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Health News Stories

Below are key excerpts of revealing news articles on health from reliable news media sources. If any link fails to function, a paywall blocks full access, or the article is no longer available, try these digital tools.

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Sort articles by: Article Date | Date Posted on WantToKnow.info | Importance

COVID vaccination and age-stratified all-cause mortality risk
2021-10-01, ResearchGate (Article preprint by Spiro Pantazatos at Columbia University)
Posted: 2022-01-10 00:43:45
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/355581860_COVID_vaccination_and_age-...

Existing surveillance studies are not designed to reliably estimate life-threatening event or vaccine-induced fatality rates (VFR). Here, regional variation in vaccination rates was used to predict all-cause mortality and non-COVID deaths in subsequent time periods using two independent, publicly available datasets from the US and Europe. Results [suggest] 146K to 187K vaccine-associated US deaths between February and August, 2021. Comparing our estimate with the CDC-reported VFR (0.002%) suggests VAERS deaths are underreported by a factor of 20, consistent with known VAERS under-ascertainment bias. Comparing our age-stratified VFRs with published age-stratified coronavirus infection fatality rates (IFR) suggests the risks of COVID vaccines and boosters outweigh the benefits in children, young adults, and older adults with low occupational risk or previous coronavirus exposure. There is little to no evidence that vaccines reduce community spread and transmission. Vaccine mandates in workplaces, colleges, schools and elsewhere are ill-advised. The mandates are not based on sound science given the relatively low COVID risk in healthy middle-aged and young adults and growing evidence base for alternative prevention and early treatment options for COVID.

Note: See this webpage for information on the author of this study. Why has the media been all but silent on deaths and injuries from the vaccines? Read hundreds of personal stories of severe vaccine injury and death that are not being reported. And explore an excellent website which presents official VAERS information and in easily understandable format. For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on coronavirus vaccines from reliable major media sources.


Arpad Pusztai obituary
2021-12-31, The Times (One of the UK's leading newspapers)
Posted: 2022-01-10 00:34:52
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/arpad-pusztai-obituary-0n89lplnx

Arpad Pusztai spoke for only two and a half minutes during his interview for ITN's World in Action in 1998, but it was enough to end his career. The Hungarian-born expert in lectins, a type of protein, had spent decades working at the Rowett Institute in Aberdeen and had almost 300 scientific papers and three books to his name. In the mid-1990s, with big food manufacturers increasingly developing and promoting genetically modified crops, he had been asked to investigate the effect that their products, specifically GM potatoes, could have on rats. His data showed that those being fed GM potatoes experienced stunted organ and brain growth and disturbance to their immune systems. Pusztai ... agreed to discuss his research on television in the hope of attracting new funding. His comments, which were promoted by the programme in a press release headed "new health fears over 'Frankenstein' food", started a media frenzy. Pusztai was suspended and his raw data was seized. According to [author Andrew] Rowell: "All GM work was stopped immediately and Pusztai's team was dispersed. His three PhD students were moved to other areas. He was threatened with legal action if he spoke to anyone. His phone calls and emails were diverted. No one was allowed to speak to him either." In Pusztai's telling ... the Rowett Institute came under pressure from senior figures in the government and the food industry. Two employees told him that the institute had taken calls from the office of Tony Blair, the prime minister.

Note: Read more about this important scientist. And for more on the dangers of GM food, see this important book summary. For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on food system corruption and GMOs from reliable major media sources.


Companies spent nearly $30 billion in one year marketing medical products to Americans
2019-01-09, Los Angeles Times
Posted: 2022-01-03 10:03:10
https://www.latimes.com/science/sciencenow/la-sci-sn-medical-marketing-money-...

