It's an old, shopworn story: A patient goes into the doctor's office and tells the doctor that they are taking several different kinds of herbs. He has been advised to seek the doctor's advice. Are these herbs okay to take with my medication, he asks. The doctor has no idea, and suggests that the patient stop taking the herbs – just to err on the safe side. Scenes like this happen every day.

Now, thanks to the recent publication of the new edition of the American Herbal Products Association's (AHPA) Botanical Safety Handbook, no health professional needs to make an uninformed decision like that ever again. Researched and written by herbal scientist Zoe Gardner, and edited and reviewed by an expert advisory panel of world-class botanical specialists including AHPA President Michael McGuffin, the Botanical Safety Handbook provides a reliable, scientifically validated reference that lets doctors know the current state of science and safety on over 500 common and lesser known herbs.

Years in the making, the more than 1,000-page long AHPA Botanical Safety Handbook provides definitive information on herbs, their standard doses, contraindications, any possible drug interactions, safety of use during pregnancy and lactation, any reported adverse events, toxicity studies, and references for all data cited. The most exhaustive reference of its kind ever assembled, the AHPA Botanical Safety Handbook distills in one place hundreds of thousands of pages of scientific and medical information on herbs – the most widely employed class of health remedies in the world. Without question, the handbook answers the question, "Is it safe?"

As numerous studies have shown, people in the United States are turning to herbs at an unprecedented rate. Reasons for this include dissatisfaction with conventional pharmaceuticals and greatly expanded media highlighting the benefits of herbal medicines. Yet even with decades of steady escalating herbal use, physicians and other health care professionals, including pharmacists, have been slow to learn about this burgeoning category. With the AHPA Botanical Safety Handbook on hand, now every doctor, nurse, pharmacist, clinic and hospital can have readily on hand the definitive guide to recurring herbal questions.

Since 1999, the World Health Organization, the public health arm of the United Nations, has published four authoritative volumes on medicinal plants – the WHO Medicinal Plant Monographs. These volumes give up-to-date information on known uses and benefits of many major herbs. In addition, the American Botanical Council has published numerous books on these traditional medicines, including the ABC Clinical Guide to Herbs. The WHO volumes, combined with the ABC guide and the AHPA handbook, lift the veil of confusion surrounding herbal remedies and firmly establish the deep scientific roots of plant-derived medicines. With this small library, a once uninformed doctor can confidently answer the herbal questions that patients pose every day.

Health experts used to complain that there wasn't enough science on herbs to give accurate recommendations on their uses and safety. Those days are long gone. Hundreds of thousands of scientific and medical papers and thousands of books have been written on herbal medicines. Now, with the AHPA Botanical Safety Handbook and the other guides described here, no health care professional needs to remain bewildered or uncertain about this globally valuable sector of human health care.

As William Blake famously declared, necessity is the mother of invention. For many years, we have needed definitive botanical safety science, all in one convenient reference, in the hands of health care professionals. With the AHPA Botanical Safety Handbook in print and available, that critically important need has been fulfilled.

The new edition of the AHPA Botanical Safety Handbook is available on Amazon.com.

(source; www.foxnews.com)

A traveller who visited the UAE is in hospital in France after being found to have a potentially deadly new respiratory virus related to Sars, it has been reported.

Health authorities in France have confirmed the country's first case of novel coronavirus and say the victim, a Frenchman aged 65, had just returned from the UAE.

It is the second novel coronavirus case linked to the UAE in two months.

The French Health Ministry said yesterday that the victim was in isolation and under medical surveillance.

It said the Pasteur Institute in Paris analysed the virus and confirmed it was a novel coronavirus, the first such case in France.

The French authorities said they were trying to find anyone who might have been in contact with the man to prevent the virus from spreading. It is unclear how or where he was infected.

Between September last year and Monday this week, the World Health Organisation (WHO) has been told of 30 confirmed cases of novel coronavirus around the world.

Of those, 18 people have died.

Most of the cases originated in Saudi Arabia but the UAE, UK, Qatar and Germany all have links to the virus.

