Venezuela’s opposition demands “whole truth” about Chavez health

CARACAS (Reuters) – Venezuela‘s opposition on Wednesday demanded the government tell “the whole truth” about the health of cancer-stricken President Hugo Chavez, who has not been heard from in three weeks after undergoing a grueling operation in Cuba.

Officials have acknowledged the usually garrulous former soldier’s health is delicate after his fourth cancer surgery in 18 months, but they have offered scant details on his condition.

He has not spoken in public in more than three weeks.

Ramon Aveledo, head of the opposition Democratic Unity coalition, slammed the government for not keeping its word about keeping Venezuelans informed.

“The official version (of Chavez’s health) hides more information than it gives,” Aveledo said at a press conference.

“The vice president himself has promised to tell the truth, whatever it is. Fine, he should tell it. He should tell the whole truth,” said Aveledo.

Vice President Nicolas Maduro, whom Chavez last month designated as his heir apparent, on Tuesday said in an interview from Havana that Chavez had recognized the complexity of his post-operative condition.

Maduro said he was returning to Venezuela after several days visiting with Chavez and his relatives, which may quell rumors his trip to Cuba signaled the president was in his final days.

The president’s son-in-law and Science Minister Jorge Arreaza, who is in Havana, said via his Twitter account on Wednesday that the medical team told him Chavez’s condition “remains stable” but that his health is still delicate.

“Commander Chavez is fighting hard and he sends his love to the people. Dedication and patience!!!” he tweeted.

Chavez’s abrupt exit from the political scene would be a shock for Venezuela, where his oil-financed socialism has made him a hero to the poor majority but a nemesis to critics who call him a dictator.

He is still set to be sworn in on January 10, as laid out in the constitution. If he dies or steps aside, new elections would be held within 30 days, with Maduro running as the Socialist Party candidate.

DELICATE HEALTH

Chavez suffered unexpected bleeding and a respiratory infection after a six-hour operation on December 11. Terse official statements have said nothing about when he might be expected back or whether his life is in danger.

The government has provided none of the signature videos or pictures released after Chavez was diagnosed with cancer in June 2011 and his relapse in 2012. And allies have refused to discuss the possibility that he could hand over power or resign.

Chavez last year staged what appeared to be remarkable comeback from the disease to win reelection to a third six-year term in October despite being weakened by radiation therapy. He returned to Cuba for new treatment within weeks of his win.

Officials from the ruling Socialist Party are now suggesting his inauguration could be postponed indefinitely to accommodate his health.

Aveledo insisted the government should stick to the January 10 timeline called for in the constitution.

“Trying to make the country believe that the president is governing is absurd to the point of being irresponsible,” he said. “January 10 marks the end of one presidential term and the start of another. As such, there is no continuation of the current government.”

Aveledo said if Chavez cannot make it back in time, he should hand power over to the president of Congress – who would temporarily run the country while elections are called.

Congress, controlled by Chavez allies, on Saturday elects a new president. Current Congress chief Diosdado Cabello, a close Chavez ally who could be reelected to head the legislature, has at times been considered a rival of Maduro. The two have taken great pains in recent weeks to publicly deny this.

While the constitution cites January 10 as the start of the new term, it does not explicitly state what happens if the president does not take office on that date.

Chavez’s condition is being watched closely by Latin American countries that have benefited from his generous assistance, as well as Wall Street investors who are drawn to Venezuela’s lucrative and heavily traded bonds.

(Editing by Cynthia Osterman)

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Gambian leader says to build herbal AIDS-cure hospital

BANJUL (Reuters) – AIDS patients would be offered an herbal cure at a 1,111-bed hospital in Gambia that the president said on Tuesday he plans to build despite medical concerns the treatment is dangerous.

President Yahya Jammeh said in 2007 he had found a remedy of boiled herbs to cure AIDS, stirring anger among Western medical experts who claimed he was giving false hope to the sick.

“With this project coming to fruition, we intend to treat 10,000 HIV/AIDS patients every six months through natural medicine,” Jammeh said in his New Year’s address, adding that he expected the 1,111-bed hospital to open in 2015.

The World Health Organisation and the United Nations have said Jammeh’s HIV/AIDS treatment is alarming mainly because patients are required to cease their anti-retroviral drugs, making them more prone to infection.

Jammeh said in October that 68 HIV/AIDS patients undergoing his herbal remedy had been cured and discharged, the seventh batch since the treatments began five years ago.

Other African leaders have drawn criticism for extolling the power of natural remedies to combat AIDS.

The administration of former South African President Thabo Mbeki was ridiculed for denying there was a link between HIV and AIDS while prescribing meaningless treatments such as beet root instead of internationally proven medicines.