Drug makers and other healthcare companies spent almost $30 billion in a single year to influence the medical choices made by Americans and steer them toward treatments that were newer, vastly more expensive and sometimes riskier than their tried-and-true alternatives, new research shows. The 2016 expenditures paid for TV commercials, sponsorships of patients' groups, promotional meetings for doctors, free drug samples and perks for prescribers. The amount represents a 70% increase since 1997, when drug companies began making direct appeals to American consumers. The study ... offers the most comprehensive accounting of healthcare marketing efforts to date. It traces broad shifts in the media and regulatory environment in which health companies operate, as well as the drugs and services – including erectile dysfunction pills, DNA testing kits and robotic surgery services – they are keen to sell. While lawmakers and regulators have tried to counter the impact of healthcare marketing in recent years, the reforms have had little effect on an industry that accounts for nearly 18% of the country's gross domestic product. The drug industry has increasingly turned to a more indirect approach in its marketing: sponsoring disease-awareness campaigns. Such campaigns, in which a company sponsors ads that do not name a particular medication, rose from 44 in 1997 to 401 in 2016, with an attendant spending increase from $177 million to $430 million.

Note: The pharmaceutical industry provides 75% of television advertising revenue when many countries do not allow drug advertising. For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on Big Pharma profiteering from reliable major media sources.


The epidemiological relevance of the COVID-19-vaccinated population is increasing
2021-12-19, The Lancet
Posted: 2021-12-27 01:20:28
https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanepe/article/PIIS2666-7762(21)00258-1/fu...

High COVID-19 vaccination rates were expected to reduce transmission of SARS-CoV-2 in populations by reducing the number of possible sources for transmission and thereby to reduce the burden of COVID-19 disease. Recent data, however, indicate that the epidemiological relevance of COVID-19 vaccinated individuals is increasing. In the UK it was described that secondary attack rates among household contacts exposed to fully vaccinated index cases was similar to household contacts exposed to unvaccinated index cases (25% for vaccinated vs 23% for unvaccinated). 12 of 31 infections in fully vaccinated household contacts (39%) arose from fully vaccinated epidemiologically linked index cases. Between week 39 and 42, a total of 100.160 COVID-19 cases were reported among citizens of 60 years or older. 89.821 occurred among the fully vaccinated (89.7%), 3.395 among the unvaccinated (3.4%). One week before, the COVID-19 case rate per 100.000 was higher among the subgroup of the vaccinated compared to the subgroup of the unvaccinated. The [CDC] identifies four of the top five counties with the highest percentage of fully vaccinated population (99.9–84.3%) as “high” transmission counties. It appears to be grossly negligent to ignore the vaccinated population as a possible and relevant source of transmission.

Note: This paper in the UK's highly esteemed Lancet shows that the vaccines are not stopping the spread of infection of COVID. They clearly are greatly decreasing the number of hospitalizations and deaths among the vaccinated, but they are not helping to stop the spread of this virus. For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on coronavirus vaccines from reliable major media sources.


These Chemicals Disrupt the Sexual Development of Children - And They're Everywhere
2021-12-07, The Intercept
Posted: 2021-12-27 01:14:56
https://theintercept.com/2021/12/07/epa-dinp-phthalates-child-sexual-developm...

Laurie Valeriano first heard about DINP decades ago. “I started to worry about the chemicals that come out of all these plastics,” she said. DINP, one of a group of chemicals called phthalates that makes plastic more pliable, was one of them. It was already clear that DINP could cause cancer and interfere with hormonal functioning. In February 2000, Valeriano and her employer, the Washington Toxics Coalition, asked the Environmental Protection Agency to add DINP to the list of chemicals it monitors through a nationwide program called the Toxics Release Inventory. Seven months later ... the EPA announced that it planned to grant the group’s request and issued a proposed rule that would add DINP to the toxics inventory. Yet more than 20 years later, the EPA has yet to make good on its promise to add DINP to the list of chemicals. It never finalized the rule. Companies have continued to churn out DINP ... in astounding amounts without disclosing how much individual plants make and emit. In addition to the cancer and hormone disruption that sparked Valeriano’s claim 21 years ago, we now know more about how DINP affects the sexual development of children. It decreases sperm motility, increases malformations of the testes and other organs, and makes boys ... more likely to be infertile later in life. In fact, the entire group of phthalates — an estimated half-billion pounds of which are made and used in the U.S. each year — seem to cause a similar constellation of health problems.