The WHO has advised countries to test any people with unexplained pneumonia.

"Any virus that has the potential to develop into something that is highly transmissible between people, including the coronavirus, is a major concern," WHO spokesman Gregory Hartl said.

"We need to follow up on all possible routes of infection, that is animal to human, whether it's being spread in hospitals or from human to human."

The French victim has been in under observation in a hospital in Douai, northern France, since April 23 and is receiving respiratory assistance and blood transfusions, said Jean-Yves Grall, the government health director.

Mr Hartl confirmed the WHO had been notified of the case.

The French health minister, Marisol Touraine, said it was an isolated case but authorities were "fully mobilised" to stop it spreading. A national hotline was yesterday established for the public to call about the virus.

The new coronavirus, first identified last year, can cause acute pneumonia and kidney failure.

The Dubai Health Authority yesterday said it was monitoring the situation.

"We have been keeping a close eye on the situation since World Health Organisation first reported the disease outbreak last year," a DHA spokeswoman said.

"The DHA, in collaboration with Ministry of Health, is closely following the World Health Organisation and Centres of Disease Control and Prevention protocols.

"All health institutions are aware of the virus and its symptoms. We urge health institutions to investigate any cases of people who have symptoms of serious lung infection, like pneumonia, and this is a protocol that is being followed internationally.

"Health and other relevant authorities in the UAE are taking all necessary measures."

The spokeswoman said there had been no travel advisories issued by WHO.

In March, an Emirati man died in a hospital in Germany after contracting the virus.

The man, who was 73, had been transferred by air ambulance to Munich from a hospital in Abu Dhabi on March 19. German doctors diagnosed a novel coronavirus infection and the man was pronounced dead on March 26.

It is not known where he contracted the virus, although he had recently visited Saudi Arabia.

The WHO is trying to determine how humans are catching and spreading the coronavirus, and how best to treat it.

It does not appear to be as contagious as Sars or the flu, but it has probably spread between people who had close contact. It seems to have spread among family members in the UK and in health workers in Jordan.

Sars, or severe acute respiratory syndrome, killed about 800 people in a 2003 epidemic.

(source; www.thenational.ae)

Children living near toxic waste sites in lower and middle income countries such as India, Philippines and Indonesia may experience higher blood lead levels, resulting in a loss of IQ points and a higher incidence of mental retardation, according to a study presented today by Kevin Chatham-Stephens, MD, Pediatric Environmental Health Fellow at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, at the Pediatric Academic Societies (PAS) annual meeting on May 6 in Washington, DC.

The study titled, "The Pediatric Burden of Disease from Lead Exposure at Toxic Waste Sites in Low and Middle Income Countries in 2010," was a joint research partnership between Mount Sinai and the Blacksmith Institute.

Researchers measured lead levels in soil and drinking water at 200 toxic waste sites in 31 countries then estimated the blood lead levels in 779,989 children who were potentially exposed to lead from these sites in 2010. The blood lead levels ranged from 1.5 to 104 µg/dL, with an average of 21 µg/dL in children ages four years and younger.

According to Dr. Chatham-Stephens, first author of the study, these higher blood lead levels could result in an estimated loss of five to eight IQ points per child and an incidence of mild mental retardation in 6 out of every 1,000 children.

"The average blood lead level in an American child is approximately 1.3 µg/dL," said Dr. Chatham-Stephens. "Our research found an average predicted blood lead level of 21 µg/dL, which is very high. Lead has serious, long-term health consequences such as the potential to impair cognitive development in children and cause mental retardation." The condition of mental retardation is defined as having an IQ below 70.

"On a global level, this analysis highlights the importance of assigning more public health resources to identify, evaluate and remediate lead-contaminated toxic waste sites in these countries," said Philip Landrigan, MD, MSc, Dean for Global Health at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, one of the authors of the study. "In order to prevent further detrimental effects on neurodevelopment in children, these countries should create programs to identify toxic wastes and reduce lead exposure."