The HIV rate in Gambia is relatively low compared to other African states, with 2 percent of the country’s roughly 1.8 million people infected, according to the United Nations.

Jammeh came to power in Gambia, a sliver of land on Africa’s west coast that is popular with sun-seeking European tourists, in a bloodless military coup in 1994.

He is accused by activists of human rights abuses during his rule, and most recently drew international criticism for executing nine death-row inmates by firing squad.

(Reporting by Pap Saine; Writing by Richard Valdmanis; Editing by Michael Roddy)

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Combative Obama knocks Republicans, says fiscal deal in sight

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – President Barack Obama, in remarks that needled Republicans and resembled a victory lap, said on Monday an agreement with Congress to avoid a “fiscal cliff” of tax increases and spending cuts was in sight.

The Democratic president appeared at a White House event in the early afternoon with cheering supporters to press for lawmakers to complete a deal that would extend tax cuts for the middle class, raise rates for high earners and extend unemployment insurance for people seeking work.

“Today it appears that an agreement to prevent this New Year’s tax hike is within sight, but it is not done,” Obama said. “There are still issues left to resolve, but we’re hopeful that Congress can get it done.”

Hours later, however, a Democratic aide said skeptical senators from the president’s own party had sought a meeting with Vice President Joe Biden to discuss the deal, and the House of Representatives appeared unlikely to hold a vote on Monday, suggesting the country would – at least technically – go over the cliff anyway.

Obama, who won re-election in November partially on a promise to increase taxes on the wealthiest Americans, made a point of noting in his remarks that the opposing party came around to his position on raising rates.

“Keep in mind that just last month Republicans in Congress said they would never agree to raise tax rates on the wealthiest Americans. Obviously, the agreement that’s currently being discussed would raise those rates and raise them permanently,” he said to applause.

Obama knocked Congress for waiting to the last minute to resolve the fiscal cliff problem and expressed, with some disdain, his regret that a bigger deal was not possible.

“My preference would have been to solve all these problems in the context of a larger agreement, a bigger deal, a grand bargain,” he said. “But with this Congress, that was obviously a little too much to hope for at this time.”

‘SHARED SACRIFICE’

Obama’s words and tone annoyed Republican lawmakers, whose support he is seeking for the deal to be done.

“I’m disappointed that the president took the eve of what might be a bipartisan deal to take a swipe at Congress once again,” said Republican Representative Darrell Issa on CNN.

“That’s not the way presidents should lead,” said Republican Senator John McCain, Obama’s rival in the 2008 election.

Obama had other jabs for Republicans.

While repeating his call for deficit reduction that did not hurt senior citizens and middle class families, Obama noted pointedly that he had won the election.

“If we’re going to be serious about deficit reduction and debt reduction, then it’s going to have to be a matter of shared sacrifice – at least as long as I’m president,” he said. “And I’m going to be president for the next four years, I think.”

The outlines of a deal in the U.S. Senate include raising income tax rates for individuals making more than $ 400,000 a year and households making more than $ 450,000 a year, but a sticking point remains on how long to delay automatic spending cuts to defense and domestic programs, known as a “sequester.”

Obama stressed that a deal over spending cuts had to include tax revenue, echoing pledges he made on the campaign trail.

“Any agreement we have to deal with these automatic spending cuts that are being threatened for next month, those also have to be balanced,” he said.

“That means that revenues have to be part of the equation in turning off the sequester, in eliminating these automatic spending cuts,” he said, adding the same would be true for any future deficit-cutting agreement.

(Additional reporting by Mark Felsenthal, Tabassum Zakaria, Roberta Rampton, David Morgan, David Lawder; editing by Todd Eastham)

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New Year’s Resolutions For Better Health

New Year’s resolutions are typically so singular, self-focused and private. How about making a resolution or two this year that has benefits beyond yourself? Here are some suggestions with lots of links to get you started.