Note: For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on government corruption and health from reliable major media sources.


Whitewashing AIDS History
2014-02-21, Huffington Post
Posted: 2021-12-27 01:12:57
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/whitewashing-aids-history_b_4762295

Dr. Anthony Fauci is rewriting history. He is doing so to disguise his shameful role in delaying promotion of an AIDS treatment that would have prevented tens of thousands of deaths in the first years of the epidemic. In my book, Body Counts, A Memoir of Politics, Sex, AIDS, and Survival, I recount how slow the federal government was in publicizing the use of Bactrim and other sulfa drugs to prevent PCP (the pneumonia that was then the leading killer of people with AIDS). Had Fauci listened to people with AIDS and the clinicians treating them, and responded accordingly, he would have saved thousands of lives. Between 1987, when [AIDS activist Michael] Callen met with Fauci and 1989, when the guidelines were ultimately issued, nearly 17,000 people with AIDS suffocated from PCP. Most of these people might have lived had Fauci responded appropriately. Callen and others ... met with Fauci to plead for his support. They explained that many frontline AIDS physicians, following the lead of Dr. Joseph Sonnabend, were already using Bactrim effectively to prevent the recurrence of PCP. The science was clear. Fauci refused to acknowledge the evidence and, according to one account, even encouraged people with AIDS to stop taking treatments, like Bactrim. Treatment activist Richard Jefferys wrote in 2001 that Fauci "went as far as telling activists attending a 1987 meeting that there was no data to suggest PCP prophylaxis was beneficial and that it may, in fact be dangerous."

Note: For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on government corruption and health from reliable major media sources.


Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. Reveals Fauci’s AIDS Bungling in the Runaway Bestseller ‘The Real Anthony Fauci’
2021-12-09, Yahoo! News
Posted: 2021-12-20 01:00:41
https://sports.yahoo.com/chd-robert-f-kennedy-jr-163100668.html

In his new bestselling book The Real Anthony Fauci: Bill Gates, Big Pharma and the Global War on Democracy and Public Health, Children’s Health Defense board chair and lead counsel Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. provides readers with previously little-known information on Dr. Fauci’s handling of pandemics prior to COVID including the AIDS epidemic. “...Dr. Fauci copied the choreographed script for winning remdesivir’s EUA from the worn rabbit-eared playbook that he developed during his early AIDS years, and then used repeatedly across his career to win approvals for deadly and ineffective drugs,” writes Kennedy. “Time and again, he has terminated clinical trials of his sweetheart drugs the moment they begin to reveal cataclysmic toxicity. He makes the absurd claim that his drug-du-jour had proven so miraculously effective that it would be unethical to deny it to the public, and then he strong-arms FDA to grant his approvals.” One of the AIDS treatments promoted by Dr. Fauci and his agency [NIAID] was azidothymidine (AZT), a powerful and toxic chemotherapy drug used widely for AIDS patients despite the availability of less toxic options. AZT, according to SPIN magazine, is a drug that “was worse than the disease.” Kennedy also exposes Dr. Fauci’s experiments using various toxic AIDS drugs on Black and Hispanic foster children in New York and six other states.

Note: Read more about the foster children used as guinea pigs to test HIV drugs. If you don't have time for the whole book (rated 4.9 stars on amazon.com), you can find an engaging summary of key points on this webpage. For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on government corruption and health from reliable major media sources.


Publisher blasts 'total media blackout' of Robert Kennedy's bestseller on Dr. Fauci
2021-12-02, Washington Times
Posted: 2021-12-20 00:58:02
https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2021/dec/2/publisher-blasts-total-media-...