"This study is important because, to our knowledge, the burden of disease from these toxic waste sites has never been calculated before," said Dr. Chatham-Stephens. "We are showing that children who were chronically exposed to toxic waste sites in lower and middle income countries could have had high lead blood levels."

(source: www.sciencedaily.com)

Volunteers from the Churches of Scientology of the Tampa Bay Area spent World Health Day April 7 helping local residents make healthy choices by providing the truth about drugs.

Tampa Bay, Florida (PRWEB) May 06, 2013

Members of the Churches of Scientology in the Tampa Bay area marked World Health Day April 7 by taking action against drug abuse—a health issue that has become an epidemic.

On March 28, Dr. Tom Frieden, Director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) tweeted: "Drug poisoning deaths from opioid analgesics have more than quadrupled since 1999, now 43% of drug poisoning deaths."

The news in Florida is a bit more hopeful. The Florida Department of Law Enforcement announced in March that drug-related deaths dropped 5 percent in the first half of 2012 compared to the same period the year before.

But this still means that 4,126 Floridians died of drug-related causes—4,126 too many, according to the Tampa Bay Scientologists who took to the streets on World Health Day and distributed more than 3,000 copies of The Truth About Drugs booklet at Clearwater Beach and in Tarpon Springs and Tampa.

The Truth About Drugs booklet provides essential information on how drugs work and how they affect the body and mind, why people take them, and the effects of the most commonly abused substances. Without scare tactics, the booklet provides information that empowers young people to make their own decisions to live drug-free.

The Church of Scientology has published the brochure Scientology: How We Help —The Truth About Drugs, Creating a Drug-Free World to meet requests for more information about the drug education and prevention initiative it supports. To learn more or to read a copy of the brochure, visit http://www.Scientology.org/antidrug.

Scientology Founder L. Ron Hubbard wrote, "The planet has hit a barrier which

prevents any widespread social progress—drugs and other biochemical substances. These can put people into a condition which not only prohibits and destroys physical health but which can prevent any stable advancement in mental or spiritual well-being."

The Church of Scientology supports the Truth About Drugs, one of the world's largest nongovernmental drug education and prevention campaigns. It has been conclusively proven that when young people are provided with the truth about drugs—factual information on what drugs are and what they do—usage rates drop commensurately.

(source: www.beaumontenterprise.com)

The World Health Organization's ability to police the new strain of bird flu that has killed 27 people in China is being jeopardized by budget cuts, according to a top U.S. official.

"One of the things that, frankly, concerns us is the ability of WHO to respond effectively," Dr. Thomas Frieden, director of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, told the Reuters Health Summit in New York on Monday.

Frieden said he planned to raise the issue with other countries at the World Health Assembly (WHA) meeting, which is being held in Geneva, where the U.N. agency has its headquarters, from May 20 to May 28.

Many scientific questions still have to be answered about the new flu strain, known as H7N9, which first caused patients to sicken in China in February having been previously unknown in humans.

So far, researchers have established it is being transmitted to people from birds - probably mostly chickens. There is no evidence of it spreading from person to person.

The WHO plays a central role in coordinating the global response to such emerging disease threats, but it is struggling in the face of budget cuts that were forced on it two years ago, partly as a result of a strong appreciation in the Swiss franc.

"They had trouble sending a team to China for H7 because they didn't have enough money to travel," Frieden said. "They are managing and we will help them manage - and will send staff there as needed - but the world needs them to be effective."

Taiwan reported its first case of H7N9 on April 24 and health experts say it is critical to monitor closely the new strain's potential to spread in neighbouring countries.

Dr. Keiji Fukuda, the WHO's assistant director-general for health security, said the organization was carrying out the work that needed to be done but the operation, involving more than 50 staff, was "very expensive".

"We need the gas tank to be full if the car is going to move. We've already been working with donors in terms of response and funds for support," he said in a telephone interview in Geneva.

There will be a side event on H7N9 during the WHA meeting on May 21 where both Dr. Margaret Chan, WHO director-general, and he will speak, along with the Chinese health minister, Fukuda added.

