NY Times – One day last summer, Anne and her husband, Miguel, took their 9-year-old son, Michael, to a Florida elementary school for the first day of what the family chose to call “summer camp.” For years, Anne and Miguel have struggled to understand their eldest son, an elegant boy with high-planed cheeks, wide eyes and curly light brown hair, whose periodic rages alternate with moments of chilly detachment. Michael’s eight-week program was, in reality, a highly structured psychological study — less summer camp than camp of last resort. Read article
Reuters – More than half of kids who were part of a new study from California tested positive for secondhand smoke exposure — despite only a handful of their parents admitting to lighting up. Parents may think kids are only exposed if they’re around someone actively smoking a cigarette, researchers said, or are unaware of where else their children might be breathing in smoke. Read article
AP — A deadly lead poisoning outbreak that began two years ago in northern Nigeria continues to claim young victims even today, an aid agency official said Thursday, while calling on the government to do more to protect those at risk. Ivan Gayton of Doctors Without Borders also criticized the government of oil-rich Nigeria for not taking the threat seriously, despite 4,000 children already being sickened by the outbreak linked to gold mining. Foreign aid groups have done much of the work to clean the villages affected in rural Zamfara state and provide care to the children, who likely will suffer long-term brain damage from their exposure to the lead. Read article
AP – Fighting obesity will require changes everywhere Americans live, work, play and learn, says a major new report that outlines dozens of options – from building more walkable neighborhoods to zoning limits on fast-food restaurants to selling healthier snacks in sports arenas. But schools should be a national focus because that’s where children spend most of their day, eat a lot of their daily calories – and should be better taught how to eat healthy and stay fit, the influential Institute of Medicine said Tuesday. Read article
The Guardian – Prescriptions of Ritalin for attention deficit hyperactivity disorder have quadrupled in a decade, prompting fears it is being pushed on children at the expense of alternative treatments and without appreciation of long-term effects. Figures released by the NHS business services authority to the Liberal Democrat MP Tessa Munt reveal the number of prescriptions of methylphenidate hydrochloride, the generic name for Ritalin, rose in England from 158,000 in 1999 to 661,463 in 2010. Read article
IBT – The number of premature births has skyrocketed, according to a new report published by the World Health Organization on Wednesday. Between 1995 and 2010 the number of premature births doubled from 3 percent of all births worldwide to 6 percent — an increase that requires swift and urgent action to stop, the report said. “In the United States, our preemies have among the highest survival rates in the world,” he [ "Christopher Howson, head of Global Programs for the March of Dimes] said. “Where we fall flat is on the prevention side. Read article
ScienceDaily — A University of Adelaide study has identified the risk of major birth defects associated with different types of assisted reproductive technology. In the most comprehensive study of its kind in the world, researchers from the University’s Robinson Institute have compared the risk of major birth defects for each of the reproductive therapies commonly available internationally, such as: IVF (in vitro fertilization), ICSI (intracytoplasmic sperm injection) and ovulation induction. They also compared the risk of birth defects after fresh and frozen embryo transfer. Read article
Reuters – Amish children raised on rural farms in northern Indiana suffer from asthma and allergies less often even than Swiss farm kids, a group known to be relatively free from allergies, according to a new study. “The rates are very, very low,” said Dr. Mark Holbreich, the study’s lead author. “So there’s something that we feel is even more protective in the Amish” than in European farming communities. What it is about growing up on farms — and Amish farms in particular — that seems to prevent allergies remains unclear. Read article
CRI English – U.S. toothpaste brand Crest stated on Wednesday that the fluoride toothpaste products it sells on the Chinese mainland meet the Chinese national standards, after netizens expressed concern regarding the ingredients in the products, China Network Television reports. A Chinese netizen posted a microblog on Sunday night, quoting a CEO who tested the ingredients of Crest fluoride toothpaste bought in Shanghai, stating that the product contained no fluoride but did contain industrial waste. Fluoride in toothpaste benefits the formation of dental enamel and bones. However, children are not recommended to use fluoride toothpaste as fluoride may affect their normal growth. Read article
ScienceDaily — While chlorpyrifos is no longer registered for household use in the US, it continues to be widely used around the world, as well as on many food and agricultural products throughout the US. Even low to moderate levels of exposure to the insecticide chlorpyrifos during pregnancy may lead to long-term, potentially irreversible changes in the brain structure of the child, according to a new brain imaging study … The changes in brain structure are consistent with cognitive deficits found in children exposed to this chemical. Read article
ScienceDaily — Early colonization of the gut by microbes in infants is critical for development of their intestinal tract and in immune development. A new study, published in BioMed Central’s open access journal Genome Biology, shows that differences in bacterial colonization of formula-fed and breast-fed babies leads to changes in the infant’s expression of genes involved in the immune system, and in defense against pathogens. The health of individuals can be influenced by the diversity of microbes colonizing the gut, and microbial colonization can be especially important in regulating both intestinal and immune development in infants. However, little is known about the potential interactions between the host’s health at a molecular level, their gut microbes, and diet. Read article
BBC – The number of babies born in the US showing symptoms of opiate withdrawal increased threefold in the 10 years up to 2009, a medical study has found. The research, published in the Journal of the American Medical Association, said one in every 1,000 newborns was affected in 2009. The number of pregnant women testing positive for illegal or legal opiates increased fivefold in the same period. Read Article
Daily Mail – Rising numbers of women are dying in labour as obesity and delayed motherhood make births more risky. There are concerns maternity units can’t cope with the increasing number of complicated and potentially dangerous labours. Read article
NY Times – Obesity and the form of diabetes linked to it are taking an even worse toll on America’s youths than medical experts had realized. As obesity rates in children have climbed, so has the incidence of Type 2 diabetes, and a new study adds another worry: the disease progresses more rapidly in children than in adults and is harder to treat. Before the 1990s, this form of diabetes was hardly ever seen in children. It is still uncommon, but experts say any increase in such a serious disease is troubling. There were about 3,600 new cases a year from 2002 to 2005, the latest years for which data is available. Read article
PhysOrg – As many as 8 million people living in the valley are estimated to be at risk of dental and skeletal fluorosis as a result of their long-term exposure to high levels of naturally occurring fluoride in the region’s groundwater. Fluoride is essential for healthy tooth enamel development, but consuming too much of it can damage enamel and bones, particularly in children between the ages of 3 months and 8 years. Mild to moderate fluorosis typically results in permanent discoloring and disfiguration of tooth enamel. Severe fluorosis can cause chronic pain and lead to tooth and bone loss. Most efforts to combat fluorosis in the region have focused primarily on treating drinking water to reduce its fluoride content. Read article
Editorial Note: Flouride occurs naturally in many places in India in DEEP water wells that are relied on for clean water. A similar situation occurs in parts of Africa, made worse by malnutrition in populations.
