s story out of her head. The 25-year-old cystic fibrosis patient was near death, her lungs overwhelmed by a bacterial infection. Her father suggested an experimental treatment known as phage therapy, which uses viruses to kill bacteria. But Smith needed a phage perfectly evolved to kill the bacteria — so phage researchers started an urgent hunt to find the right virus. Sacher and a developer friend knew there had to be a better way to search for potentially therapeutic phages, so they hatched a plan on a Monday in mid-November to create a phage directory. Their website launched that Friday, two days after Smith died. STAT’s Eric Boodman has more here.

Senate turns to taxes — and to individual mandate repeal

The Senate budget committee is meeting today to push the GOP’s tax bill toward a vote by the end of the week. Among other measures, the bill would repeal the individual health insurance mandate and possibly eliminate the orphan drug tax credit, which incentives drug makers to develop treatments for rare diseases. The effort to repeal the individual mandate may face considerable resistance. Sen. Susan Collins and other moderate Republicans have expressed concern that nixing it could raise premiums and make the insurance markets more unstable.

Doctors warn about edible marijuana poisoning in kids

Emergency physicians are warning in a new paper that the number of kids who show up in the ER after accidentally eating marijuana edibles could rise as more states pass and implement new marijuana laws. Experts say it’s easy for kids to ingest edible marijuana products like gummies because they look so similar to commercial candy. But because symptoms of marijuana intoxication in kids — including drowsiness, vision problems, and respiratory difficulties — can look like other conditions, the authors say it’s important for ER doctors to keep the possibility of accidental ingestion in mind when working to make a diagnosis. They also say there’s a need for more public education to prevent children from accidentally ingesting edibles in the first place.