Health and Medicine

Many of today’s medicines were discovered by trial and error: a substance is found which helps alleviate the symptoms of a disease, and it may take years before scientists really understand how it works. Typically they find that a drug has its effects by attaching itself to a particular molecule in a cell and blocking part of its activity, the way you might prevent someone from turning a light on or off by putting a lock over the switch. Scientists now hope to take the opposite approach, and custom-d

New data from a 1998 study to assess the potential risks of chromosomal abnormalities of residents living near landfill sites is detailed in a research letter in this week’s issue of THE LANCET. The findings suggest that the increased risk of chromosomal abnormalities is of a similar magnitude to the increased risk of non-chromosomal abnormalities previously reported.

Previous findings of the EUROHAZCON study (Lancet 1998; 352: 423–27) showed a 33% increase in the risk of non-chromosomal ano

An effective, affordable, and accessible HIV vaccine is 7-10 years away, according to scientists at the Medical Research Council of South Africa, in this week’s BMJ. However, its success depends on a complex interplay of politics, science, and public-private partnerships.

Equitable public-private partnerships between researchers, manufacturers, and distributors and partnerships between rich and poor countries are the best strategy for the development of the vaccine, say the authors. Successf

A team of Italian researchers has demonstrated in the laboratory for the first time that combining two of the newest anti-cancer targeted agents may produce a powerful new combination against breast cancer – and possibly many other cancers as well. Their findings are reported (Thursday 24 January) in the journal Annals of Oncology.*

They found that trastuzumab (Herceptin) and the as yet unlicensed drug ZD1839 (Iressa), act synergistically against two rogue genes commonly involved in breast c

Combining two separate observations of cells in brain tumours could enable doctors to improve the success rate of radiotherapy. Speaking today (23 January) at the Institute of Physics Simulation and Modelling Applied to Medicine conference in London, chemical engineer Dr Norman Kirkby from the University of Surrey will explain how using the correct time intervals between a sequence of low dose radiotherapy sessions could increase the chance of curing brain cancers that tend to resist treatment.

Researchers at the University of Bristol have discovered that not all babies who wheeze will develop asthma in later life.

Dr Andrea Sherriff and asthma experts from the Institute of Child Health in Bristol and St George`s Hospital Medical School in London studied around 10,000 children taking part in the Children of the 90s project in Bristol.

The researchers discovered that over 60% of babies who wheezed in the first six months had stopped by 3½ years of age. When they we