You can help stop the spread of disease. Resolve to get up-to-date on your vaccines. While children have a full slate of vaccines, many adults don’t realize they have regular immunization obligations, too. Getting flu, pertussis, human papillomavirus and other vaccines can protect you and help stop the spread of diseases that harm others. Here’s a great guide to adult immunizations from the federal government. If the cost of vaccines is an issue, check into free or low-cost immunizations through your county’s public health department. Here’s a guide to finding your local office. Volunteer with an organization that needs your help. A group called Catchafire matches professionals who wish to volunteer their skills to organizations that need the help — including many important health organizations. The idea is to give great organizations access to top talent while respecting the professionals’ schedules and making their volunteer work meaningful. Here’s the link. Influence a healthier food climate. Americans spend about half of their food budgets eating out. So we had better demand thorough nutritional information about what we’re getting. Under healthcare reform, many restaurant chains will soon carry nutritional information. But the law has loopholes. If you don’t see the information you’re looking for on salt, fat, calories or other nutrients, ask the restaurant’s manager where you can find it. Nutritional information should be easy to access. Until it is, speak up and ask for it. Do your part to keep down healthcare costs. The Affordable Care Act will bring many consumers into the insurance healthcare system for the first time. But that doesn’t mean we can ignore the cost of care. Rising healthcare costs remain a huge issue that could drag down the economy and bedevil some reform efforts. You can help by being a wise healthcare consumer. Read your insurance policy and know what it does and doesn’t cover. Take advantage of free preventive care services and screening tests under the ACA. Shop around for prescriptions to find the cheapest prices. Ask your doctor for generic equivalents. Finally, use your health savings account if your employer offers one. These accounts provide incentives for using your money wisely, shopping around to find the best healthcare prices and weighing the costs and benefits of certain drugs, tests or procedures.  Here’s a guide to understanding how HSAs work. Be responsible about the prescription drugs you store at home. You can reduce your own risk of addiction and lower the risk for others, too, if you are careful about medications kept in your home. This year marked a turning point in the nation’s epidemic of prescription-drug abuse and addiction.  Admissions to addiction treatment centers for use of narcotic painkillers rose 569 percent in the past decade, according to the federal government. More people now die from drug overdoses than from traffic accidents. More than six million Americans abuse prescription drugs, and more than 70 percent of addicts get their drugs through family or friends or by raiding a home medicine cabinet. Dispose of unused medications. The Drug Enforcement Agency operates a National Prescription Drug Take-Back Day a few times a year (the next one is in April), that makes it easy to dispose of dangerous substance.  Go through your home today and collect unused medications. You can take them to a pharmacy for disposal or even flush them down the toilet. Some drugs carry disposal instructions on the label. Here’s information on how to dispose of prescription medications. Be a safe driver. One of the biggest safety issues on the nation’s roads these days is driver distraction. A large share of the distractions come from talking on a hand-held cell phone or text messaging while driving. You’re 23 times more likely to crash if you text while driving. Most states now prohibit texting while driving, but there are still many people who do it while knowing it’s unsafe. Break yourself of this terrible habit. The federal government has a website that provides people with information and tools to discourage distracted driving. Included in this package is a simple pledge sheet you can print out, sign and post on your refrigerator door or bathroom to help you make the commitment. There are a couple of other things you can do, too. Speak out if the driver you’re riding with is distracted. Encourage family and friends to drive phone-free. Run a race for the greater good. Who doesn’t love a good 5K walk or run? You benefit from the exercise and, if you choose a charity race, others reap rewards, too. There are thousands of charity races each year. Pick one and invite your friends to participate with you. Here’s a website to help you find a race.  Apply for a grant. There’s money out there for doing good. Saucony’s Run for Good Foundation aims at preventing child obesity by promoting running as part of a healthy lifestyle for kids. The foundation issues grant money to organizations that want to organize a kids’ running group. You can find information on how to apply at the foundation website. Sign a petition. Concerned about flame retardants in consumer products? Gun safety? Funding for research to fight a particular disease? There’s probably a petition for that. It’s an easy way to make your voice heard. Both change.org and thepetitionsite.com are good places to look to find a petition close to your heart.

Question: What resolutions can you make to help others? Tell us what you think in the comments.

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Shari Roan is an award-winning health writer based in Southern California. She is the author of three books on health and science subjects.

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Tumor boards may add little to VA cancer care

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) – Getting doctors together to discuss the best treatments for cancer patients in U.S. Veterans Affairs hospitals was only linked to a minor improvement in care in a large new study.

Analyzing the records of 138 VA medical centers, researchers found that the presence of a so-called tumor board – a group of cancer treatment experts – only affected seven out of 27 measures of quality and processes in patient care, and not always for the better.

“This does not support the hypothesis that tumor boards are doing a lot to improve care,” said Dr. Nancy Keating from Boston’s Harvard Medical School and Brigham and Women’s Hospital, the study’s senior author.

Tumor boards are a standard part of medical care in the U.S. and are generally made up of several different types of doctors, including surgeons and radiation oncologists, who review patients’ cases and make recommendations for their treatment.

The study’s authors write in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute that previous research found hospitals dedicate about 50 hours per month of their doctors’ time to participation in tumor boards.

“It is interesting that despite the fact that tumor boards seem like a good thing and they are so well established, there is so little literature on them,” said Keating.

She and her colleagues wanted to know whether tumor boards actually made a difference.

To do that, they linked together information and records from the VA’s 138 medical centers on cancer patients treated between 2001 and 2004.

The team found that 75 percent of the medical centers had at least one tumor board that discussed most of the conditions the researchers were interested in: colorectal, lung, prostate, breast and blood cancers.