Longtime vaccine critic Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has a runaway bestseller on his hands with his blockbuster book skewering Dr. Anthony Fauci, no thanks to what his publisher calls a "total media blackout." "The Real Anthony Fauci: Bill Gates, Big Pharma, and the Global War on Democracy and Public Health" continued its reign Wednesday atop the Amazon and USA Today nonfiction bestseller lists and ranked fifth on The New York Times' list of top-selling books. The book is flying off the shelves even though technology platforms refuse to carry its advertising. Mainstream media outlets won't touch it, much to the frustration of Tony Lyons, president and publisher of Skyhorse Publishing. "I defy you to find a single case where the No. 1 bestselling book in America over a 16-day period has not been mentioned in one mainstream newspaper in the country," Mr. Lyons [said]. Not even the aura of the Kennedy name has tempted the mainstream media. The snub hasn't occurred in a vacuum. Mr. Kennedy became persona non grata after he launched his vaccine criticism in 2005. Dr. Fauci is a media favorite, and social media companies have cracked down on content that contests the coronavirus authorities in the name of squelching "misinformation." Among the book's claims are that the White House chief medical adviser oversaw the "disastrous mismanagement" of the 2020 pandemic and has prioritized the pharmaceutical industry over public health.

Note: If you don't have time for the whole book (rated 4.9 stars on amazon.com), you can find an engaging summary of key points on this webpage. Learn how the CIA is involved in suppressing Kennedy's book and so much more. For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on media manipulation and the coronavirus from reliable sources.


Vermont Seeing Largest COVID Surge of Pandemic, Despite 74 Percent of Residents Vaccinated
2021-12-08, Newsweek
Posted: 2021-12-20 00:49:13
https://www.newsweek.com/vermont-seeing-largest-covid-surge-pandemic-despite-...

Although 74 percent of its population is fully vaccinated, the state of Vermont is experiencing its largest surge of COVID-19 cases since the pandemic began. Throughout the past week, coronavirus infections have jumped 54 percent along with an 18 percent increase in hospitalizations. According to the Vermont Department of Health, six new deaths have been attributed to COVID-19 complications across the state. Ninety percent of those hospitalized in intensive care units in the state are unvaccinated. Vermont is far from the only state recording surges of COVID-19 infections. The number of Americans fully vaccinated reached 200 million Wednesday amid a dispiriting holiday-season spike in cases and hospitalizations that has hit even New England, one of the most highly inoculated corners of the country. New cases in the U.S. climbed from an average of nearly 95,000 a day on November 22 to almost 119,000 a day this week, and hospitalizations are up 25 percent from a month ago. Deaths are running close to 1,600 a day on average, back up to where they were in October. The overall U.S. death toll less than two years into the crisis could hit another heartbreaking milestone, 800,000, in a matter of days. Some states, notably in highly vaccinated New England, but also in the Midwest, are grappling with some of the worst surges since the start of the pandemic. Hospitals are filling up and reacting by canceling non-urgent surgeries or taking other crisis measures, while states are strongly promoting boosters.

Note: For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on coronavirus vaccines from reliable major media sources.


Autism Now Diagnosed in 1 in Every 44 Children, CDC Says
2021-12-02, U.S. News & World Report
Posted: 2021-12-12 16:03:27
https://www.usnews.com/news/health-news/articles/2021-12-02/autism-now-diagno...

Autism may be more prevalent among American children than believed, a new U.S. government study shows. One in 44 children at age 8 in the United States have been diagnosed with the developmental disorder, a jump from the previous estimate of 1 in 54 children, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention report found. But a second study offered more heartening news: After looking at 4-year-old children in the same 11 communities analyzed in the first report, researchers found there was progress in the early identification of children with autism. These children were 50% more likely to receive an autism diagnosis or special education classification by age 4 when compared to the 8-year-olds. The new rate was based on 2018 data from 11 communities in the Autism and Developmental Disabilities Monitoring (ADDM) network. Autism rates in those communities ranged from 1 in 60 (1.7%) in Missouri to 1 in 26 (3.9%) in California. These differences could be due to how communities identify children with autism, according to the CDC, which noted that some communities also have more services for children with autism and their families. The reports were published Dec. 2 in the CDC’s Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report. Researchers also found persistent racial and ethnic differences in the diagnosis of autism. In several of the 11 communities, fewer Hispanic children were diagnosed with autism than Black or white children.

