This video - created by Casey Neistat for a New York Timesstory - explains why texting while walking is dangerous. Numerous people have sustained injuries from walking and texting simultaneously. A walking teen once fell down a manhole while texting. Doctors have been warning of the dangers since 2008.
The video shows how narrow your field of vision is when you are texting and walking at the same time. It also shows how walking while texting can be dangerous for other people as well. Neistat says the proper technique is to stop and put your back against a wall while you text. Take a look:
CNN has a report on the twelve girls at Le Roy JR/SR High School in Leroy, New York suffering from a mysterious Tourette-like illness. Health officials have found no evidence of infection, diseases or environmental factors at the high school. Dr. Laszlo Mechtler, a neurologist at the DENT Neurologic Institute in Amherst, N.Y. believes the girls are suffering from conversion disorder or mass hysteria. However, it is not clear what would have triggered the disorder. The girls don't feel like their lives are particular stressful. Take a look:
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The CDC says in its latest Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report (MMWR) that it has received reports of 12 human infections with influenza A (H3N2)v viruses. The CDC says the new swine flu strain contains the matrix (M) gene from the influenza A (H1N1)pdm09 virus (formerly called swine-origin influenza A [H3N2] and pandemic influenza A [H1N1] 2009 viruses).
The 12 cases occurred in five states (Indiana, Iowa, Maine, Pennsylvania, and West Virginia). Eleven of the twelve cases were children. Six of the 12 patients had no identified recent exposure to swine. Three of the 12 patients were hospitalized, and all have recovered fully.
U.S. Newsreports that the sample of cases so far is too small for CDC epidemiologists to determine how contagious the new swine flu strain will become. If it does spread the current seasonal flu vaccine will not be much help.
The death of a 39-year-old man in China from bird flu (H5N1) has renewed concerns that the virus will eventually cause a pandemic. The man died in Shenzhen, a southern city of China. The Wall Street Journalreports that H5N1 has infected 575 people and killed 338 since. This is a very high death rate for a flu virus. The good news is so far the disease has not spread very easily from person-to-person. Scientists are very concerned that someday the virus will mutate and the virus will start spreading easily from human-to-human and become a global pandemic. Take a look:
A study released earlier this year found a link between cell phones and brain cancer. The study found people using cell phones for more than ten years had double the rate of a type of brain tumor. Dr. Kieth Black, Chairman of Neurology, Cedas-Sinai Medical Center, told CNN's Dr. Gupta that there "is no way to say that cell phone usage is safe. I think that the public has the right to know that there could be a potential risk."
Now there is a new Danish study saying cell phones are safe. The new study followed 350,000 people for about ten years. No doubt there will be another study in a few months saying the opposite. Take a look:
The clinical trial of a new malaria vaccine, RTS,S, has shown promise in Africa. Researchers say infants given the vaccine had half the malaria risk of those not given the vaccine. The study was published in The New England Journal of Medicine. Former Microsoft CEO/co-founder Bill Gates was thrilled with the results. The vaccine itself is probably about three years away. Take a look:
The Palm Beach Post is reporting that a second case of locally acquired dengue fever has been reported in Palm Beach County. Health Department Director Alina Alonso in a statement, "We have been closely monitoring the county for the possibility of dengue. The second case is good evidence that it is becoming established here and all should be on the alert to prevent mosquitoes from biting."
The first case, reported on October 13, prompted an advisory. The Palm Beach Post reports that the advisory is being upgraded to an alert.
There have also been at least two cases of locally acquired dengue fever in Miami-Dade counties.
The FDA has approved LeGoo, a gel that enables surgeons to temporarily stop blood flow during surgery. The goo can be used intead of clamps or elastic loops. The FDA says LeGoo can minimize blood flow to the surgical area without causing damage to the blood vessels.
Christy Foreman, director of the Office of Device Evaluation in the FDA’s Center for Devices and Radiological Health, said, "LeGoo is an innovative device that offers surgeons an additional aid during vascular surgery. The gel’s unique properties may facilitate surgeries that entail the joining or grafting blood vessels."
LeGoo remains liquid at room temperature but solidifies at higher temperatures. The gel forms a plug that molds to shape of blood vessels when it is injected. The gel can stop blood flow for up to 15 minutes.