Then, using established national guidelines, the researchers developed a list of 27 markers for the quality and type of care patients received.

For example, the researchers checked whether patients with stage II or III rectal cancer got the recommended dose of chemotherapy and radiation before surgery to remove the cancer.

Overall, the researchers found the presence of a tumor board was only linked with differences in seven of the 27 markers.

“And some of those seven were actually a situation where the tumor board was associated with worse care,” Keating said.

In addition, recommended care for specific types of malignancies, such as blood cell cancers, was more often seen in centers with no tumor board (56 percent) or only a general tumor board (61 percent) than in centers with tumor boards specializing in blood cancers (39 percent).

“This is a little bit off-putting because it challenges the conventional wisdom that tumor boards are a good thing,” said Dr. Douglas Blayney, a professor of medicine at the Stanford School of Medicine in California.

“I think the main issue that remains to be answered: Did the recommendations of the tumor boards actually get carried out?” added Blayney, who wrote an editorial accompanying the study.

“We think patients benefit from having their cases reviewed at the outset, but we leave it to the medical system to get acted upon,” he said.

Keating said researchers need to do a “deep dive” into tumor boards to find out more. She said they still need to know how the tumor boards are structured, and what types of cases are discussed.

Until then, “I do think that people and centers who are investing time and energy in their tumor boards should really think about how they are structured, and if they’re set up in a way to improve patient care,” she said.

Blayney told Reuters Health that he doesn’t think hospitals should scrap their tumor boards based on these findings, because there are new possibilities with new technology.

“The promise of telemedicine technology makes extra use of academic centers available to patients who may live in rural locations and doctors who are remote from the academic centers,” he said.

For example, the rural doctors of a woman with breast cancer can conference with a tumor board that specializes in breast cancer at a large, urban academic center.

“Again it’s tapping into the knowledge and experience of a broad range of physicians,” Blayney said.

SOURCE: http://bit.ly/UckC33 Journal of the National Cancer Institute, online December 28, 2012.

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State’s first flu death is Tulsa County resident

A Tulsa County resident between the ages of 19 and 64 is the first person in Oklahoma to die from the flu this season.

Since Sept. 30 there have been 24 hospitalizations due to flu reported in Tulsa County, the most for any county in the state.

Oklahoma County has reported 10, according to the Oklahoma State Department of Health.

There have been 75 flu hospitalizations throughout the state. Twenty-one of those were reported last week. The age range with the most hospitalizations was 65 and older with 28. Children under 4 accounted for 20 cases, according to the department.

Nationally 1,013 people have been hospitalized and eight children have died, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Flu activity has been increasing, particularly in the south central and southeastern regions of the county. Oklahoma reported regional flu activity last week while 29 states had widespread activity, according to the CDC.

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Ex-U.S. President George H.W. Bush in intensive care

AUSTIN, Texas (Reuters) – Former President George H.W. Bush is in the intensive care unit of a Houston hospital and is in “guarded condition,” family spokesman Jim McGrath said Wednesday.

“The president is alert and conversing with medical staff, and is surrounded by family,” McGrath said in a statement.

“Following a series of setbacks including a persistent fever, President Bush was admitted to the intensive care unit at Methodist Hospital on Sunday where he remains in guarded condition,” McGrath said.

Doctors at Methodist Hospital “continue to be cautiously optimistic about the current course of treatment,” McGrath said.

The 88-year-old was admitted to the hospital November 23 for bronchitis.

Bush, the 41st U.S. president and a Republican, took office in 1989 and served one term in the White House. The father of former President George W. Bush, he also served as a congressman, ambassador to the United Nations, envoy to China, CIA director and vice president for two terms under Ronald Reagan.

(Reporting by Corrie MacLaggan; Editing by Paul Thomasch and Phil Berlowitz)

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Obesity declining in young, poorer kids: study

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) – The number of low-income preschoolers who qualify as obese or “extremely obese” has dropped over the last decade, new data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention show.

Although the decline was only “modest” and may not apply to all children, researchers said it was still encouraging.

“It’s extremely important to make sure we’re monitoring obesity in this low-income group,” said the CDC‘s Heidi Blanck, who worked on the study.

Those kids are known to be at higher risk of obesity than their well-off peers, in part because access to healthy food is often limited in poorer neighborhoods.

The new results can’t prove what’s behind the progress, Blanck told Reuters Health – but two possible contributors are higher rates of breastfeeding and rising awareness of the importance of physical activity even for very young kids.

Blanck and her colleagues used data on routine clinic visits for about half of all U.S. kids eligible for federal nutrition programs – including 27.5 million children between age two and four.

They found 13 percent of those preschoolers were obese in 1998. That grew to just above 15 percent in 2003, but dropped slightly below 15 percent in 2010, the most recent study year included.