Note: Why isn't the government pouring in billions of dollars to get to the bottom of what is causing this huge and continuing rise in autism? For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on health from reliable major media sources.


Pro-Trump counties now have far higher COVID death rates.
2021-12-05, NPR
Posted: 2021-12-12 16:00:44
https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2021/12/05/1059828993/data-vaccine-...

Since May 2021, people living in counties that voted heavily for Donald Trump during the last presidential election have been nearly three times as likely to die from COVID-19 as those who live in areas that went for now-President Biden. That's according to a new analysis by NPR that examines how political polarization and misinformation are driving a significant share of the deaths in the pandemic. NPR looked at deaths per 100,000 people in roughly 3,000 counties across the U.S. from May 2021, the point at which vaccinations widely became available. People living in counties that went 60% or higher for Trump in November 2020 had 2.73 times the death rates of those that went for Biden. Counties with an even higher share of the vote for Trump saw higher COVID-19 mortality rates. In October, the reddest tenth of the country saw death rates that were six times higher than the bluest tenth, according to Charles Gaba, an independent health care analyst who's been tracking partisanship trends during the pandemic and helped to review NPR's methodology. Those numbers have dropped slightly in recent weeks, Gaba says: "It's back down to around 5.5 times higher." The trend was robust, even when controlling for age, which is the primary demographic risk of COVID-19 mortality. The data also reveal a major contributing factor to the death rate difference: The higher the vote share for Trump, the lower the vaccination rate.

Note: Though COVID vaccines do not prevent viral spread, the evidence is strong that they are effective at reducing disease severity and death. Yet the media is clearly hiding the many thousands of deaths and side effects resulting from the vaccines, as can be seen at https://nomoresilence.world. For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on coronavirus vaccines from reliable major media sources.


Covid Treatments Are Coming
2021-12-03, New York Times
Posted: 2021-12-12 15:59:05
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/12/03/briefing/covid-treatments-pfizer-merck.html

A new generation of Covid-19 treatments will soon be available, and they matter more than many people realize. They have the potential to substantially reduce hospitalization and death. In the simplest terms, they can help turn Covid into a more ordinary respiratory disease, similar to the common cold or flu, rather than one that’s killing about 1,000 Americans a day and dominating daily life for millions. Two treatments are on the way — one from Pfizer and one from Merck — and they will have both medical and psychological benefits. Not only can they reduce serious Covid illness, but they can also reduce Covid fears and help society move back to normalcy. Both Pfizer’s and Merck’s treatments are pill regimens that people take for five days after a positive Covid test. The pills prevent the virus from replicating inside the body and are broadly similar to treatments that revolutionized H.I.V. care in the 1990s. In truth, the virus has already been largely defanged. The death rate for vaccinated adults under 50 is virtually zero. Pfizer has projected that it will produce enough doses to treat 20 million people in the first half of next year. The Biden administration has agreed to buy 10 million of the treatments, known as Paxlovid, at a cost of about $530 each. Merck projects that it will produce more than 10 million courses of its drug, called molnupiravir, by the end of this year. The federal government has agreed to buy 3.1 million of those courses for around $700 each.

Note: And thus big Pharma is set to receive another huge windfall. Why are they setting prices so how and raking in huge profits when so many are suffering financially? For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on the coronavirus from reliable major media sources.


New therapy with ‘special scaffold’ reverses paralysis in mice
2021-11-12, The Independent (One of the UK's leading newspapers)
Posted: 2021-12-12 15:50:11
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/therapy-scaffold-paralysis-mice-re...

