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Mashup Score: 0
The Israeli military has launched a ground incursion into Rafah, southern Gaza, despite warnings from aid organisations that this would have “catastrophic consequences” for the 1.3 million displaced Palestinians sheltering in the area.1 Bob Kitchen, the International Rescue Committee’s vice president on emergencies, said on 8 May that dozens of civilians had already been killed in overnight attacks, while “hundreds of thousands more remain at grave risk from the threat of further conflict and a lack of access to life saving assistance.”2 Kitchen said it was “unconscionable to target such a densely populated area” and urged Israel to “halt further violence” and for “all parties to agree to an immediate and permanent ceasefire.” He has also called on the international community to “wield all diplomatic influence at its disposal to bring the parties to an agreement and halt the humanitarian tragedy underway in Rafah.” Last week the World Health Organization warned that a …
Source: www.bmj.comCategories: General Medicine News, General Journals & SocietTweet
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Mashup Score: 105Why corporate power is a public health priority - 2 hour(s) ago
The marketing campaigns of multinational corporations are harming our physical, mental, and collective wellbeing. Gerard Hastings urges the public health movement to take action The work of Professor Richard Doll provides two key lessons for public health. The first, that we must do all we can to eradicate the use of tobacco, has been well learnt and is being energetically acted upon. The second, more subtle learning—that our economic system has deep flaws—remains largely ignored. And yet, lethal though tobacco is, the harm being done to public health by our economic system is far greater. Furthermore, the two are intimately connected: tobacco has remained such an intractable problem only because our economic system allows free ranging corporations to market it. The same applies to the other two “industrial epidemics”1 that constitute such a large share of the public health burden: alcohol misuse and obesity. In each case evocative promotion, ubiquitous distribution, perpetual new prod
Source: www.bmj.comCategories: General Medicine News, CardiologistsTweet
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Mashup Score: 2Polio vaccines: hope, hype, and history repeating? - 3 hour(s) ago
Announcement of new polio vaccines has once again raised hopes of eradicating polio. But the ongoing difficulties of their predecessors provide a cautionary tale, writes Robert Fortner In June 2023, a research article in Nature heralded new, “more stable” versions of the vaccines against two of the three types of poliovirus (types 1 and 3).1 “Super-engineered polio vaccines created to help end polio,” read a BBC headline.2 “Polio endgame finish is in sight,”3 added a Nature news article.3 The backdrop, however, is a little muddier. A similar fanfare had greeted the first of this new generation of oral polio vaccines in 2021. Novel oral polio vaccine type 2 (nOPV2) targets type 2 polio and went straight into widespread use. But it remains far from clear how well nOPV2 works. Before it was approved for emergency use, scientists warned that nOPV2 would not solve the problem set for it: to stamp out vaccine-derived polio. So far, it has not done so. Instead there are unanswered questions a
Source: www.bmj.comCategories: General Medicine News, General HCPsTweet
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Mashup Score: 3Moderna’s decision to shelve vaccine plant in Kenya should encourage global south’s self-reliance, says global health adviser - 3 hour(s) ago
A decision by the drug manufacturer Moderna to drop plans to set up its first mRNA vaccine manufacturing plant outside the United States in Nairobi, Kenya, should be seen as a wake-up call to developing countries to increase their investment in vaccine and drug development, an expert has said. Madhukar Pai, a Canada research chair in epidemiology and global health at McGill University’s School of Population and Global Health, said that it was “a huge mistake” for African nations to rely on the drug industry. Pai told The BMJ that Moderna’s “U turn on manufacturing in Africa was not a surprise to anyone” given the company’s reluctance to share …
Source: www.bmj.comCategories: General Medicine News, Hem/OncsTweet
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Mashup Score: 26
Five infants died after developing whooping cough in England in the first three months of 2024, the UK Health Security Agency has reported.1 Altogether there were 1319 confirmed cases of whooping cough in the UK in March, up from 918 in February and 556 in January, bringing the total number of cases up to the end …
Source: www.bmj.comCategories: General Medicine News, General HCPsTweet
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Mashup Score: 3
Objective To compare the effectiveness of three commonly prescribed oral antidiabetic drugs added to metformin for people with type 2 diabetes mellitus requiring second line treatment in routine clinical practice. Design Cohort study emulating a comparative effectiveness trial (target trial). Setting Linked primary care, hospital, and death data in England, 2015-21. Participants 75 739 adults with type 2 diabetes mellitus who initiated second line oral antidiabetic treatment with a sulfonylurea, DPP-4 inhibitor, or SGLT-2 inhibitor added to metformin. Main outcome measures Primary outcome was absolute change in glycated haemoglobin A1c (HbA1c) between baseline and one year follow-up. Secondary outcomes were change in body mass index (BMI), systolic blood pressure, and estimated glomerular filtration rate (eGFR) at one year and two years, change in HbA1c at two years, and time to ≥40% decline in eGFR, major adverse kidney event, hospital admission for heart failure, major adverse cardio
