Important News You May Have Missed 2

Gardasil, a vaccine that hit the American market in 2006, has become the recent target of health complaints. This vaccine is given to young girls between the ages of 11 and 21 and claims to prevent certain types of the Human Papillomavirus (HPV) that have been linked to specific cancers of the female body. From the time this vaccine began to be administered, there have been fifteen deaths were reported to the FDA and claimed to have been caused by the vaccine. Ten of those deaths were confirmed by the CDC, but none of have been directly linked to the vaccine. There have been a total of 7,802 reports of adverse side affects caused by this vaccine, symptoms ranging from nausea to the previously mentioned deaths.

Merck, the company that produces the vaccine, indicates that these adverse affects and deaths are likely nothing more than a coincidence. However, they do intend to continue evaluating every claim of adverse reactions to the fullest.

If your daughter has not yet received this vaccine, it may be a good idea to wait until theses concerns can be completely investigated. As with all new medications, the fact that the FDA approves the drug for use does not mean that the drug has been completely and fully studied with regards to all the possible affects that may occur within the general population.

Researchers in Sweden and Hungary have recently undertaken a training project like no other. It seems that they have succeeded in training dogs to sniff out certain types of female specific cancers. Ovarian, cervical and endometrial cancers can now be detected by specially trained dogs with the talent to determine the grade and type of the cancer being discerned. This is an important step in detecting cancers early and allowing treatment to begin in the early stages of cancer. Cancer detected early is often curable through aggressive treatments.

Dogs have long been employed in sniffing out substances, such as bombs and drugs, so it stands to reason that researchers would delve into the possibility that dogs could be used within the realm of medicine to help diagnose specific illnesses. Scientists did note that this new development is still within the beginning stages of study and the use of dogs in clinics is not likely to be something to see in the near future.

Macular degeneration is a condition of the eye that typically results in a partial or complete loss of vision. Lucentis, a new drug that has recently been approved by the FDA, has shown such dramatic results in treating macular degeneration by not only slowing the disease process but also correcting damage that has already been caused to the eye.

This drug is administered by injection to the eye once every four weeks for an entire year. The drug then works to stop the bleeding within the eye that causes the disease. This is a big step in maintaining quality of life for the elderly patients that are typical victims of this particular eye disease.