Scientists have developed a novel therapy that promotes recovery from spinal cord injury and reverses paralysis in mice. In the research published in the journal Science ... scientists administered a single injection to tissues surrounding the spinal cords of paralysed mice. Just four weeks later, the rodents could walk again. The therapy, administered in the form of a gel, works by organising molecules at the injury site into a complex network of nanofibers mimicking the natural matrix found in all tissues that play a major role in wound healing and cell to cell communication, the study noted. This gel tunes the motion of molecules at the injury sites, enabling them to find and properly engage with constantly moving receptors on cells, said the researchers. “The key innovation in our research, which has never been done before, is to control the collective motion of more than 100,000 molecules within our nanofibers,” study co-author Samuel I Stupp from Northwestern University said. One of the challenges in administering wound healing drugs, the scientists said, is that the receptors sticking out of nerve cells and other types of cells constantly moves around. The novel gel fine-tunes the motion of molecules which “move, ‘dance’ or even leap temporarily out of these structures”, enabling them to connect more effectively with receptors, Dr Stupp explained. With further studies and clinical trials, the scientists believe that the new therapy could be used to prevent paralysis after major trauma.

Note: Explore a treasure trove of concise summaries of incredibly inspiring news articles which will inspire you to make a difference.


'A staggering increase': Yearly overdose deaths top 100,000 for first time
2021-11-17, NBC News
Posted: 2021-12-05 22:00:38
https://www.nbcnews.com/health/health-news/yearly-drug-overdose-deaths-top-10...

Drug overdose deaths in the United States surpassed 100,000 in a 12-month period for the first time, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Wednesday, a troubling milestone amid an already devastating period for the country. The number of overdose deaths rose 29 percent, from 78,056 from April 2019 to April 2020, to 100,306 in the following 12 months. The data, from the CDC’s National Center for Health Statistics, is considered provisional but is a good indication of what the final numbers will show. “It’s a staggering increase for one year,” said Bob Anderson, chief of the mortality statistics branch at the NCHS. Vermont saw the biggest rise, with a nearly 70 percent increase. Large increases were also observed in West Virginia (62 percent), Kentucky (55 percent), Louisiana (52 percent) and Tennessee (50 percent). Drug overdose deaths went down in just four states: Delaware, New Hampshire, New Jersey and South Dakota. South Dakota had a nearly 20 percent decrease in overdose deaths, the greatest by far. Just how much of a role the stress and isolation of the pandemic played in the rising overdose deaths remains to be seen. “Opioid addiction is a chronic, relapsing condition such that the stress or the social isolation and the inability to access support groups could have resulted in relapses in people with opioid addiction, and Covid could have made it harder for people with opioid addiction to access treatment, as well,” [Dr. Andrew] Kolodny said.

Note: Yet another tragic consequence of the lockdowns and fear-mongering. For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on the coronavirus and health from reliable major media sources.


Guinea Pig Kids
2004-11-19, BBC News
Posted: 2021-12-05 21:50:53
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/this_world/4035345.stm

During a nine month investigation, the BBC has uncovered the disturbing truth about the way authorities in New York City are conducting the fight against Aids. HIV positive children - some only a few months old - are enrolled in toxic experiments without the consent of guardians or relatives. In some cases where parents have refused to give children their medication, they have been placed in care. The city's Administration of Children's Services (ACS) does not even require a court order to place HIV kids with foster parents or in children's homes, where they can continue to give them experimental drugs. In 2002, the Incarnation Children's Center - a children's home in Harlem - was at the hub of controversy over secretive drugs trials. [Reporter Jamie Doran] speaks to a boy who spent most of his life at Incaranation. Medical records, obtained by the This World team, prove the boy had been enrolled in these trials. "I did not want to take my medication," said the boy, "but if you want to get out of there, you have to do what they say." He also conveys a horrifying account of what happened to the children at Incarnation who refused to obey the rules. "My friend Daniel didn't like to take his medicine and he got a tube in his stomach," he said. For months, the BBC tried to get information from the people responsible for the trials, but none would comment. The companies that supply drugs for the trials are among the world's largest, including Britain's own Glaxo SmithKline (GSK).

