Give what you can, share where you may. Hopeline.

It is expected there would be no problems securing funding to explore a drug that could shrink cancerous tumors and has no side-effects in humans, but University of Alberta researcher Evangelos Michelakis has hit a stalemate with the private sector who would normally fund such a venture.

Michelakis’ drug is none other than dichloroacetate (DCA), a drug which cannot be patented and costs pennies to make.

It’s no wonder he can’t secure the $400-600 million needed to conduct human trials with the medicine – the drug doesn’t have the potential to make enough money.

Michelakis told reporters they will be applying to public agencies for funding, as pharmaceuticals are reluctant to pick up the drug.

At roughly $2 a dose, there isn’t much chance to make a billion on the cancer treatment over the long term.

According to research on DCA, formerly used to fight metabolic disease in children, the drug apparently revitalizes damaged mitochondria in cancer cells, effectively triggering cell death and shrinking the cells.

“One of the really exciting things about this compound is that it might be able to treat many different forms of cancer,” explained Michelakis.

This is also a large part of what’s wrong with the American medical system.

Who would ever want a $2 pill that shrinks/kills tumors with no side effects? Don’t be ridiculous. The mere idea of such a thing being desirable is absurd.

Some 1.2 million children under 18 were living in counties rendered disaster zones by Katrina. As many as 8 percent, or 100,000, are expected to develop post-traumatic stress disorder, according to one assessment.

Most experts say the toll is likely far higher. Of the first 1,000 children screened by the Louisiana State University Health Sciences Center, 27 percent displayed symptoms of trauma, including nightmares, flashbacks, heightened anxiety and bedwetting, says Dr. Joy Osofsky, a professor of pediatrics and psychiatry at LSU’s Harris Center for Infant Mental Health.

Britney Spears had to be rushed to hospital after treading on a hypodermic needle.

The pop babe – who is on holiday in Hawaii – had stepped out of her car without shoes on when she trod on the needle in a parking lot.

An attempt to resume state spending on birth control got shot down Wednesday by House members who argued it would have amounted to an endorsement of promiscuous lifestyles.

Missouri stopped providing money for family planning and certain women’s health services when Republicans gained control of both chambers of the Legislature in 2003.
..
“If you hand out contraception to single women, we’re saying promiscuity is OK as a state, and I am not in support of that,” Phillips, R-Kansas City, said in an interview.

I wonder if every sperm is sacred still counts if the fertilized blastocyte has two X chromosomes.

The house bill adds a new requirement to Medicaid elegibility by requiring an applicant to provide either a Birth Certificate or a Passport as documentation of citizenship. This requirement will effectively deny or delay benefits to a significant number of southern blacks, who were born at home because of segregationalist laws that prevented their mother’s from receiving maternity care in the white hospitals. It is possible to get a delayed Birth Certificate in most states but the process takes anywhere from 1 to 3 years and hinges upon the applicant being able to furnish an affidavit from at least one person who was over 10 years old at the time of the applicant’s birth who can attest to the date and place of the birth. It also requires one official document dating to before the applicant’s 10th birthday, that shows the child’s name, date of birth, place of birth, and the date the document was established. A second document is required that establishes that the mother was present in the state at the time of the birth.

I’ve have personally witnessed a number of Mobile residents who present to the Health Department when they reach retirement age because Social Security denied them benefits for not having a birth certificate. Their retirement plans are suddenly thrown into disarray when they find that the delayed certificate might not be issued for years, or might not be possible at all without the proper documentation.

The Birth Certificate/Passport requirement was placed in the bill suppossedly to keep illegal aliens from applying for Medicaid benefits but will mainly serve to keep native born, eligible blacks from Medicaid coverage.

Hey…..back of the bus there darky!!

