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More than 21 million hospitalizations and 732,000 deaths among children born in the last 20 years have been spared by vaccination preventive action, but despite this more and more parents choose to shun vaccines, not only for them, but for their children as well. The consequences are evident, but it's not the lives of themselves and their children that parents who refuse vaccines risk. It's that of those around them, in their communities as well.
A new study conducted by Harvard scientists concluded that moderate consumption of alcohol (moderate!) can lead to lower risk of heart failure. The study, which was conducted on over 14,000 men and women aged 45-64 found that a small drink every day is associated with a 20 percent lower risk of men developing heart failure and […]
In a first for the UK, doctors have transplanted the kidneys and liver cells of a newborn baby girl to two recipients. The procedure, a milestone in neonatal care, is set to become more common once the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health will release its new set of guidelines this year. Elsewhere, newborn […]
The great apes are suffering greatly from Ebola too - gorillas and chimps are facing the greatest threat ever, after Ebola has wiped out a third of the populations since the 1990s.
What do you do if you need to catch your own food... but you're just not fast enough? That's the problem cone snails had to face, and the solution they came up with is pretty amazing: they kill fish by lowering their sugar levels with a unique type of insulin, researchers found
We like big butts and I know why: because it helps babies develop their brains properly. Researchers have found that especially during breastfeeding, the development of babies’ brains relies on fat supplies stripped directly from the mother’s thighs and bottom.
Out of all the solutions which could help deaf people here, this is definitely one of the most creative things I've seen. Researchers from the US have developed an electric mouthpiece that can transmit sounds to people - through their tongues.
Nutritionists have identified pizza as a major contributor to obesity among young children and adolescents, and caution parents to be extremely careful considering the prevalence of the food stuff. One of the world's favorite snack is very rich in saturated fat, sodium and calories and, in the US, one in five children eat pizza on any given day. Fast food pizza is considerably more rich in calories than cafeteria pizza.
The most important message mommies are missing is that pregnant women and their babies need vaccines to stay healthy, according to Saad Omer, a researcher the Royal Society for Public Health.
A recent study has shown that no matter the culture, circumcised boys have a significantly larger chance of developing autism spectrum disorder (ASD). According to the Danish researchers who conducted the study, the risk is especially larger for infantile autism, before the age of 5.
The statistics of children drinking milk at school may be skimmed by the fact that many kids actually only drink chocolate milk. A new study has found that when chocolate milk is removed from the menu, total milk consumption drops by 41%.
Hearing loss can be devastating: you lose friends, become ever trapped inside your head and alienated from society. Yet, only one in five Americans choose to use a hearing aid. Some ignore their problem, others can’t afford treatment or installing a hearing aid, but really a lot of people choose not to wear a hearing […]
People tend to follow the norm – that’s pretty well documented, and well understood. However, a new study has found that not only do people tend to follow other people, but they also follow the lead of a computer – even when it is blatantly wrong. In modern society, real life interactions and discussions are […]
The World Health Organization reports a drop in the Ebola cases in the three Western African countries hit most by the disease. However, as farmers abandon their fields in the infected areas, a new problem seems to emerge: a food crisis. Liberia only reported 48 cases in the past three weeks, but Sierra Leone is still struggling, with […]
Most kids believe that human and animal characteristics are innate - that is, looks, personality and language are intrinsic, inherited, and not something which can change over time. However, learning a second language can help them learn that some characteristics are acquired than inherited, enabling them to see the world in a different way.
The most comprehensive study of its kind found that people working more than 48 hours a week are at a significant risk of drinking more alcohol than it is safe. The study’s findings which included correspondents from 14 countries were not affected by socioeconomic status or region, suggesting they universally apply. The findings bear important […]
A new study has shown that women who experience racial discrimination while pregnant suffer significant health impacts - and they pass them on to their children.
For the first time, scientists have created a human muscle in a lab which can contract responds to external stimuli just like a real muscle. The engineered muscle responds to electrical pulses, biochemical signals and pharmaceuticals. The development will allow researchers to test the effect of drugs on human muscles without needing human subjects and in time, may lead to the creation of artificial muscles.