Similarly, the prevalence of extreme obesity increased from nearly 1.8 percent in 1998 to 2.2 percent in 2003, then dropped back to just below 2.1 percent in 2010, the research team reported Tuesday in the Journal of the American Medical Association.

Whether kids are obese is determined by their body mass index (BMI) – a measure of weight in relation to height – and by their age and sex.

For example, a four-year-old girl who is 40 inches tall would be obese if she was 42 pounds or heavier. A two-year-old boy who is 35 inches tall qualifies as obese at 34 pounds or above, according to the CDC’s child BMI calculator. (The CDC’s BMI calculator for children and teens is available here:.)

The new findings are the first national data to show obesity and extreme obesity may be declining in young children, Blanck said.

“This is very encouraging considering the recent effort made in the field including by several U.S. federal agencies to combat the childhood obesity epidemic,” said Dr. Youfa Wang, head of the Johns Hopkins Global Center on Childhood Obesity in Baltimore.

Blanck said between 2003 and 2010 researchers also saw an increase in breastfeeding of low-income infants. Breastfeeding has been tied to a healthier weight in early childhood.

Additionally, states and communities have started working with child care centers to make sure kids have time to run around and that healthy foods are on the lunch menu, she added.

Parents can encourage better eating by having fruits and vegetables available at snack time and allowing their young kids to help with meal preparation, Blanck said.

Her other recommendations include making sure preschoolers get at least one hour of activity every day and keeping television sets out of the bedroom.

“The prevalence of overweight and obesity in many countries including in the U.S. is still very high,” Wang, who wasn’t involved in the new study, told Reuters Health in an email.

“The recent level off should not be taken as a reason to reduce the effort to fight the obesity epidemic.”

SOURCE: http://bit.ly/JjFzqx Journal of the American Medical Association, online December, 25, 2012.

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Catholic Church urges Irish to oppose abortion law

DUBLIN (Reuters) – The head of Ireland‘s Catholic Church urged followers in his Christmas Day message to lobby against government plans to legalize abortion.

Ireland, the only EU member state that currently outlaws the procedure, is preparing legislation that would allow limited access to abortion after the European Court of Human Rights criticized the current regime.

The death last month of an Indian woman who was denied an abortion of her dying foetus and later died of blood poisoning has intensified the debate around abortion, which remains a hugely divisive subject in the predominantly Catholic country.

“I hope that everyone who believes that the right to life is fundamental will make their voice heard in a reasonable, but forthright, way to their representatives,” Cardinal Sean Brady said in a Christmas message on Tuesday.

“No government has the right to remove that right from an innocent person.”

Irish Prime Minister Enda Kenny, a regular Mass goer, is bringing in legislation that would allow a woman to have an abortion if her life was at risk from pregnancy.

The country’s Supreme Court ruled in 1992 that abortion was permitted when a woman’s life was at risk but successive governments have avoided legislating for it because it is so divisive.

The death of Savita Halappanavar, who repeatedly asked for an abortion while she was miscarrying in an Irish hospital, highlighted the lack of clarity in Irish law that leaves doctors in a legally risky position.

Halappanavar’s death re-ignited the abortion debate and prompted large protests by groups both in favor of and against abortion.

Kenny and his conservative Fine Gael party have been criticized for tackling the abortion issue and some party members have indicated that they may not be able to back the law.

Relations between the Irish government and the once dominant Catholic Church are at an all-time low in the wake of years of clerical sex abuse scandals.

Kenny told parliament last year that the Vatican’s handling of the scandals had been dominated by “elitism and narcissism” and accused it of trying to cover up the abuse. The speech prompted the Vatican to recall its ambassador, or nuncio, to Ireland.

Brady, who has faced calls this year to resign over accusations he failed to warn parents their children were being sexually abused, said in his Christmas message that he wanted relations with government to improve.

“My hope is that the year ahead will see the relationship between faith and public life in our country move beyond the sometimes negative, exaggerated caricatures of the past.”

(Reporting by Carmel Crimmins; Editing by Sandra Maler)

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Colorado Woman Billed Medicaid for Dead Father

A Colorado woman was convicted this week for felony forgery for submitting fraudulent documents to Medicaid regarding personal health care services provided to her father after he died. It was the second announcement of Medicaid fraud-related convictions made by the Colorado Attorney General’s office in less than a week. Here are the details.

* According to the office of Colorado Attorney General John Suthers, 52-year-old Viola Kwong pleaded guilty to felony forgery in Denver District Court on Tuesday. She was sentenced to pay $ 16,000 in criminal restitution and perform 50 hours of public service. The restitution reflects all of the money illegally received by Kwong.

* Kwong will also be placed on supervised probation for four years, is responsible for all court costs and probation supervision fees associated with her case, and will pay a civil penalty of more than $ 37,000 to the Colorado Medicaid program, the Attorney General’s Office stated.