Source: www.bmj.comCategories: General Medicine News, General HCPsTweet
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Mashup Score: 2“I’m not asking to be let off”—suspended climate activist GP Sarah Benn continues to stand her ground - 5 hour(s) ago
Sarah Benn—the first doctor to face disciplinary action after being convicted and jailed for actions relating to climate activism—tells Adele Waters why suspension from the medical register will not stop her protesting “I don’t feel guilty. I don’t feel I’ve dishonoured the profession, and I think I could explain myself very well to anybody who thought that I had,” says Sarah Benn, climate activist and former general practitioner. Fresh from the decision by the UK’s Medical Practitioners Tribunal Service (MPTS) on 23 April to suspend her from the professional register for five months,1 she finds the situation clear: the activism that led to her suspension was necessary to raise the alarm over the climate crisis and was also in keeping with a doctor’s mission to promote health and save lives. “The world is facing an unprecedented crisis due to the danger of climate and ecological collapse, and I believe that my actions are a justified and proportionate effort to raise an alarm about the
Source: www.bmj.comCategories: General Medicine News, General HCPsTweet
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Mashup Score: 12China’s declining fertility rate - 6 hour(s) ago
A long term trend with serious implications for population health and healthcare China had the largest population in the world for many decades. Its total fertility rate (the average number of children a woman is expected to have in her lifetime) was as high as 6.0 before 1970, then decreased to 1.5-1.7 by the late 1990s. The rate remained stable until the early 2010s and then fell again.1 In an attempt to increase birth rates, China replaced its one child policy—introduced in 1979— with a universal two child policy from 2015. However, the total fertility rate continued to fall, reaching 1.3 by 2020.2 Additional pronatalist measures followed in 2021 but did not reverse the trend. In 2023, just 9.02 million babies were born in China, half the number born in 2016. As societies become more prosperous and women achieve greater equality in education and employment, a falling birth rate seems unavoidable. In addition to rapid socioeconomic development and urbanisation, China’s family plannin
Source: www.bmj.comCategories: General Medicine News, General Journals & SocietTweet
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Mashup Score: 6
Working in clinical research alongside clinical practice can make for a rewarding and worthwhile career.123 Building research into a clinical career starts with research training for early and mid-career doctors. Traditional research training typically involves a dedicated period within an integrated clinical academic training programme or as part of an externally funded MD or PhD degree. Informal training opportunities, such as journal clubs and principal investigator (PI)-mentorship are available (box 1), but in recent years several other initiatives have launched in the UK, meaning there are more ways to obtain research experience and embark on a career in clinical research. Box 1 ### Examples of in-person and online research training opportunities These are available either informally or formally, free of charge or paid, and via local employing hospital trusts, allied health organisations, royal colleges, or universities #### Research training opportunitiesRETURN TO TEXT This artic
Source: www.bmj.comCategories: General Medicine News, EndocrinologyTweet
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Mashup Score: 11Ultra-processed foods linked to higher mortality - 8 hour(s) ago
Debate about the “ultra-processed” concept must not delay food policies that improve health As research into ultra-processed food gains momentum,1 so too does the debate.234 Foods that fall into the ultra-processed category according to the Nova classification are heterogeneous and include carbonated soft drinks, confectionary, extruded snack foods, distilled alcohol (spirits), and mass produced packaged wholegrain bread.5 Ultra-processed foods are typically high in energy, added sugar, saturated fat, and salt, and a major criticism of previous studies is that they have not disentangled the effects of processing, per se, from the nutrient profile of food products. The linked paper by Fang and colleagues (doi:10.1136/bmj-2023-078476) addresses this concern and others, in their evaluation of the relation between ultra-processed food consumption and mortality in two large US cohort studies.6 Fang and colleagues found a modest increase in the risk of total mortality with higher ultra-proce
Source: www.bmj.comCategories: General Medicine News, General HCPsTweet
The Israeli military has launched a ground incursion into Rafah, southern Gaza, despite warnings from aid organisations that this would have “catastrophic consequences” for the 1.3 million displaced Palestinians sheltering in the area https://t.co/cpnZEx6nvN