Your surgeon, George W. Bush, informs you that based on information he has placed in your medical record, you have a rare form of bone cancer in the tip of your ring finger. In order to make sure that he really gets that cancer, and not because it increases his billable services, Dr. Bush proceeds to amputate your right arm at the shoulder. Histological examination of the amputated tissue reveals that there was no carcinoma present and the surgery was unnecessary. Dr. Bush indicates that it was not his fault, because a lab tech provided the erroneous report and the lab tech had been initially hired by the previous practice group before he used Daddy’s money to by them out. Even though he amputated your limb on faulty information it was still the right thing to do because you no longer have to deal with such recurring nuiscances as washing your hand, clipping your fingernails, and wacking your funny bone on the furniture. Everyone agrees that those are things that we wish we didn’t have to deal with.

Oh, and the high cost of health care is due to frivolous lawsuits and you are an ingrate for being critical of the man who saved your life and improved its quality. Saying negative things about your doctor decreases the morale of the entire hospital, which puts all the other patients at risk, and lets the diseases win.

Its hard work being a doctor.

The woman had lost her nose, lips and chin after being savaged by a dog.

In the controversial operation, tissues, muscles, arteries and veins were taken from a brain-dead donor and attached to the patient’s lower face.

Doctors stress the woman will not look like her donor, but nor will she look like she did before the attack – instead she will have a “hybrid” face.

Now Bush43 and the American Taliban are in the breach. This is going to be a long post, but what the hell…

A senior United Nations official has accused President George Bush of “doing damage to Africa” by cutting funding for condoms, a move which may jeopardise the successful fight against HIV/Aids in Uganda.

Stephen Lewis, the UN secretary general’s special envoy for HIV/Aids in Africa, said US cuts in funding for condoms and an emphasis on promoting abstinence had contributed to a shortage of condoms in Uganda, one of the few African countries which has succeeded in reducing its infection rate.

Oh, and what have these evil fuckers helped to bring about? Why, nothing other than genocide on a continental scale:

Some 510,000 people are now infected, with 67,000 new infections and 57,000 deaths, UNAids regional figures show. Worldwide 40.3m people are infected.

Sudan is the worst-hit, and two thirds of women there were unaware of condoms.
…
Sudan was by far the worst-affected country in the region, the report said.

“Only 5% knew that condom use could prevent HIV infection and more than two-thirds of the women had never seen or heard of a condom,”

Not to get too Pahlaniuk on you or anything, but it is (in)action on the part of those best able to stem the tide such as we have here that makes me see red. I want to breathe fire. I want to feel smoke pouring from my fingertips. I want to grab each ignorant, shortsighted, mouthbreathing zealot by the neck and squeeze until I hear the sound of celery stalks snapping. After all, it would only be fair.

Oh, sorry, were you expecting the pacifist liberal? Wrong blog.

All this and I’m a pretty equaniminous/zen guy, too. I believe that we may all be part of one universal energy, subjectively imagining ourselves and that this reality is merely one data point in the infinite, that pain is an illusion, this body is a mere shell, that I attempt to be the rock in the stream rather than the leaf upon the water, I embrace this precious moment, I encourage and welcome whatever may come, and so on.

… buuuuut if a little active seeking of my ideals brings me a better precious moment, well then, some rocks can move a little bit. I’m bringing the stream to me, bitches. And yeah, yeah, that should be “hath wrought” in the title. So sue me.

I’m not telling you what to do or whom to support, but here’s one way you can help – UNICEF’s fight AIDS in Africa campaign.

It’s a space-opera scene we know by heart: The hero’s tiny craft faces off against the vast enemy ship. Now scale down the set a billion times or so, and replace Luke Skywalker’s X-wing and the Death Star with a clump of drug-bearing molecules and a misshapen cancer cell.

Ka-BOOM!

This scenario — from a National Cancer Institute video — is just one possibility offered by the burgeoning field of cancer nanotechnology, where miniscule molecules are designed with literally atomic precision to combat a disease that kills half a million Americans every year.

