Edmund's Newsletter July 1, 2008 Issue: #27 Volume 8 Join Our List In This Issue Cigarette Use Among High School Students Fake Virus Could Make Safe New Vaccines Different Type of Colon Cancer Vaccine Reduces Disease Spread Marijuana May Be Effective For Neuropathic Pain Computers as Safe as Medical Experts for Prescribing Blood Thinning Drugs Study Sheds Light on Role of Abortion Drug in Causing Rare, Fatal Infections When Used Off-Label Blue Light Used to Harden Tooth Fillings Stunts Tumor Growth Believe It Or Not News From MedWatch Recently Approved Drugs/Indications FDA Recalls and Safety Alerts in the Past 60 Days Drug Shortages Quick Links Edmund's Blog Edmund's Newsletter Edmund's Web Page Past Issues SPECIAL THANKS TO Michael R. Cohen President The Institute for Safe Medication Practices and Dr. Stephen Barrett Quackwatch Some links in Edmund's Newsletter will point to a page that requires registration.  In all cases the most you will have to do is fill out a simple form to enroll as a member.  In no case will I point you to a site that requires payment to view the page. PRAY FOR PEACE © 2001,2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007 Join Our List Cigarette Use Among High School Students Cigarette use is the leading preventable cause of death in the United States (1). A national health objective for 2010 is to reduce the prevalence of current cigarette use among high school students to 16% or less (27-2b) (1). To examine changes in cigarette use among high school students in the United States during 1991--2007, CDC analyzed data from the national Youth Risk Behavior Survey (YRBS). This report summarizes the results of that analysis, which indicated that the prevalence of lifetime cigarette use was stable during 1991--1999 and then declined from 70.4% in 1999 to 50.3% in 2007. The prevalence of current cigarette use increased from 27.5% in 1991 to 36.4% in 1997, declined to 21.9% in 2003, and remained stable from 2003 to 2007. The prevalence of current frequent cigarette use increased from 12.7% in 1991 to 16.8% in 1999 and then declined to 8.1% in 2007. To resume the declines observed in current cigarette use during 1997--2003 and achieve the 2010 objective, communitywide comprehensive tobacco-control programs that use coordinated evidence-based strategies should be implemented and revitalized. The biennial national YRBS, a component of CDC's Youth Risk Behavior Surveillance System, used independent, three-stage cluster samples for the 1991--2007 surveys to obtain cross-sectional data representative of public and private school students in grades 9--12 in all 50 states and the District of Columbia (2). Sample sizes ranged from 10,904 to 16,296. For each cross-sectional national survey, students completed anonymous, self-administered questionnaires that included identically worded questions about cigarette use. School response rates ranged from 70% to 81%, and student response rates ranged from 83% to 90%; therefore, overall response rates for the surveys ranged from 60% to 70%. For this analysis, temporal changes for three behaviors were assessed: lifetime cigarette use (i.e., ever tried cigarette smoking, even one or two puffs), current cigarette use (i.e., smoked cigarettes on at least 1 day during the 30 days before the survey), and current frequent cigarette use (i.e., smoked cigarettes on 20 or more days during the 30 days before the survey). Race/ethnicity data are presented only for non-Hispanic black, non-Hispanic white, and Hispanic students (who might be of any race); the numbers of students from other racial/ethnic groups were too small for meaningful analysis. Read more..... Fake Virus Could Make Safe New Vaccines A "wimpy" artificial virus protected mice against polio, and the approach might be used to make a range of safer new vaccines against viruses, U.S. researchers reported on Friday. The team at the State University of New York, Stony Brook, had created the first artificial virus, a synthetic version of polio, in 2002. Reporting in the journal Science, they said they used it to vaccinate mice, and then infected the mice with what should have been a deadly dose of polio. The mice survived. "Ultimately we created a wimpy poliovirus that can be customized and does not cause disease unless given at high doses," Bruce Futcher, a professor of molecular genetics and microbiology who worked on the study. Read more..... Different Type of Colon Cancer Vaccine Reduces Disease Spread Taking advantage of the fact that the intestines have a separate immune system from the rest of the body, scientists at the Kimmel Cancer Center at Jefferson in Philadelphia have found a way to immunize mice against the development of metastatic disease. Reporting online Tuesday, June 24, 2008 in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute, Scott Waldman, M.D., Ph.D., professor and chair of Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics at Jefferson Medical College of Thomas Jefferson University and his co-workers have shown that mice immunized with an intestinal protein developed fewer lung and liver metastases after injection with colon cancer cells than did control animals that were not immunized. The work may portend the development of a different kind of cancer vaccine, the researchers say, that may help prevent disease recurrence. One of the reasons that cancer vaccines have been disappointing in many cases is the lack of immune system-alerting protein antigens that are specific for tumors only. According to Dr. Waldman, mucosal cells, which line the intestines (colon cancer arises from mucosal cells, and mucosal cell proteins continue to be expressed even after they become cancer) are essentially compartmentalized and possess a separate and distinct immune system from the body's general immune system. He and his group thought that such proteins would be seen as foreign by the latter system and be useful for anti-cancer vaccines. Dr. Waldman, postdoctoral fellow Adam Snook, Ph.D., and their colleagues engineered viruses - adenovirus, vaccinia and rabies - to express the protein guanylyl cyclase C (GCC), which is normally found in the intestinal lining (and in metastatic colon cancer). The researchers injected the animals with colon cancer cells before or after immunization. Read more..... Marijuana May Be Effective For Neuropathic Pain The growing body of evidence that marijuana (cannabis) may be effective as a pain reliever has been expanded with publication of a new study in The Journal of Pain reporting that patients with nerve pain showed reduced pain intensity from smoking marijuana. Researchers at University of California Davis examined whether marijuana produces analgesia for patients with neuropathic pain. Thirty-eight patients were examined. They were