While this study may seem hilariously obvious at first, it was actually necessary. When Mormon religion meets homosexuality, the results are often so mind blowing and saddening that you just need studies like this to explain how things really are. In a society which believes that homosexuality is something treatable just like alcoholism, you need a study to tell people that if a gay man marries a woman, divorce is very likely.
Children nutrition in schools in the US has a big problem - not only are the kids not eating enough fruits and vegetables (which leads to health issues later on in life), but a study has shown that kids waste millions of dollars every day by throwing away the fruits and veggies. Now, a new study has found that a no-cost trick could greatly improve that: just have recess before lunch - not after.
CT shines in its ability to image tissue inside the body otherwise unapproachable using other methods. All of the GIFs in this post were made from computer images taken using General Electric's Revolution CT, first introduced in 2013. The device is designed to emit less radiation and provide more comfort. Guts, veins, brains and hearts have now been imaged in the gruesomest detail ever.
People spend more of their time asleep as babies than at any other point in their lives, but even if this has been common knowledge for some time we're only beginning to understand what role sleep plays during this key stage. University of Sheffield researchers claim that sleeping is key to leaning and forming new memories for infants as old as 12 months. Babies who didn't nap were far less able to repeat what they had been taught only 24 hours earlier.
Swiss scientists demonstrated a flexible ribbon-like implant that attaches itself to a paralyzed rat's spinal cord, allowing the animal to walk again. The prosthetic, described by foremost experts in the field as 'remarkable', works by delivering timed electrical impulses and drugs along the spinal cord. In this particular case, rats aren't that different from humans, and true enough clinical trials are now one step closer. In the future, paralysis might just be another word for "walking funny."
Researchers have found that just by analyzing your Facebook Likes, a computer can judge your personality better than even your close friends. They went even further than that, and calculated how many Likes the algorithm has to analyze to figure your personality traits.
The WHO says that the government's lack of action is adding much to shape the Ebola epidemic ravaging through West Africa and threatening the entire planet. The situation became more serious, and the WHO has released a document asking for more action if we want to control this epidemic and future ones.
When the flu hits, an unmistakable feeling of drowsiness sinks in. Washington State University Spokane scientists have now found a specific protein that is uniquely involved in sleep responses triggered by the influenza virus in mice. They found that the protein boosts the healing power of sleep and helps recovery. The researchers speculate that it might be possible to develop treatments based on it that might speed up recovery even more.
The "one size fits all" approach to diabetics treatment may cause significant problems for older patients also suffering from other conditions. Attempting to aggressively control blood sugar with insulin and sulfonylurea drugs could lead to over-treatment and hypoglycemia (low blood sugar), Yale researchers report.
A new study has shown that people with optimistic views of life tend to have much healthier hearts and have much lower risks of cardiovascular disease.
After four decades without any published scientific information on LSD, a new study has reopened the door for the psychedelic drug. Psychiatrists in Santa Cruz, California published results from the first controlled medical trial of LSD in over 40 years, highlighting potential medical benefits.
It's a game changer - scientists have discovered a new class of antibiotics which can kill an array of germs by blocking their capacity to build their cell walls, making it extremely difficult for bacteria to evolve resistance. It's the first such discovery in the past three decades, and comes as a much needed breath of air in the fight against superbugs.
For a while, the general consensus was that long term memories are stored in synapses. A new UCLA research topples this paradigm after experiments made on snails suggests that synapses aren’t that crucial storing memories as previously believed, but only facilitate the transfer of information someplace else, most likely in the nucleus of the neurons themselves […]
Hopes are high this time of year, but before your make your New Year’s resolution you might want to consider an important cognitive bias: when following goals, progress is given a lot more consideration than setbacks. Say your resolution is to lose weight, so next year you’ll be on a diet. Chances have it, according […]
The latest in brain-computer interface technology was recently demonstrated after woman with quadriplegia shaped a sophisticated robotic hand with ten degrees of freedom using her thoughts. Through the interface, she instructed the robotic hand to move up, down or sideways, pick up small or big objects and even squeeze them. In just a couple of years, […]
It seems like every year, at least one major TV station cautions us that the average person gains between 7 and 10 pounds during the holiday season and as such we should all be careful. In reality, studies show this is a myth and only one pound is gained on average.