“It’s 21st-century medicine,” said Vicki Colvin of Rice University’s Center for Nanoscale Science and Technology. “It sits at the intersection of some of the greatest achievements in many different areas of science, from material science to cell biology to physics and advances in imaging.”
…
The first cancer nanotech applications will likely involve detection. Nanoparticles could recognize cancer’s molecular signatures, gathering the proteins produced by cancerous cells or signaling the presence of telltale genetic changes. Researchers have already used a protein called albumin — considered a naturally occurring nanoparticle — to detect proteins found in ovarian cancer tissue.

An internal memo sent to Wal-Mart’s board of directors proposes numerous ways to hold down spending on health care and other benefits while seeking to minimize damage to the retailer’s reputation. Among the recommendations are hiring more part-time workers and discouraging unhealthy people from working at Wal-Mart.

In the memorandum, M. Susan Chambers, Wal-Mart’s executive vice president for benefits, also recommends reducing 401(k) contributions and wooing younger, and presumably healthier, workers by offering education benefits. The memo voices concern that workers with seven years’ seniority earn more than workers with one year’s seniority, but are no more productive.

Hahahhah. Read the memo, it’s hilarious… in a sociopathic inhuman sort of way. Here’s the part that will get them in ADA trouble:

To discourage unhealthy job applicants, Ms. Chambers suggests that Wal-Mart arrange for “all jobs to include some physical activity (e.g., all cashiers do some cart-gathering).”

Real classy, those Wal-Mart people. Reaaaaal classy. Other suggestions to decrease Wal-Mart costs include decreasing coverage for spouses (by increasing the costs charged to the employees) and reducing the amounts contributed to the 401(k) plans.

Of course, if this pushes Wal-Mart to support a national healthcare system, then I’m all for it. I can’t believe we don’t have one. Our country is seriously retarded in certain key areas, this being one of them.

The diet focuses on seven foods that have been proven to reduce cholesterol and blood pressure.

It involves daily consumption of 150ml of red wine, which has been found to cut heart disease risk by 32 per cent.

Chocaholics line up, because you have to consume 100g of dark chocolate per day, an amount the scientists calculate will reduce blood pressure.

I’m thinking the garlic-chocolate combo might push me over the top and into whathafu?ville, though.

And just imagine the massive species extinction and potential cures about to be lost in the upcoming global warming. Just makes you feel good about your SUV, doesn’t it?

From the Kansas City Star

Medical malpractice insurers in recent years have reaped a windfall in premiums that have far outstripped their claim payouts, a report issued by consumer groups said Thursday.

The report, written by former Missouri Insurance Commissioner Jay Angoff, contends that the amount of premiums collected by 15 major medical malpractice insurers has more than doubled over the past five years. At the same time, the report found that the companies’ claim payouts have remained essentially flat [...]

The report said malpractice insurers as a group raised their net premiums between 2000 and 2004 by 120.2 percent, to about $4.2 billion, even though their net claim payments rose by only 5.7 percent, to about $1.4 billion.

As a result, the amount of claim payments made as a percentage of premiums dropped from 69.9 percent in 2000 to 33.6 percent in 2004.

President Bush claims he is leading the world in the fight against global AIDS. But he has been inexplicably stingy and slow to act — and by placing religion over science, he’s responsible for the loss of untold numbers of lives.

Not as many lives as those grassfuckers Reagan and JP2 are responsible for, but a huge, huge number. Also on the list: big pharma, the WTO, and anyone else who won’t release their patents for the manufacture of generic drugs in developing countries. You all have blood on your hands.

Of course, we have no evidence that it’s MRSA, but I wouldn’t be a blogger if I wasn’t irresponsibly speculating on wildly speculative fearmongering matters, now, would I?

This is the man with a large portion of control over women’s reproductive rights and the ear of the administration and our regulatory agencies.