The U.N. health agency, which helped eliminate smallpox in the late 1970s, co-ordinated worldwide efforts to deal with the H1N1 swine flu pandemic in 2009/10.

It receives the bulk of its funding in dollars, leaving it exposed to currency fluctuations. It was forced in 2011 to cut 300 jobs in Switzerland - or one in eight - because of the strength of the Swiss franc and financial problems in some donor countries.

"They've had to lay off hundreds of staff in Geneva and in other parts of the world, including in areas that are quite relevant to flu response," Frieden said.

(source: www.sabc.co.za)

An update of World Health Organisation's action plan for the "Decade of Vaccines" focusing on the global status of immunisation will be presented at a conference to be held in Qatar from December 4-7.

The presentation will be made by Dr Thomas Cherian, WHO's programme and impact monitoring co-ordinator, Excellence in Paediatrics Institute announced yesterday.

The conference is being sponsored by Sidra Medical and Research Centre, a member of Qatar Foundation for Education, Science and Community Development.

The global vaccine action plan (GVAP) was endorsed by the 194 member-states of the WHO in 2012 to achieve the 'Decade of Vaccines' vision by delivering universal access to immunisation. The GVAP's mission is to improve health by extending the full benefits of immunisation to all people, regardless of where they are born, who they are or where they live by 2020.

If the GVAP is translated into action and resources are mobilised, 24.6-25.8mn deaths could be averted by the end of the decade, billions of dollars in productivity will be gained, and immunisation will greatly contribute to achieving the Millennium Development Goal target to reduce by two-thirds the under-five mortality rate, the institute said.

The GVAP builds on the Global Immunisation Vision and Strategy 2006–2015, the United Nation's Millennium Declaration and the UN Secretary-General's Global Strategy for Women and Children's Health.

Developing the plan has brought together multiple stakeholders involved in immunisation, including the leadership of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundations, GAVI Alliance, Unicef and US National Institute of Allergies and Infectious Diseases.

All partners, including governments and elected officials, health professionals, academia, manufacturers, global agencies, development partners, civil society, media and the private sector, are committed to achieving the ambitious goals of GVAP.

Sidra, who has been working to improve the provision of healthcare for women and children in Qatar, region and internationally, supports the goals of GVAP.

"At Sidra, the focus is not only on ensuring an unparalleled patient experience within the hospital, but improving the individual's overall wellbeing before they even arrive at our doors. Vaccination is essential in disease prevention and I am looking forward to Dr Cherian's update on WHO's action plan for the Decade of Vaccines," Sidra's chief medical officer Dr Edward Ogata said.

(source: www.gulf-times.com)

Toxic waste sites with elevated levels of lead and chromium cause a high number of "healthy years of life lost" in individuals living near 373 sites located in India, the Philippines and Indonesia, according to a study by a Mount Sinai researcher published online in Environmental Health Perspectives.

The study leader, Kevin Chatham-Stephens, MD, Pediatric Environmental Health Fellow at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, presented the findings today at the Pediatric Academic Societies (PAS) annual meeting in Washington, DC. "Lead and hexavalent chromium proved to be the most toxic chemicals and caused the majority of disease, disability and mortality among the individuals living near the sites," said Dr. Chatham-Stephens, first author of the study.

The study titled, "The Burden of Disease from Toxic Waste Sites in India, Indonesia, and the Philippines in 2010," was a joint research partnership between Mount Sinai and the Blacksmith Institute. Eight chemicals were sampled and collected at the toxic waste sites in 2010. The samples were then measured for pollutant levels in the soil and water and then compared with the 8,629,750 individuals who were at risk of exposure around these sites in order to calculate the loss of years of equivalent full health.

Researchers calculated healthy years of life lost due to ill-health, disability or early death, in disability-adjusted life years (DALY), a measure of overall disease burden used by the World Health Organization. One DALY represents the loss of one year of equivalent full health. In this study, the total number of lost years of full health or DALYs was 828,722. In comparison, malaria in the same countries caused 725,000 lost years of full health, and outdoor air pollution caused 1.4 million lost years of full health in 2008, according to Dr. Chatham-Stephens.

