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Opinion: Governments Must Take 'Concrete Action' To Reduce Maternal Mortality, Morbidity
With the U.N. Human Rights Council"s June session coming up, governments have a "chance to prove that they value women"s lives by taking concrete action" to recognize "preventable maternal death as a violation of women"s rights," Mary Robinson and Alicia Yamin, advisory council members of the International Initiative on Maternal Mortality and Human Rights, write in a Boston Globe opinion piece.
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Annals Of Nutrition And Metabolism Publishes New Recommendations On Fat Consumption By 40 Of The World's Leaders In Diet Nutrition And Health
Reports published today in the Annals of Nutrition and Metabolism suggest that many people are confused about the health consequences of fats consumed. Often fat is not considered to be part of a healthy, balanced diet. Also many do not know that there are good, and even essential, fats. As a result, the quality of fats they consume is not in line with recommendations. To help overcome this problem, experts suggest that simple dietary changes be made, such as replacing full fat dairy (e.g. fatty cheeses) and meat products with lean choices, and use of fats and oils of vegetable origin rich in essential fats (sunflower oil, rapeseed oil, soybean oil and products made of these oils such as margarines) rather than of consuming fat of animal origin (lard, butter, etc).
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Health Reform: Good For Small Business, According To President's Economic Advisors
A report from President Obama"s Council of Economic Advisers finds that "health care reform would be good for small businesses because it would enable them to obtain better insurance coverage for less money," The Denver Business Journal writes. "Small businesses pay up to 18 percent more than large businesses do for the same coverage because of high broker fees, administrative costs and adverse selection, according to the CEA"s report." Christina Romer, chair of the CEA, "said the health care reform bills moving through Congress are specifically designed to address the burden the current health care system places on small businesses. The legislation would create insurance exchanges, where individuals and small businesses could "choose among a multitude of plans that would provide better coverage at lower costs than they could find in the current small group market," the report said." But, The Journal notes: "Many small business groups also doubt that health insurance would be cheaper under the House bills or the Senate HELP Committee bill. Including a government-run plan in the insurance exchange would undermine private insurers, ultimately driving premiums higher, they contend. Not all small businesses would be able to access the exchange. Plus, the bills call for the federal government to establish minimum coverage levels for insurance plans, which could be pricier than what small businesses now provide. (Hoover, 8/3).
Endocrinology

$1.3 Million Grant Awarded To LSUHSC To Develop New Cancer Vaccine

Eduardo Davila, PhD, Assistant Professor of Pediatrics, Microbiology, and Immunology at LSU Health Sciences Center New Orleans School of Medicine and Stanley S. Scott Cancer Center, has been awarded a $1.3 million grant over five years by the National Cancer Institute of the National Institutes of Health to develop new immunotherapies, including a vaccine, for cancer. Two years of the research will be supported by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA). Dr. Davila"s research lab has been working with T lymphocytes, immune cells, which can detect cancer. The LSUHSC research team has identified a novel signaling pathway in T lymphocytes, and they have demonstrated that the stimulation of specific proteins called toll-like receptors (TLRs) on the surface of human T lymphocytes boosts the production of molecules involved in tumor destruction. They have shown that TLRs can induce potent and long-lived anti-tumor activity against a highly aggressive melanoma tumor. "One arm of this grant is looking at generating/optimizing a cancer vaccine against melanoma and breast cancer," notes Dr. Davila. "Our preclinical data have indicated very promising results showing that we can activate and sustain high numbers of tumor-specific immune cells. Data using human cells parallel these studies and demonstrate the ability to activate human cells indicating promise in treating cancer patients." The LSUHSC researchers are working to increase our understanding of the underlying mechanisms of TLR activation and to define strategies to maintain potent TLR signals in T cells with the aim of prolonging antitumor T cell responses. "We envision these studies will make possible new approaches for the development of effective T lymphocyte-based therapies against cancer through a greater understanding of molecular signals that enhance T cell activation to weakly immunogenic tumors in patients," says Dr. Davila. "These are the tumors that grow aggressively because the body"s immune response to them is weak." The ARRA funding is supporting the retention of a research technician and a postdoctoral fellow in Dr. Davila"s laboratory, as well as the creation of one new position. Leslie Capo Louisiana State University Health Sciences Center


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