* The Attorney General’s Office stated that Kwong had requested services for her elderly father through a Medicaid program that allows the Medicaid client to direct his or her own home-based medical care.

* Because Kwong’s father was too ill to manage his care, Kwong was authorized by the program as his personal representative, in charge of obtaining those services for her father.

* Kwong’s father died on July 23, 2010, but Kwong continued to submit documents about personal health care services that were being provided to her father until Nov. 8, 2010.

* Suthers stated that the restitution ordered was “another significant recovery for Colorado’s Medicaid program.”

* Colorado Department of Health Care Policy and Financing initially referred the case to the Attorney General’s Medicaid Fraud Control Unit.

* Last week, the Attorney General’s Office announced the conviction of occupational therapist Cheryl Moss, 47, for felony theft and felony forgery. Moss pleaded guilty to forging treatment records and fraudulently billing the Colorado Medicaid program for services she did not perform.

* Moss agreed to repay the program $ 54,332, serve 60 days home detention and perform 300 hours of community service. She was also ordered to pay an additional $ 46,000 to resolve any potential civil issues and to report her conviction to the agency charged with licensing occupational therapists in Colorado.

* According to the Attorney General, Medicaid is health insurance for qualifying low-income, disabled individuals, and children and families. Covered services include hospital care, skilled nursing home care, residential adult family care services, hospice, mental health, dental and eyeglass services. Each state administers its own Medicaid program.

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Lauded cancer researcher, Springfield native, dies

A Springfield High School and Wittenberg University graduate whose research transformed the treatment of breast cancer and saved and prolonged the lives of women afflicted by it died Sunday in Cincinnati.

Elwood Jensen was 92.

Known as the “Father of the Nuclear Receptor Field,” Jensen was one of three researchers to share the 2004 Lasker Award for Basic Medical Research, what some call the American Nobel Prize.

The University of Cincinnati, where Jensen was a distinguished professor of cancer biology, noted that just one other of its graduates had won the honor, Albert Sabin, who developed a vaccine for polio.

“Some have estimated that his work annually saves or prolongs the lives of more than 100,000 women,” the university said in announcing his death.

A 1936 graduate of Springfield High School, Jensen was honored in 2008 as one of the Springfield City Schools Alumni of Distinction and he made periodic visits and lectures at Wittenberg University, one of five institutions to award him an honorary doctorate.

A 1940 graduate of Wittenberg, he went on to earn a Ph.D in organic chemistry from the University of Chicago, where he enjoyed a long career as a teacher and researcher. His interest in studying hormones began during 1946, when he spent a year as a Guggenheim Fellow at the Federal Institute of Technology at Zurich.

After his 1990 retirement from the University of Chicago, Jens also taught at Cornell, the University of Hamburg and the Karolinksa Institute in Stockholm and did research at the National Institutes of Health.

In 2003, the University of Cincinnati honored him by organizing the Jensen Symposium on Nuclear Receptors and Endocrine Disorders, which drew more than 300 top researchers from around the world.

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Pentagon day care review expanding to schools

WASHINGTON (AP) — Defense Secretary Leon Panetta is expanding a Pentagon review of hiring at military day care centers to include Defense Department schools, youth centers and other facilities where children are present.

Pentagon press secretary George Little said Wednesday that officials are also questioning why it took three months for the Army to inform Panetta about arrests and problems with background checks at a day care center at Fort Myer, Va. Two people were arrested in September on multiple charges of assault against children at the Fort Myer center.

Little also said reports that parents of children at the center weren’t told about the problems indicate there may have been a serious breakdown in communications.

“We need to do everything we can wherever our children are entrusted to the care of DOD-employed personnel to insure we have the right personnel with the right background taking care of them,” said Little. “We want to insure that there’s consistency in the standards and policies and practices in hiring wherever military youth are involved.”

Panetta on Tuesday ordered a military-wide review of hiring at day care centers shortly after the Army disclosed problems with security background checks of workers at Fort Myer. Little said Pentagon leaders were surprised to hear of the problem and that “clearly this information did not get reported up the chain of command as quickly as we think it should have.”

The actions stem from the Sept. 26 arrests of two Army employees. One was charged with five counts of assault and the second was charged with four counts of assault.

But the problems at Fort Myer apparently went much deeper. Indications are that at least 30 workers at the facility have histories that call into question their suitability to care for children, according to two officials, speaking on condition of anonymity because the investigation into worker backgrounds at Fort Myer has not been completed.

After the Fort Myer arrests, the Army replaced the day care center’s management team and found what the Army called “derogatory information” in the background of an unspecified number of other employees there. Army officials did not reveal the information, and officials said it’s not clear if the background checks were not done, were not sufficient or simply were not used appropriately in screening personnel.