With the autumn sunlight streaming through the stained-glass windows, Hager opened his Bible to the Old Testament Book of Ezekiel and looked out into the audience. “I want to share with you some information about how…God has called me to stand in the gap,” he declared. “Not only for others, but regarding ethical and moral issues in our country.”
…
Back at Asbury, Hager cast himself as a victim of religious persecution in his sermon. “You see…there is a war going on in this country,” he said gravely. “And I’m not speaking about the war in Iraq. It’s a war being waged against Christians, particularly evangelical Christians. It wasn’t my scientific record that came under scrutiny [at the FDA]. It was my faith…. By making myself available, God has used me to stand in the breach…. Just as he has used me, he can use you.”

Up on the dais, several men seated behind Hager nodded solemnly in agreement. But out in the audience, Linda Carruth Davis–co-author with Hager of Stress and the Woman’s Body, and, more saliently, his former wife of thirty-two years–was enraged. “It was the most disgusting thing I’ve ever heard,” she recalled months later, through clenched teeth.

According to Davis, Hager’s public moralizing on sexual matters clashed with his deplorable treatment of her during their marriage. Davis alleges that between 1995 and their divorce in 2002, Hager repeatedly sodomized her without her consent. Several sources on and off the record confirmed that she had told them it was the sexual and emotional abuse within their marriage that eventually forced her out. “I probably wouldn’t have objected so much, or felt it was so abusive if he had just wanted normal [vaginal] sex all the time,” she explained to me. “But it was the painful, invasive, totally nonconsensual nature of the [anal] sex that was so horrible.”

Think the “liberal” media will be all over this one? I wonder what the Bible says about sodomy and marital rape?

A life-like prosthetic penis called the Whizzinator and other products promising to help illegal drug users pass urine tests provoked U.S. lawmakers on Wednesday to take legal action with subpoenas of manufacturers.

Lawmakers objected to attempts to circumvent drug tests with products such as The Whizzinator, a fake penis that can provide a flow of clean urine “again and again, anytime, anywhere you need it!”

My prediction is that it goes nowhere because Bush vetos the bill, and then there aren’t enough votes to over ride the veto. Next election the GOP congressmen can hit the campaign trail and say, “See? No reason to vote for the Democrat, we tried to get it passed but we we got vetoed.”

Most of the Southern Congressmen can safely vote against stem cell research because the GOP in the south has shown that it can run anyone with a pulse and win. The GOP will be playing to the more moderate audiences in other states to show them they are reasonable.

Our government hasn’t gotten a bit smarter since the days when Medical Schools had to have a grave robber on staff to provide cadavers for their students to study.

So… they could be toast. I think that nationalized healthcare will come from more of this. If the megacorps finally realize how grossly inefficient and expensive our healthcare is, they’ll push for socialized medicine. That would be a good thing via the back door. I’m OK with that.

Sensationalist headlines, alarmist text like this:
“It’s becoming a huge problem,” said Dick Thompson, a spokesman for the World Health Organization, which has dispatched surveillance teams to the country’s northern provinces. “We clearly don’t know the dimensions of the outbreak.”

Let’s be clear – 178 people have died from the Marburg strain.

Meanwhile over 25 million people in Africa are infected with HIV. 25 million.

So it's more difficult for those with the greatest need to get chemotherapy now. That's great. What a well-designed medicare reform package that was.

It was only a matter of time. DU dust is some scary shit, man.

"Farm-raised salmon contain significantly more dioxins and other potentially cancer-causing pollutants than do salmon caught in the wild, says a major study that tested contaminants in fish bought around the world.

Salmon farmed in Northern Europe had the most contaminants, followed by North America and Chile, according to the study released Thursday. It blames the feed used on fish farms for concentrating the ocean pollutants.

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Eating more than a meal of farm-raised salmon per month, depending on its country of origin, could slightly increase the risk of getting cancer later in life, researchers conclude. They urge consumers to buy wild salmon and recommend that farmers change fish feed."