Related articles: Pakistan: Vicious circle of fluoride contamination, illness and poverty
The Independent – Special Report day one: The phosphorus shells that devastated this city were fired in 2004. But are the victims of America’s dirty war still being born? For little Sayef, there will be no Arab Spring. He lies, just 14 months old, on a small red blanket cushioned by a cheap mattress on the floor, occasionally crying, his head twice the size it should be, blind and paralysed. Sayeffedin Abdulaziz Mohamed – his full name – has a kind face in his outsized head and they say he smiles when other children visit and when Iraqi families and neighbours come into the room. Read article
The Independent – Special Report day three: Abandoned and afraid, the parents of Iraq’s suffering children wait in vain for help. “He needs multiple surgery outside Iraq. … He has no hearing in his left ear. They told me he has to be six before they can remove cartilage from his chest wall to put in his ear. All operations have to be outside Iraq to beautify the ear and give him his hearing.” … Compared to other children with birth deformities, Sayef Ala’a is lucky. He can see, breathe, walk, run, play and listen to his father and friends with his right ear. Read article
Toronto Star – Pediatricians in Canada are starting to discharge children whose parents refuse to have them vaccinated. More and more, doctors are taking a stand when their medical advice is being ignored, said Dr. Hirotaka Yamashiro, chair of the pediatrics section for the Ontario Medical Association and president of the Pediatricians Alliance of Ontario. “There have been some pediatricians who are very concerned about that, and may not take on the patient in the beginning,” Yamashiro said. “If you are going to fundamentally disagree with one of the things I think is good for your child, what else are we going to have a problem with?” Dr. Fatima Kamalia, a Thornhill-based pediatrician, says she discharges patients whose parents refuse to have them vaccinated. Read Article
Special Report day two: The pictures flash up on a screen on an upper floor of the Fallujah General Hospital. And all at once, Nadhem Shokr al-Hadidi’s administration office becomes a little chamber of horrors. A baby with a hugely deformed mouth. A child with a defect of the spinal cord, material from the spine outside the body. A baby with a terrible, vast Cyclopean eye. Another baby with only half a head, stillborn like the rest, date of birth 17 June, 2009. Yet another picture flicks onto the screen: date of birth 6 July 2009, it shows a tiny child with half a right arm, no left leg, no genitalia. Read article
International Business Times – The ever-controversial screening policies of the TSA are under the microscope again after Dina Frank, a 7-year-old girl with cerebral palsy, was rigorously patted down to the point where her family missed their flight. “They make our lives completely difficult,” Dina’s father, Joshua Frank, told The Daily, as reported by CBS Washington, referring to the U.S. Transportation Security Administration. Dina’s “not a threat to national security.” Dina’s condition prevents her from being able to go through metal detectors at airports because of her leg braces and crutches, which means TSA agents have to pat her down. Read Article
Daily Mail – Fertility drugs can more than double the chances of children born to mothers who struggle to get pregnant developing leukaemia, a study has shown.
Children were 2.6 times more likely to become ill with acute lymphoblastic leukaemia (ALL), the most common type of childhood leukaemia, if their mothers had been treated with ovary-stimulating drugs. Read article
The West Australian – Environmental health experts have called for stricter control and monitoring of chemical contaminants in food, air and water after the release of data showing the extent of pollutants in pregnant women. Research by academics at Edith Cowan University found that the WA women tested had among the world’s highest levels of the heavy metal cadmium in their blood and urine as well as evidence of polychlorinated biphenyls banned in Australia since 1975. Read article
MNT – Researchers at the University of Liverpool have found that children who have experienced severe trauma are three times as likely to develop schizophrenia in later life. Read article
ABC – The Australian Medical Association (AMA) says there is no excuse for GPs administering banned vaccines amid data showing children were given the controversial flu shot, Fluvax. The Federal Health Department has confirmed the CSL product was given to a handful of children under the age of five, causing one confirmed adverse reaction, with two other suspected cases. Read article
Editorial Note: The “adverse reaction” mentioned above was reported by The Australian (newspaper) to have put the child in Intesive Care Unit.
The Guardian – In his first television interview, Glasenberg [Glencore CEO] said that Glencore took corporate responsibility seriously, saying: “We care about the environment. We care about the local communities.” But an investigation by the BBC’s Panorama has found Glencore dumping acid into a river and it discovered children as young as 10 working in the Tilwezembe mine, which was officially closed by Glencore in 2008. International law prohibits anyone under 18 working in a mine. Undercover researchers at Tilwezembe found under-18s who climbed down hand-dug mineshafts 150ft deep without safety or breathing equipment to dig copper and cobalt. Read article
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