Colorado to become first US state to allow terminally ill patients to take experimental drugs, including those years away from FDA approval.
This week, Colorado’s Governor John Hickenlooper officially signed the aptly named “Right To Try” bill into law, after a unanimous decision by state government. The bill draws similarities from the Oscar-winning film Dallas Buyers Club, which follows the story of an AIDS patient who smuggles life-saving experimental medicine from Mexico into the United States. Louisiana and Missouri will see similar bills come in to effect in the near future.
Terminally ill patients will be allowed to use experimental drugs in Colorado. (Image courtesy of Wakeup World)
Conditions using experimental drugs include clauses stating that healthcare providers and insurers are not liable for adverse effects of such drugs, if patients choose to take them. The bill allows drug companies to provide experimental medications outside of normal clinical trials.
Source and more information can be found here.
Scientific study involving 1.3 million children disproves any link between vaccines and autism.
Vaccines do not cause autism. (Image courtesy of Canadian Awareness)
A scientific study published this week in the journal Vaccine has proven that there is no causal link between vaccines and autism in any form. The study involved 1.3 million children as direct subjects and ten thousand more as control-cases.
Source and more information can be found here.
French government orders 2,000 trains that turned out to be too wide for its platforms.
New trains ordered by the French national rail company are too wide for many of its platforms. (Image courtesy of The Telegraph)
A recent blunder by France’s national rail company SNCF has already resulted in over $110 million repair fees for the government. The company ordered 2,000 trains for an expanded regional rail network that turned out to be too wide in dimensions for many station platforms. By the time the problem was discovered, it was too late to recall orders. Construction work has already begun to reconfigure station platforms and physically make more space. The French rail company only gave the dimensions of platforms build less than 30 years ago, whereas many of France’s 1,200 platforms are more than 50 years old and of different design. SNCF has publicly announced full responsibility for the issue.
Source and more information can be found here.
Specially trained canine cancer-sniffing snouts show more than 90 percent accuracy.
A typical canine possesses up to 220 million olfactory (smell) cells, which may soon be put to cancer-fighting use, says researchers at the University of Pennsylvania. The largest study of cancer-sniffing dogs found detection rates of prostate cancer through sniffing urine may be up to 98 percent accurate. Similarly, ovarian cancer has been detected by dogs with a high degree of accuracy
A cancer-sniffing dog undergoing training. (Image courtesy of Bloomberg)
When dogs sniff for cancer, they look for specific chemicals emitted by a tumor, referred to as volatile organic compounds (VOCs). VOCs may often be found in the breath of lung and colon cancer patients, as well as the urine of prostate and ovarian cancer patients. While researchers have been seeking approval from the government to establish new diagnostic procedures using a correlational approach with trained canines (meaning results from dog responses alone cannot indicate cancer but can strongly hint towards the existence of tumorous cells), there have been stronger efforts to develop an electronic nose that replicates a trained dog’s cancer detection abilities. The expense of using dogs in actual clinical settings would be impractically high. According to medical staff, a machine that can deliver similar results would be extremely useful. Ongoing tests are being conducted to quantify dog reactions and to replicate them in computer programs.
Source and more information can be found here.