given either high-dose (7%), low-dose (3.5%) or placebo cannabis. The authors reported that identical levels of analgesia were produced at each cumulative dose level by both concentrations of the agent. As with opioids, cannabis does not rely on a relaxing or tranquilizing effect, but reduces the core component of nociception and the emotional aspect of the pain experience to an equal degree. There were undesirable consequences observed from cannabis smoking, such as feeing high or impaired, but they did not inhibit tolerability or cause anyone to withdraw from the study. In general, side effects and mood changes were inconsequential. Read more..... Computers as Safe as Medical Experts for Prescribing Blood Thinning Drugs The largest ever study into the administration of blood thinning drugs, principally Warfarin, has concluded that dosages calculated by computer are at least as safe and reliable as those provided by expert medical professionals. Increasing evidence of the value of these anticoagulant drugs in a wide range of clinical disorders such as abnormal heart rhythm, or atrial fibrillation, has led to a rapid rise in their use around the world. However, prescribing the right oral dose of anticoagulant to patients, even for experienced medical staff, can be problematic as individuals differ greatly in response to a given dose and a single patient's response can change over the period of an illness. Too high a dose for an individual and the blood becomes too thin and can lead to internal bleeding, too low and the blood clots too readily. Previous studies supporting the use of computer-assisted dosage have depended solely on laboratory results and have not been sufficiently large to determine whether prolongation of normal blood clotting - measured as the 'international normalised ratio' or INR - resulted in clinical benefit and improved safety. Read more..... Study Sheds Light on Role of Abortion Drug in Causing Rare, Fatal Infections When Used Off-Label The off-label use of a drug given with RU-486 to terminate a pregnancy may be responsible for a handful of rare, fatal infections seen in women taking the drugs since 2000, a study by University of Michigan scientists suggests. The drug misoprostol is FDA-approved to be taken by mouth along with RU-486 to end a pregnancy. But many women have received the drug vaginally as part of the two-drug combination, a method of delivery not evaluated by the FDA.   In animal and cell culture studies, the U-M researchers found that misoprostol, when given directly in the reproductive tract, suppresses key immune responses and can allow a normally non-threatening bacterium, Clostridium sordellii, to gain the upper hand and cause deadly infection. When absorbed through the stomach, however, the drug did not compromise immune defenses or cause illness.   The study, which appears online ahead of print in the Journal of Immunology, also has implications for understanding dangerous infections that occur during pregnancy. Read more..... Blue Light Used to Harden Tooth Fillings Stunts Tumor Growth A blue curing light used to harden dental fillings also may stunt tumor growth, Medical College of Georgia researchers say. "The light sends wavelengths of blue-violet light to the composite, which triggers hardening," says Alpesh Patel, a rising MCG School of Dentistry junior. "The light waves produce free radicals that activate the catalyst and speed up polymerization of the composite resin. In oral cancer cells, though, those radicals cause damage that decreases cell growth and increases cell death." Mr. Patel, who has been working with Dr. Jill Lewis, associate professor of oral biology, Dr. Regina Messer, associate professor of oral rehabilitation and oral biology, and Dr. John Wataha, adjunct professor of oral rehabilitation and oral biology, studied 10 tumor-bearing mice, five treated with the light and five untreated. He exposed half the mice to the blue light for 90 seconds a day for 12 days. Then the tumors were extracted and each one was split into two sections. Half were used to create slides for tissue analysis, and half were frozen to prepare protein extracts. Read more..... Believe it or not Man auctions off his life, sale price disappoints A man who put his life up for auction on eBay found it wasn't worth quite as much as he thought when he settled for around A$100,000 (48,000 pounds) less than his target price. Ian Usher, 44, held the seven-day auction of all his belongings, including his three-bedroom home in the west Australian city of Perth and a trial for his job at a rug store, after the break-up of his five-year marriage. Bids had reached as high as A$2.2 million, only for Usher to discover there had been a glitch on eBay's system which allowed the participation of non-registered bidders who had put in bogus offers. In the end, the winning bidder agreed to pay A$399,300 (190,656 pounds) for all of Usher's worldly goods, which also include his friends, a motorcycle and a jetski. According to the eBay website, the mystery buyer, whose user name is "mslmcc", is in Australia and has a 100 percent feedback score. Usher, who gave regular updates on the auction on his Web site www.alife4sale.com, now plans to travel in search of a new life. He's not the first person to put his life on the block. American John Freyer started All My Life For Sale (www.allmylifeforsale.com) in 2001 and sold everything he owned on eBay, later visiting the people who bought his things. Adam Burtle, a 20-year-old U.S. university student, offered his soul for sale on eBay in 2001, with bidding hitting $400 before eBay called it off, saying there had to be something tangible to sell. Burtle later admitted he was a bored geek. ($1 = A$1.05) News From MedWatch Keep up-to-date on all of the recent MedWatch reports that gives you timely safety information on the drugs and other medical products regulated by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration by  CLICKING HERE   Recently Approved Drugs/Indications Keep up-to-date on all of the recently approved drugs and/or approved new indications on already FDA approved drugs by CLICKING HERE   FDA Recalls and Safety Alerts in the Past 60 Days: To see a list of all FDA Recalls and product safety alerts for the last 60 days CLICK HERE   Drug Shortages: As many of you are aware, many drugs in the US are either unavailable or in short supply.  To view a list of these drugs CLICK HERE   Recommend Edmund's Newsletter Edmund's Newsletter is published for only one reason and that is expand our knowledge base, join people together with like minds and to disseminate valuable information. If you feel this newsletter is of worth, please pass it along to your friends and colleagues. 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