Col. Fern Sumpter, the Fort Myer commander, said the day care center was closed “out of an abundance of caution” and the children moved to a separate day care center at Fort Myer. A Fort Myer spokeswoman, Mary Ann Hodges, said the center was closed on Dec. 13.

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New Laser Treatment at Cosmedics Skin Clinics Offers Fast, Efficient Results for Facial Thread Veins

Although thread veins are relatively common and medically harmless, they can look unpleasant and people can go to great lengths to hide them. Now laser technology is set to offer a fast, effective treatment on the high street and now Medical Director Dr Ross Perry of Cosmedics Skin Clinics offers laser thread vein removal in London and Bristol.

London (PRWEB UK) 19 December 2012

Thread veins are quite common and the good news is that they are medically harmless. However, they are rarely considered attractive; so for those patients struggling to hide the appearance of red spider veins on the face or bluish broken veins on the legs, they can become quite a prominent feature which they would rather not have.

Facial thread veins are the most obvious as they are so visible year round. They can appear as one or just a few quite distinct veins with a bluish tinge; or where there are a lot, look more like a red patch of tiny capillaries, interwoven at the skin’s surface and lending a “ruddy” appearance. They are especially noticeable where the skin is thin, for example, on the nose, chin or cheeks.

Now the latest advanced laser technology offers thread vein sufferers hope of a fast, efficient and permanent solution in private clinics.

Dr Ross Perry, Medical Director at Cosmedics Skin Clinics, explains:

“For the broken, red spider veins on the face and particularly the nose we use a safe cautery laser to seal off the unsightly blemishes, removing the redness. The laser works efficiently to target the vein or veins while leaving the surrounding skin untouched so that it can heal quickly with a minimum of scarring and sometimes none at all.”

“Treatment is surprisingly effective and for many patients, the problem can be solved in just treatment, though in some cases 2-3 sessions may be advisable to get the optimum finished result.”

“Once treated with laser, the thread veins should not return; although continued over-exposure to the sun, smoking or hormonal changes such as menopause may cause new thread veins to appear.”

For treating larger veins which can appear on the body, tiny sclerotherapy injections are more suitable. These work to effectively block the offending veins at the skin’s surface, causing them to dissolve over the following weeks. In some cases, laser and injection treatments may be combined for best results.

Laser thread vein treatment is available in all of Cosmedics’ 6 Skin Clinics based in London (Putney, City, Harley Street, Canary Wharf, Knightsbridge) and Bristol. All treatments are carried out by skilled and experienced doctors who are registered with the GMC.

Cosmedics Skin Clinics was established by Dr Perry in 2003 and remains a doctor owned and managed company. The company is renowned for high standards of professionalism and discretion throughout.

Cosmedics’ doctors offer a full range of private medical skin treatments including mole removal, skin tag, cyst, verruca and wart removal, hyperpigmentation, thread vein treatment and excessive sweating injections; as well as popular cosmetic anti-ageing injections including dermal fillers. In addition, Cosmedics Beauty therapists offer a variety of treatments including laser hair removal and CACI.

Call 020 7386 0464 or email info(at)cosmedics(dot)co(dot)uk to book an appointment. http://www.cosmedics.co.uk for further information.

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Experts: Kids are resilient in coping with trauma

WASHINGTON (AP) — They might not want to talk about the gunshots or the screams. But their toys might start getting into imaginary shootouts.

Last week’s school shooting in Connecticut raises the question: What will be the psychological fallout for the children who survived?

For people of any age, regaining a sense of security after surviving violence can take a long time. They’re at risk for lingering anxiety, depression, post-traumatic stress disorder.

But after the grief and fear fades, psychiatrists say most of Newtown‘s young survivors probably will cope without long-term emotional problems.

“Kids do tend to be highly resilient,” said Dr. Matthew Biel, chief of child and adolescent psychiatry at MedStar Georgetown University Hospital.

And one way that younger children try to make sense of trauma is through play. Youngsters may pull out action figures or stuffed animals and re-enact what they witnessed, perhaps multiple times.

“That’s the way they gain mastery over a situation that’s overwhelming,” Biel explained, saying it becomes a concern only if the child is clearly distressed while playing.

Nor is it unusual for children to chase each other playing cops-and-robbers, but now parents might see some also pretending they’re dead, added Dr. Melissa Brymer of the UCLA-Duke National Center for Child Traumatic Stress.

Among the challenges will be spotting which children are struggling enough that they may need professional help.

Newtown’s tragedy is particularly heart-wrenching because of what such young children grappled with — like the six first-graders who apparently had to run past their teacher’s body to escape to safety.