Note: Read a long list of examples of humans being treated as guinea pigs by corporate and governmental programs. For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on corruption in government and in Big Pharma from reliable major media sources.


Scientists mystified, wary, as Africa avoids COVID disaster
2021-11-19, ABC News
Posted: 2021-11-28 20:22:22
https://abcnews.go.com/Health/wireStory/scientists-mystified-wary-africa-avoi...

When the coronavirus first emerged last year, health officials feared the pandemic would sweep across Africa, killing millions. Although it’s still unclear what COVID-19’s ultimate toll will be, that catastrophic scenario has yet to materialize in Zimbabwe or much of the continent. Scientists emphasize that obtaining accurate COVID-19 data, particularly in African countries with patchy surveillance, is extremely difficult. But there is something “mysterious” going on in Africa that is puzzling scientists, said Wafaa El-Sadr, chair of global health at Columbia University. “Africa doesn’t have the vaccines and the resources to fight COVID-19 that they have in Europe and the U.S., but somehow they seem to be doing better,” she said. Fewer than 6% of people in Africa are vaccinated. For months, the WHO has described Africa as “one of the least affected regions in the world” in its weekly pandemic reports. Some researchers say the continent’s younger population - the average age is 20 versus about 43 in Western Europe - in addition to their lower rates of urbanization and tendency to spend time outdoors, may have spared it the more lethal effects of the virus so far. Several studies are probing whether there might be other explanations. WHO data show that deaths in Africa make up just 3% of the global total.

Note: For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on the coronavirus from reliable major media sources.


EPA Withheld Reports of Substantial Risk Posed by 1,200 Chemicals
2021-11-01, The Intercept
Posted: 2021-11-28 20:20:49
https://theintercept.com/2021/11/01/epa-toxic-chemicals-reports-withheld/

The Environmental Protection Agency has withheld information from the public since January 2019 about the dangers posed by more than 1,200 chemicals. By law, companies must give the EPA any evidence they possess that a chemical presents “a substantial risk of injury to health or the environment.” Until recently, the agency had been making these reports — known as 8(e) reports, for the section of the Toxic Substances Control Act that requires them — available to the public. But since 2019, the EPA has only posted one of the reports to its public website. During this time, chemical companies have continued to submit the critical studies to the agency, according to two EPA staff members with knowledge of the matter. Since January 2019, the EPA has received at least 1,240 reports documenting the risk of chemicals’ serious harms, including eye corrosion, damage to the brain and nervous system, chronic toxicity to honeybees, and cancer in both people and animals. PFAS compounds are among the chemical subjects of these notifications. Not only has the agency kept all but one of these reports from the public, but it has also made them difficult for EPA staff to access, according to the two agency scientists, who are choosing to remain anonymous. The substantial risk reports have not been uploaded to the databases used most often by risk assessors searching for information about chemicals. They have been entered only into an internal database that is difficult to access and search.

Note: For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on government corruption from reliable major media sources.


Synthetic chemical in consumer products linked to early death, study finds
2021-10-12, CNN News
Posted: 2021-11-22 00:08:41
https://www.cnn.com/2021/10/12/health/plastic-chemical-early-death-wellness/i...

Synthetic chemicals called phthalates, found in hundreds of consumer products such as food storage containers, shampoo, makeup, perfume and children's toys, may contribute to some 91,000 to 107,000 premature deaths a year among people ages 55 to 64 in the United States, a new study found. People with the highest levels of phthalates had a greater risk of death from any cause, especially cardiovascular mortality, according to the study published Tuesday in the peer-reviewed journal Environmental Pollution. Phthalates are known to interfere with the body's mechanism for hormone production, known as the endocrine system, and they are "linked with developmental, reproductive, brain, immune, and other problems," according to the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences. Even small hormonal disruptions can cause "significant developmental and biological effects," the NIEHS states. Prior research has connected phthalates with reproductive problems, such as genital malformations and undescended testes in baby boys and lower sperm counts and testosterone levels in adult males. Often called "everywhere chemicals" because they are so common, phthalates are added to consumer products such as PVC plumbing, vinyl flooring, rain- and stain-resistant products, medical tubing, garden hoses, and some children's toys. Other common exposures come from the use of phthalates in food packaging, detergents, clothing, furniture and automotive plastics.