Many TV shows (like Dr. Oz and The Doctors) claim to give solid medical advice, based on scientific evidence. But a new study has found that about half of all recommendations given on those TV shows are actually bogus, with either no scientific evidence to back them up, or even worse – being contradicted by […]
As modern medicine can be quite paradoxical sometimes, checking into a hospital can actually boost your chances of an infection; and if you’re thinking that this only happens in poorer, underdeveloped countries – you’re wrong. No matter where you check in at a hospital, you are vulnerable to infections which have nothing to do with […]
They say that when two people fall in love, you can see sparks flying. Well, that may or may not be true, but researchers from the US have shown that when sperm meets and egg – sparks definitely fly. Fertilization Fireworks These are the first images captured at the exact moment when a mammal’s egg is […]
Among evidence analyzed during a rape-related crime investigation, one of the best clues that might incriminate a suspect are pubic hair samples. But because these hairs most often than not are missing their roots, it’s very difficult if not impossible to make a conclusive DNA analysis. Silvana Tridico, a forensic biologist at Murdoch University in Perth […]
Widespread use of computers is said to make people dumber or more prone to forgetfulness. It’s true, while we’re less inclined to memorize things such as poems or mathematical formulas, this doesn’t necessarily make it a bad thing. A study made by US psychologists found that when people save information on their computers or phones, […]
You see them at the dentist, at the vet, the hair salon – the old magazines on the table. Fashion magazines, car magazines, travel magazines, whatever… they all have one thing in common – they’re really old. Why don’t practitioners just put new magazines? A new study has now shown that they really do… but […]
A new study conducted by Spanish researchers and published in the prestigious journal Pediatrics has revealed that late clamping of the umbilical cord leads to increased anti-oxidant capacity of mature newborns, and the moderation of inflammatory effects in the case of those born from induced labor. In other words, it leads to a better development in their first […]
A patient who has been in a near-vegetative state for two years has been awaken after receiving a common anti-anxiety drug.The patient was in this state following a motorcycling accident he had, and after receiving the drug, he immediately became active, talking to his doctor, calling his aunt and congratulating his brother on graduating. Then, […]
The wave of outrage against CIA’s interrogation techniques (which often involved torture) has been strong and sharp. But aside for being highly unethical (up to the point of inhumanity), a new study has shown that torture is also pretty ineffective. The report shows that confessions are four times more likely when interrogators adopt a respectful […]
A mind blowing international project performed a mass genome sequence to build the entire avian tree and reveal how birds evolved, particularly after the fall of the dinosaurs some 65 million years. A fallen dinosaur kingdom was replaced by a bird republic, as the direct descendants of the dinosaurs began to fill all the now […]
We’ve all experienced it – waking up early in the morning can be really hard, and even if you do wake up, you’re just not productive; and then, in the night, you just can’t go to sleep – you stay up too late, it gets even harder to wake up the next day and the […]
A study conducted on 11,000 Americans found that the vast majority of vegetarians relapse totally or partially after only one year. A third of them relapse after only three months. Vegetarianism is the practice of intentional abstaining from the consumption of meat (red meat, poultry, seafood and the flesh of any other animal), as well as […]
We’ve come a long way since the first mammal, a sheep named Dolly, was cloned. Now, a lab in South Korea will clone your dog for around $100,000; so far, they’ve cloned 400 pets since 2006. Cloning is still tabu in many parts of the world, but it’s a process which is no longer reserved for […]
Really bad experiences, like going through a particularly stressful or frighting situation, are a lot easier to remember than the things we do a day to day basis, or even those special pleasant experiences. That’s because we’re sort of evolutionary geared to remember those particularly nasty experiences so that we might avoid these in the future. […]
The more data doctors have of their patients’ health, the better the treatments they can prescribe. Ideally, you’d want patients to be constantly monitored for key life signs like heart rhythm, glucose levels or even brain activity. Typically, this is only possible in a hospital setting, but what if you want to follow how a […]
Talk about taking things literally, but it really seems like laughing gas or nitrous oxide, as it’s known by its chemical formula, can relieve chronic depression symptoms even in those cases where no other treatment seemed to render results. This is the first time that laughing gas was used as a potential treatment for depression. […]