"The number of DALYs estimated in our study potentially places toxic waste sites on par with other major public health issues such as malaria and outdoor air pollution which are also causing a high number of healthy years of life lost," said Dr. Chatham-Stephens. "This study highlights a major and previously under-recognized global health problem in lower and middle income countries," said Philip Landrigan, MD, MSc, Dean for Global Health at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai and one of the authors of the study. "The next step is targeting interventions such as cleaning up the sites and minimizing the exposure of humans in each of these countries where toxic chemicals are greatly present."

Additionally, children and women of child-bearing age made up two-thirds of the population in the study. "If a woman is pregnant, the fetus may be exposed to these toxic chemicals," said Dr. Chatham-Stephens. "This data is relevant because the prenatal to early childhood period is the time when individuals are very vulnerable to some toxic exposures, such as lead's impact on the developing nervous system."

Previous studies have shown that lead can cause neurological, gastrointestinal and cardiovascular damage, while those also exposed to high levels of chromium have a greater chance of developing lung cancer. "Our research shows that chemical pollutants from toxic waste sites are insufficiently studied in lower and middle income countries and that disease and death caused by these chemicals can contribute to loss of life," said Dr. Chatham-Stephens.

(source: www.countercurrents.org)

LONDON - A new strain of bird flu that is causing a deadly outbreak among people in China is a threat to world health and should be taken seriously, scientists said on Wednesday.

The H7N9 strain has killed 24 people and infected more than 125, according to the Geneva-based World Health Organization (WHO), which has described it as "one of the most lethal" flu viruses.

The high mortality rate, together with relatively large numbers of cases in a short period and the possibility it might acquire the ability to transmit between people, make H7N9 a pandemic risk, experts said.

"The WHO considers this a serious threat," said John McCauley, director of the WHO Collaborating Centre for Influenza at Britain's National Institute for Medical Research.

Speaking at a briefing in London, experts in virology said initial studies suggest the virus has several worrisome characteristics, including two genetic mutations that make it more likely to eventually spread from person to person.

"The longer the virus is unchecked in circulation, the higher the probability that this virus will start transmitting from person to person," Colin Butte, an expert in avian viruses at Britain's Pirbright Institute, said.

Of the some 125 people infected with H7N9 so far, around 20 percent have died, approximately 20 percent have recovered and the remainder are still sick. The infection can lead to severe pneumonia, blood poisoning and organ failure.

"This is a very, very serious disease in those who have been infected. So if this were to become more widespread it would be an extraordinarily devastating outbreak," Peter Openshaw, director of the centre for respiratory infection at Imperial College London, told the briefing.

Scientists who have analysed genetic sequence data from samples from three H7N9 victims say the strain is a so-called "triple reassortant" virus with a mixture of genes from three other flu strains found in birds in Asia.

Recent pandemic viruses, including the H1N1 "swine flu" of 2009/2010, have been mixtures of mammal and bird flu - hybrids that are likely to be milder because mammalian flu tends to make people less severely ill than bird flu.

Pure bird-flu strains, such as the new H7N9 strain and the H5N1 flu, which has killed about 371 of 622 the people it has infected since 2003, are generally more deadly for people.

Human cases of the H7N9 flu have been found in several new parts of China in recent days and have now been recorded in all of its provinces.

Last week a man in Taiwan became the first case of the flu outside mainland China, though he was infected while travelling there.

The H7N9 strain was unknown in humans until it was identified in sick people in China in March.

Scientists say it is jumping from birds - most probably chickens - to people, and there is no evidence yet of the virus passing from person to person.

Jeremy Farrar, a leading expert on infectious diseases and director of Oxford University's research unit in Vietnam, said the age range of those infected so far stretched from toddlers to people in their late 80s - a range that appeared to confirm the virus is completely new to the human population.

"That suggests there truly is no immunity across all ages, and that as humans we have not seen this virus before," he said.

"The response has to be calm and measured, but it cannot be taken lightly," he said.

(source: vitals.nbcnews.com)