Note: For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on corporate corruption and health from reliable major media sources.


Researchers say new blood test can spot more than 50 types of cancer — many hard to detect early
2021-11-03, CBS News
Posted: 2021-11-21 23:58:24
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/cancer-blood-test-early-detection/

The sooner most cancers are discovered, the better the odds they can be successfully treated. Mayo Clinic participated in research on a test that can detect more than 50 cancers. "My dad, he was a healthy guy. He didn't have any known risk factors for cancer," Dr. Julia Feygin said. Feygin lost her 40-year-old father to pancreatic cancer when she was 13. Diagnosed at stage three, he lived for nine more months. "I strongly believe that purpose can be found in everything that happens," Feygin said. She's now part of a team at a Menlo Park, California-based company called GRAIL that's introducing the blood test, called Galleri. She says can it catch hard-to-detect, aggressive and often deadly cancers like pancreatic, ovarian and esophageal. "If cancers can be detected early, we can dramatically improve patient outcomes," Feygin said. Feygin explains that our blood contains a DNA signature. The blood test tracks the DNA a cancer cell sheds. Two tubes of blood are drawn and sent to GRAIL's lab for analysis. "We can find and sequence these tiny bits of tumor-derived DNA in the blood and, based on the patterns we see, we can reveal if there is a signal for cancer present. We can predict with very high accuracy where in the body this cancer signal is coming from," Feygin said. An interventional study that included Mayo Clinic with 6,600 participants returned 29 signals that were followed by a cancer diagnosis. Another study found a less than 1% false positive rate.

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Sweden now has Western Europe's LOWEST Covid infection rate
2021-11-19, MSN/Daily Mail
Posted: 2021-11-21 20:13:25
https://www.msn.com/en-gb/travel/news/sweden-now-has-western-europe-s-lowest-...

Sweden now has the lowest Covid infection rate in western Europe. The Scandinavian nation — which was subject to international scrutiny last year when it refused to lockdown — is currently recording 85.4 cases per million people. By comparison, the rate is nearly 1,400 per million in Europe's current Covid capital Austria, which today announced it is going back into a full lockdown from Monday. Sweden's infection rate is far lower than other Western European countries like the Netherlands (1,048.7), Britain (581), Germany (536), and France (201). And for the first time in the pandemic, Sweden is recording fewer cases per population size than its Scandinavian neighbours Denmark (655), Norway (351) and Finland (150). The Scandinavian nation became an international outlier last year when it defied scientific advice and refused to follow the rest of the world in shutting down society to curb the virus' spread. The country ... also has next to no Covid restrictions in place. And advice for people to wear face masks on public transport was abandoned on July. Unlike other European countries it has never made face masks compulsory or enforced compulsory lockdowns. Sweden is middle of the road when it comes to vaccine uptake in western Europe. Some 68.7 per cent of the entire population have had both doses of the virus. Sweden has cut a different path to other European countries through out the pandemic, choosing to rely on citizens to make the right choices during the first wave instead of locking down.

Note: In the list of countries with the highest deaths rates per million since the start of the pandemic, Sweden is currently #42, while the U.S. is #17 and the UK is #24. Shouldn't a country that never locked down and never required masks be at or near the top of the list? Could it be that both the lockdowns and the masks are not as effective as claimed? For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on COVID from reliable major media sources. Then explore the excellent, reliable resources provided in our Coronavirus Information Center.


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