Health

The World Health Organization (WHO) has recently declared that Brunei is free of rubella disease as a public health problem.   The rubella virus is highly contagious, but its spread is preventable with safe and cost-effective vaccines. Initial symptoms among children include fever and rash.  Also known as German measles, rubella is particularly serious for pregnant women, as infection can ...

Britain’s High Streets are getting unhealthier, according to a report analysing 70 major UK towns and cities. The Royal Society for Public Health (RSPH) ranked High Streets with more payday lenders, bookmakers, tanning salons and fast food outlets the worst.   Grimsby led the unhealthy High Street list ahead of Walsall and Blackpool, while Edinburgh, Canterbury and Taunton had the ...

Women who want to bear children in their 30s and 40s often face a dilemma regarding how much time to wait between pregnancies. Doctors often advise they wait 18 to 24 months. But pregnancy risks mount with age.   A study Monday in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA), based on 150,000 pregnancies in Canada from 2004 to ...

According to a new study, older adults with tooth loss are at higher risk of both impaired oral health and malnutrition.   The study, which appeared in the Journal of Aging Research and Clinical Practice, analysed the health records of 107 community-dwelling senior citizens treated at the Rutgers School of Dental Medicine clinic between 2015 and 2016.  The results showed ...

It kills millions of people and is carried by a quarter of humans, yet there has been just a handful of new drugs in decades and the only vaccine is a century old.   Tuberculosis, a curable and preventable lung infection, killed more than 1.6 million people last year – almost as many as HIV/AIDS and malaria combined – and ...

Women’s bodies undergo a “striking” change during a specific week of pregnancy that can significantly reduce their risk of developing breast cancer later in life, scientists said Tuesday.   Previous research has highlighted how women under the age of 30 can reduce their risk of contracting breast cancer later in life by having a baby.  But a new study by ...

Eating vegetable nitrates, found mainly in green leafy vegetables and beetroot, could prevent macular degeneration, a common cause of vision loss in people over age 50, new research has found.   People who ate between 100 to 142 mgs (milligrams) of vegetable nitrates each day had a 35 per cent lower risk of developing early age-related macular degeneration (AMD) than ...

U.S. scientists at University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) have developed a new drug that can restore the function of oxygen-starved heart tissue under the conditions of hypoxia, according to the results of a new study released over the weekend.   The new drug called OMX-CV was developed by Omniox, Inc., one of the first biotech startups launched in the ...

The world’s largest burn and plastic surgery institute named after Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina is set to be inaugurated on Wednesday.   “Sheikh Hasina National Burn and Plastic Surgery Institute, which aims at opening a new horizon in burn treatment, will provide best treatment facilities to patients,” Chief Coordinator of the Institute Dr Samanta Lal Sen informed on Saturday, reports ...

Experts at a workshop on Thursday said Bangladesh has already achieved self sufficiency in food grain production, but its people should change their food habit and eat fruits daily for nutrition.   They came up with the observation at a day-long workshop on ‘dissemination of promising horticultural technology of BARI varieties and agro-techniques’ held at the conference room of Regional ...