Order of the Supreme Court of India in the matter of Network of People Living With HIV/AIDS & Others Vs Union of India & Others dated 24/02/2025. The Supreme Court (SC), February 24, 2025 has directed all states to file their affidavits addressing concerns raised about antiretroviral therapy (ART) drugs …
People with the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) have a surprisingly active thymus, an organ at the base of the neck that sends out immune cells but winds down with age. Researchers assumed that anyone with HIV would have an inactive thymus due to attack by the virus and normal ageing. …
Brain scans confirm what smokers insist: cigarettes improve concentration. Elizabeth Quattrocki of the McLean Hospital in USA, asked four smokers not to smoke for 24 hours. Using functional magnetic resonance imaging, she scanned the brains of these volunteers and four nonsmokers as they answered questions about some pictures. Both groups …
HOW do you kill cancer? It is a question that researchers the world over have been trying to answer. They have tried everything: conventional chemotherapy to blocking blood flow to cancerous tissues. Nothing, however, deterred the dreaded disease. So the research teams went back to their laboratories and tried again, …
Floods sweeping across the Seoul metropolitan area have left at least 119 people dead and 53 others missing in South Korea's worst natural disaster in years. With flood waters receding, tens of thousands of people returned to sodden, mud-caked homes, but many found only shattered remains of what was once …
A SINGLE vaccine can save more lives and money than any other form of medication currently available. This is a universal truth. In the next century, some 15-odd months away, doctors and scientists will strive to develop vaccines far more powerful and effective. Vaccines that will finally put an end …
IT is the catch 22 story. Cigarette smoking is injurious to health, proclaim the cautionary statements on every packet, but on the other hand, if you quit smoking for a short period of time, you are likely to land yourself in an accident or two, say British researchers. Stopping smoking …
THh Union government has issued a notification banning the use of quinacrine for female sterilisation/contraception. The notification bans quinacrine in pellet form for use as a contraceptive, Anyone violating the provision of the Act would be punishable with imprisonment for a term, which may extend to three years or a …
THIRTY nine men have died so far after taking the anti-impotency drug Viagra, confirms the us Food and Drug Administration (PDA). About 85 per cent of the patients were found to have one or more risk factors related to coronary artery disease. Almost half the victims died within three hours …
The world's first drug to work by smell is to begin clinical trials later this month. Kiotech, a UK-based biotechnology company, has applied for approval of a drug to alleviate anxiety. The company is developing a family of odour drugs that, claim company spokespersons, will relieve anxiety, sleeping disorders and …
The US Food and Drug Administration (PDA) has approved rifapentine (Priftin) - the first new antituberculosis (anti-TB) drug to be licensed in 25 years. Rifapentine is indicated for pulmonary tuberculo-sis but must be used in conjunction with other anti-TB drugs. It is expected to increase patient compli-ance because it has …
ONE of the biggest threats that we face as we take the last few steps towards the new millennium is from acquired immunodeficiency syndrome, or AIDS. Spreading more rapidly than the proverbial wildfire, this universally-feared disease infects over 16,000 new victims every day. And in developing countries, the situation is …
INDIA will start clinical trials this year of the anti-HIV drug, AZT, on pregnant women, despite high costs and doubts about its efficacy. The trials will be conducted in Mumbai, Tamil Nadu and Kerala, say officials at the Union government's National AIDS Control Organisation (NACO), The government has identified these …
THE thought of eating live animals certainly fills most of us with disgust. And yet, we do it all the time. These are "animals" too small to be seen by the naked eye. They are microorganisms, mainly bacteria. And their ingestion does us a lot of good. In India, yoghurt …
CANCER chemotherapy is, even at the best of times, a pretty tricky business. Doctors are always walking the razor's edge, since the line between killing the tumour and killing the patient is extremely thin. That is because chemotherapeutic drugs targeted to kill the rogue cells first spread throughout the body, …
MERCURY, which is known to damage the nervous system and disrupt mental development, can also cause infertility in men at levels well below those the World Health Organisation (WHO) says are safe. Mike Dickman, biologist at the University of Hong Kong, and Clement Leung of the In Vitro Fertilisation Centre …
SIDE-EFFECTS: The France-based Roche Holding AC, has planned to withdraw its drug for high blood pressure, Posicor, as its interaction with other medicines is poor. Long term clinical trials have shown that Posicor is no more effective in treating congestive heart failure. Last year, company officials had warned that there …
cancer, the universally-dreaded disease, could soon be eradicated. In a recent development, scientists tested two new drugs they claim can cure laboratory mice injected with the disease. And if all goes well, the first cancer patient could be injected with these drugs well within a year. Some cancer experts say …
A radical new approach to the timed release of drugs is being patented by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology ( mit ), usa . It uses a tiny silicon microchip etched with thousands of microscopic pits, each filled with a dose of the drug to be administered. Each tiny pit …
Talking can raise our blood pressure, says a group of researchers based in Paris, France. They have warned that people who chat to their doctor during a check-up could be prescribed drugs they actually do not need. Cardiologists have known for some time that blood pressure can rise in a …
six people in the us and one in Brazil have died reportedly due to the consumption of viagra, the supposedly potent drug to combat impotency. This has led to debates at several fora about the safety aspects of using the drug. Vietnam has banned it until the doubts of its …