CBS Newsreports that an independent government panel has concluded that a PSA (prostate specific antigen) blood test used to diagnose prostate cancer is not worth its risks. There are 241,000 cases of prostate cancer each year. 34,000 of the cases result in death. The PSA blood test can run positive for non-cancer causes such as infections and an enlarged prostate.
Early Show medical correspondent Dr. Jennifer Ashton says the test can generate false positives, which can lead to unnecessary biopsies, surgery and radiation. She also says there can be false negatives. Take a look:
Some disturbing newly published research by The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston (UTHealth) says that brain damage that characterizes Alzheimer's disease may originate in a form similar to that of infectious prion diseases, such as bovine spongiform encephalopathy (mad cow disease) and Creutzfeldt-Jakob. The researchers found in an experiment with mice that mice can develop Alzheimer's when the brain tissue of a human Alzheimer's patient is injected into their brains.
The researchers injected the brain tissue from a confirmed human Alzheimer's patient into mice and compared the results to those from injected tissue of a control without the disease. None of the mice injected with the control showed signs of Alzheimer's, whereas all of those injected with Alzheimer's brain extracts developed plaques and other brain alterations typical of the disease.
Claudio Soto, Ph.D., professor of neurology at The University of Texas Medical School at Houston, said in a statement, "We took a normal mouse model that spontaneously does not develop any brain damage and injected a small amount of Alzheimer's human brain tissue into the animal's brain. The mouse developed Alzheimer's over time and it spread to other portions of the brain. We are currently working on whether disease transmission can happen in real life under more natural routes of exposure."
Soto also says, "Our findings open the possibility that some of the sporadic Alzheimer's cases may arise from an infectious process, which occurs with other neurological diseases such as mad cow and its human form, Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease. The underlying mechanism of Alzheimer's disease is very similar to the prion diseases. It involves a normal protein that becomes misshapen and is able to spread by transforming good proteins to bad ones. The bad proteins accumulate in the brain, forming plaque deposits that are believed to kill neuron cells in Alzheimer's."
The results showing a potentially infectious spreading of Alzheimer's disease in animal models were published in the Oct. 4, 2011 online issue of Molecular Psychiatry.
A Today show investigation found that some delivery trucks are too hot to carry produce. Today rode along with police that pulled over trucks carrying produce in Indiana. They checked the produce and found the temperatures were way too high to be safe. Some trucks were refrigerator trucks that were not working. Other trucks were carrying produce that needed to be cold and they did not even have refrigerator units. Today says Indiana is the only state where police even bother to check food trucks. Take a look:
A new military study found that active duty men were 62% higher to commit suicide if they had low levels of Omega-3 fatty acids. The study compared blood samples of 800 male military service members who later committed suicide to samples from 800 soldiers who did not kill themselves.
Omega-3s have already been linked to health benefits in past studies, such as reducing heart disease risk and joint pain. Some foods that that contain omega-3 fatty acids include walnuts, flax seeds and salmon. WebMD has an article about Omega-3s here.
CNN's Elizabeth Cohen talked about GOP candidate Michele Bachmann's bizarre comments that the HPV vaccine Gardasil is unsafe and can cause mental retardation. Bachmann is apparently sticking by her charges despite many experts saying she is totally wrong about the HPV vaccined.
Elizabeth Cohen says there is no scientific evidence that terrible things happen after someone gets the vaccine. It is true that there have been adverse effects reported, but there is no evidence that they were caused by the vaccine. The CDC has a page here about reports of health concerns following HPV vaccination. Take a look:
Actress Kate Winslet played Dr. Erin Mears in the disease thriller Contagion. Winslet told CNN's Sanjay Gupta that she admires the infectious disease experts who try and hunt down the source of outbreaks.
Kate says, "They are extraordinarily brave people and highly skilled, highly intelligent and somewhat intimidating I found them to be, just simply because they have so much knowledge and they care so much about the job that they do. They operate in isolated little bubbles - it's just them, their backpack and their Dell computer. They just have to get on with it and work tirelessly all hours around the clock to do whatever they need to do in order to find that index patient. I just really admire them."
Kate also says she washes her hands a little bit more than she needs to these days. She says making the film made her a lot more "germ conscious." Take a look:
The FDA has approved 
