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Wednesday, April 4, 2018
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Good morning, everyone! Quick note: STAT's Sharon Begley is hosting a free online chat about cancer treatment with the president-elect of the American Association for Cancer Research. It's on Tuesday,
April 10 — sign up
here.
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New alcohol-advertising research stopped with NIH branch director’s arrival
The NIH's relationship with the alcoholic beverage industry has come under scrutiny after STAT
reported the details of a 2015 meeting in which George Koob, director of the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, pulled back from research on the relationship between alcohol marketing and underage drinking.
At the same time, other NIAAA officials were trying to persuade the industry to fund a $100 million study on the health benefits of “moderate drinking.”
To see if that funding vow was kept, STAT’s Sharon Begley and Andrew Joseph analyzed grants given out by the NIH branch — and found that things seem to have changed since Koob stepped into his role in 2014.
Get the details
here.
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FDA forces recall of kratom due to salmonella risk
The steady stream of kratom recalls continues. The FDA has ordered a mandatory recall of powdered kratom, a popular herbal supplement, produced by Triangle Pharmanaturals. Health officials asked the company
to recall its products after some were found to be contaminated with salmonella, but the company refused to cooperate. So now, the FDA is forcing its hand with a mandatory recall. The move comes as health officials continue to investigate a sweeping salmonella
outbreak linked to kratom, which has sickened dozens.
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Analysis links formula marketing to increased infant deaths
There's been a debate for decades about marketing infant formula to women who can't access clean water, and a new
analysis now suggests there was cause for concern. Here’s what you need to know:
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The background:
Back in the 70s, public health experts started raising concerns that Nestlé, the world’s largest formula producer, was marketing formula to mothers in low-income countries
who weren’t likely to have access to clean water. That could introduce deadly pathogens into an infant’s formula.
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The new findings:
Infant formula availability was associated with 9.4 more infant deaths per 1,000 births in low- and middle-income countries. In 1981 alone, the study’s authors estimate that
formula was associated with approximately 66,000 infant deaths in low- and middle-income nations.
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How they did it: Researchers compared data on infant formula
access from Nestlé’s annual reports with data on millions of births in low- and middle-income nations between 1970 and 2011.
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Lab Chat: Drug-loaded gel doles out arthritis medication
a close-up look at different concentrations of an arthritis drug in the hydrogel. (karp et. al / nature communications)
Scientists have created a drug-loaded hydrogel that can be injected into a joint and alleviate an arthritis flare-up. It’s early-stage research in mice, but it’s an interesting platform that could potentially
make it easier to deliver the right dose of drugs. Here’s what biomedical engineer Jeff Karp of Brigham and Women’s Hospital told me about the work, published Tuesday in
Nature Communications.
What problem did you set out to solve?
To get the concentration of an arthritis drug high enough in the affected joint, you need to deliver a pretty high concentration [in pill form]. The next potential target is to
deliver drugs locally by just injecting them into a joint. But the problem is the drugs don’t stay in the joint very long.
How does the hydrogel address those issues?
We developed a material that’s made of a small molecule. Each molecule stacks on top of one another, and we can include arthritis drugs in the stack. That small molecule includes
an enzyme-cleavable bond, which means it can be split by enzymes present during inflammation. So in the presence of a flare-up, the first molecule will break down, then the second, and so on. The concentration of the inflammation enzymes then starts to go
down, [and cleaving slows].
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Two more tribes sue opioid makers
The latest groups to file a lawsuit against opioid makers: The Muscogee (Creek) Nation and the Northern Arapaho Indian Tribe of the Wind River Reservation. The tribes, which each filed a lawsuit this week,
say the crisis has harmed the health of their members and has led to soaring costs to the tribal governments, including high costs to care for the kids of parents addicted to opioids.
The Northern Arapaho tribe also says it plans to join the national litigation against opioid manufacturers that’s pending in an Ohio court, which envelops hundreds of such lawsuits. Also planning to participate:
The U.S. Department of Justice. The government requested
to join the talks as a “friend of the court” earlier this week.
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Indoor charcoal use tied to health risks in rural China
A new
study suggests using coal, charcoal, and wood for cooking and heating homes in rural China is linked to a greater risk of death. Solid fuels like coal can produce lots of pollutants when burned indoors. Researchers followed
271,000 adults without cardiovascular disease in five rural areas across China and found the risk of death was decreased when people switched to gas, electric, or central heating, or started using ventilation. The study doesn’t show cause and effect. But since
it’s estimated that billions of people worldwide use solid fuels to cook and warm up at home, the study’s authors say their findings point to a need for more studies.
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What to read around the web today
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Many older Americans are using vitamins despite scarce evidence they work.
Kaiser Health News
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The silent crisis killing Puerto Ricans months after Hurricane Maria.
Splinter
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DNA IQ tests are coming, but it might not be smart to take one.
MIT Technology Review
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More reads from STAT
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How
CRISPR works, explained in two minutes.
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They built a game-changing
cancer-killing therapy. Now they’re taking on a new kind of CAR-T therapy.
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Thanks for reading! More tomorrow,
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