On 21 September 2016 the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) adopted the political declaration on antimicrobial resistance.This is the 4th time in the history of the United Nations that a health topic has come to the attention of the UNGA.The…
Category: Medicine
Rosatom makes significant breakthrough in cancer treatment
Dhaka – Russia’s state nuclear power corporation– Rosatom’s nuclear medicine specialists have made an important step forward in cancer treatment. Russian federal service for surveillance in healthcare has given authorisation to Rosatom’s scientific department – Institute of Physics and Power…
Airport secreening as 10 Bangladeshis get Zika in S’pore, one at home
Dhaka – Health Minister Mohammad Nasim said on Thursday the government has strengthened airport screening for the passengers coming from Singapore following Zika virus outbreak in the city state. The minister on Thursday said they had already asked the authorities…
Protein cages for designing various catalytic reactions
Compartmentalization is a common strategy used by living organisms to create isolated reaction environments to protect reaction catalysts from undesired reaction partners in cells. Mimicking such compartment systems is a novel approach for developing new biohybrid materials as well as…
Sensing viruses by exploring their electrical properties
Our living sphere is exposed to a wide range of pathogenic viruses—some known and others of novel origin. Currently, there is no method to continuously monitor the environment for viruses in general, and needless to say, a procedure for the…
SC fines 10 private medical colleges Tk one crore each
Dhaka – The Supreme Court of Bangladesh has imposed Tk one crore fine for each ofd 10 private medical colleges for admitting students who did not fulfil terms set by the government.
US tests confirm hepatitis A in scallops from Philippines
Honolulu (AP/UNB) — U.S. Food and Drug Administration tests found hepatitis A in scallops from the Philippines, which have been identified as the likely source of a Hawaii outbreak of the virus.
Drug lobby plans counterattack on prices
Washington’s powerful drug lobby is gearing up to spend hundreds of millions of dollars on a post-election ad war pushing back against politicians from both parties who have savaged its members over drug prices.The massive campaign by the Pharmaceutical Research…
Mistrust slows spread of solar disinfection tech
Manchester – Local mistrust is slowing take up of simple innovations that use sunlight to disinfect water, a UK conference has heard. Researchers working on low-cost, low-tech water purification systems for developing countries are struggling to convince local people that…
Muslim woman to give kidney to sister’s ailing Hindu friend
Kanpur – Amid the cacophony of communal strife, here comes a heart-warming gesture. A Muslim woman from Fatehpur district has come forward to donate her kidney to a Hindu woman from Pune (Maharashtra), who has been battling for life for…
Traditional medicine for modern times: Facts and figures
Andrea Rinaldi and Priya Shetty review the facts, figures and challenges of mixing modern and traditional medicine. For millennia, people have healed with herbal or animal-derived remedies, using knowledge handed down through generations. In Africa, Asia, Latin America and the…
4 drug stores fined for selling expired medication in Rajshahi
Dhaka – A mobile court on Sunday fined four pharmacies TK 72,500 for selling date expired medication in Laxmipur area of the city,UNB News Agency Reported.
Malaria teamwork spells danger for humans
Getting infected by two malaria species can improve conditions for the second species, making the disease more dangerous and persistent than lone infections, a mouse study shows. According to a paper made public on 5 July, being infected with both…
Disagreement continues over global drug policy
By Tharanga Yakupitiyage UN, (IPS) – A new report has found that global drug use largely remains the same, but perspectives on how to address the issue still vary drastically. The new World Drug Report, released by the UN Office…
69m children will die of preventable causes, says Unicef
UN children’s agency report highlights toll on youngsters by 2030 unless world leaders turn rhetoric into reality on fighting poverty Less than a year after the world promised to leave no one behind by signing up to an ambitious 15-year…
Method to identify different subtypes of neurons
A team of researchers has developed the first scalable method to identify different subtypes of neurons in the human brain. The research lays the groundwork for “mapping” the gene activity in the human brain and could help provide a better…
New ‘guided missiles’ engineered as alternative to chemotherapy
Scientists have engineered novel proteins that work like ‘guided missiles’ which seek out cancer cells and deliver chemotherapy drugs to treat hard-to-reach tumours without harming healthy cells. Although chemotherapy drugs do often effectively kill cancer cells, they also damage other…
The curious case of generic Hep C drug sofosbuvir
by Leena Menghaney Flip-flop around its patent in India points to need for developing nations to band for tech For more than a decade, an academic debate has raged among public health experts, the World Health Organsiation and governments on…
Six innovations scientists hope will end malaria
The Gateses aim to eradicate malaria by 2040 by doubling funding over the next decade to support the roll out of new products to tackle rising drug resistance against the disease. Their goal of permanently ending transmission of the disease…
WHO member states concerned over unaffordable prices of medicines
Geneva, (Mirza Alas and K M Gopakumar) – World Health Organization Member States once again raised concerns over unaffordable prices of medicines at the recent annual meeting of health ministers and high level officials. Many countries expressed the view that…
Turmeric effective in treating various types of cancer
Curcuma longa, also known as turmeric, is effective in the treatment of various types of cancer, including breast and ovarian cancer, which has risen 30 percent among women in the last one decade, says a study. Turmeric has nearly 20…
Medical cannabis serves as an orphan drug
An orphan drug is a pharmaceutical agent that treats a rare medical condition, the condition itself being referred to as an orphan disease. Patients with an orphan disease have very limited choices. It is, therefore, good news that Cannabis as…
Two-drug regimen shows promise against pancreatic cancer
Health Desk A combination of two chemotherapy drugs has shown promising results in fighting pancreatic cancer, significantly improving five-year survival rates, according to a European study presented Friday. The trial showed that patients who take the oral drug capecitabine in…
Speaker Shirin Sharmin hospitalised
Speaker Dr Shirin Sharmin Chaudhury has been hospitalised as she fell ill. She was admitted to the Combined Military Hospital (CMH), Dhaka on Saturday night with hypertension, said a closed aide to the Speaker. “She’s now fine,” he said wishing…
Drug overdoses take more life than traffic accidents
Satrurday, President Obama and Grammy Award-winning artist Macklemore teamed up to discuss a disease that affects far too many Americans: addiction. Macklemore opened up about his own experience with addiction: “I’m here with President Obama because I take this personally.…
Mexico debates legalizing opium poppy for medicine
Health Desk Fed up with drug-related violence, a growing number of Mexican politicians see one potential cure: legalizing the cultivation of opium poppies for the production of medicine. The debate has emerged in recent weeks after President Enrique Pena Nieto…
What you should know about the Zika virus
Dr. Vivek Murthy, US Surgeon General You’ve probably heard news reports about Zika, a virus that’s been spreading across South and Central America as well as the Caribbean. Zika is primarily transmitted by mosquitoes. In past outbreaks, the vast majority…
‘Single dose oral cholera vaccine protective in endemic setting’
Dhaka – A new study by icddr,b scientists has shown for the first time that a single dose of the oral cholera vaccine Shanchol is effective in older children and adults in an area where cholera is endemic. These findings…
Anti-vaccine parents were found guilty in the death of their Toddler
By Tamara Khandaker An Alberta couple has been found guilty of failing to provide their son with the necessaries of life, four years after he died of bacterial meningitis. The parents, whose preference for natural remedies over traditional medicine is…
New threat against affordable medicines in trade negotiations
New Delhi/Geneva: Access to affordable medicines could be severely restricted for millions of people around the world under the current proposals in the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) trade agreement, the international humanitarian medical organisation M้decins Sans Fronti่res (MSF) warned…