Pharmaceuticals

Animal studies find that a replacement compound for the estrogen-mimicking chemical bisphenol A may also be harmful to human health

The Ebola outbreak in Western Africa continues to make the news as more cases are reported and casualties rise. A common thread in reporting is the difficulty in communicating accurate information to combat the spread of the virus when communities are gripped with fear and misinformation spreads as quickly as the virus itself.

The World Health Organization's announcement could shift the focus to basic public health

News is rapidly changing regarding Ebola. Even as I've been writing this post, we've gone from "There is no treatment except supportive care" to NIH's Dr.

Outbreaks of science myth-busting can be a bit of a puzzlement. The science behind a popular headline-maker might be a tottering house of cards, but it can be impressively sturdy nevertheless.

The retraction represents a setback for those trying to explain a puzzling cluster of sudden-onset narcolepsy reported in 2010 in Europe

There is little risk of the deadly virus spreading to the U.S., experts say
 

Drug regulators are weighting the merits of disclosing preliminary results from experiments to justify a drug's federal approval and then monitor its safety

Pack rats given the right gut bacteria via a fecal transplant from other pack rats can then digest foods that they formerly could not, but the donors could. Karen Hopkin reports 

 

The Tuskegee Syphilis Experiment was an infamous clinical study that began in 1932, conducted by the Public Health Service at the Tuskegee Institute.

When refilled prescriptions for post–heart attack care resulted in the same medication looking different in shape or color, patients were significantly more likely to stop taking their meds. Dina Fine Maron reports

 

A commonly used blood thinner does not appear to lower the risk of blood clots or miscarriage during pregnancy