There’s little scientific research specifically on PTSD, post-traumatic stress disorder, in children exposed to a burst of violence, and even less to tell if a younger child will have a harder time healing than an older one.

Overall, scientists say studies of natural disasters and wars suggest most children eventually recover from traumatic experiences while a smaller proportion develop long-term disorders such as PTSD. Brymer says in her studies of school shootings, that fraction can range from 10 percent to a quarter of survivors, depending on what they actually experienced. A broader 2007 study found 13 percent of U.S. children exposed to different types of trauma reported some symptoms of PTSD, although less than 1 percent had enough for an official diagnosis.

Violence isn’t all that rare in childhood. In many parts of the world — and in inner-city neighborhoods in the U.S., too — children witness it repeatedly. They don’t become inured to it, Biel said, and more exposure means a greater chance of lasting psychological harm.

In Newtown, most at risk for longer-term problems are those who saw someone killed, said Dr. Carol North of the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, who has researched survivors of mass shootings.

Friday’s shootings were mostly in two classrooms of Sandy Hook Elementary School, which has about 450 students through fourth-grade.

But those who weren’t as close to the danger may be at extra risk, too, if this wasn’t their first trauma or they already had problems such as anxiety disorders that increase their vulnerability, she said.

Right after a traumatic event, it’s normal to have nightmares or trouble sleeping, to stick close to loved ones, and to be nervous or moody, Biel said.

To help, parents will have to follow their child’s lead. Grilling a child about a traumatic experience isn’t good, he stressed. Some children will ask a lot of questions, seeking reassurance, he said. Others will be quiet, thinking about the experience and maybe drawing or writing about it, or acting it out at playtime. Younger children may regress, becoming clingy or having tantrums.

Before second grade, their brains also are at a developmental stage some refer to as magical thinking, when it’s difficult to distinguish reality and fantasy. Parents may have to help them understand that a friend who died isn’t in pain or lonely but also isn’t coming back, Brymer said.

When problem behaviors or signs of distress continue for several weeks, Brymer says it’s time for an evaluation by a counselor or pediatrician.

Besides a supportive family, what helps? North advises getting children back into routines, together with their friends, and easing them back into a school setting. Studies of survivors of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks found “the power of the support of the people who went through it with you is huge,” she said.

Children as young as first-graders can benefit from cognitive-behavioral therapy, Georgetown’s Biel said. They can calm themselves with breathing techniques. They also can learn to identify and label their feelings — anger, frustration, worry — and how to balance, say, a worried thought with a brave one.

Finally, avoid watching TV coverage of the shooting, as children may think it’s happening all over again, Biel added. He found that children who watched the 9/11 clips of planes hitting the World Trade Center thought they were seeing dozens of separate attacks.

___

EDITOR’S NOTE — Lauran Neergaard covers health and medical issues for The Associated Press in Washington.

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NICE may reject Roche’s Avastin for advanced ovarian cancer

LONDON (Reuters) – Britain’s healthcare cost-effectiveness watchdog said it may reject Roche Holding AG‘s drug Avastin for treating advanced ovarian cancer in combination with two standard chemotherapy drugs.

In the latest of a series of setbacks for the medicine, the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) said Avastin used with chemotherapy drugs paclitaxel and carboplatin is not a cost-effective treatment for the government-funded National Health Service (NHS).

NICE said the drug costs around 2,500 pounds a month per patient.

Ovarian cancer is the fifth most common cancer in women in the UK and in 2009, the latest year for which data are available, there were nearly 7,000 new cases diagnosed in the country.

NICE rejected Avastin as a first-line treatment for advanced breast cancer in July. This was after drug regulators in the United States came to the same conclusion in 2011.

The watchdog will make a final decision on treating ovarian cancer with the drug, also known as bevacizumab, next year. Its latest guidance could change after feedback from a public consultation that runs to January 22, during which Roche could appeal.

In the meantime, NICE chief executive Andrew Dillon said that although the combination did appear to delay the spread of ovarian cancer in some patients, it was unclear whether it helped patients live longer overall.

“There was no evidence to show that the clinical benefit of the treatment justifies its cost, when compared to existing treatments – an important factor to consider, especially as the NHS has finite resources,” Dillon said in a statement.

Roche said it was disappointed but would work with NICE to win the regulator’s backing.

“Avastin is the first drug for 15 years that has been shown to improve outcomes for women with advanced ovarian cancer, and can halt the progression of the disease for up to six months compared to chemotherapy alone,” the company said.

Roche noted the drug was approved by the European Medicines Agency for treating advanced ovarian cancer in combination with standard chemotherapy in December 2011.

Until the final decision, NICE said the NHS should make decisions locally on funding the treatment but if the final decision goes against Roche, hospitals will not be able to use core NHS funds for the treatment.

(Reporting by Chris Wickham; Editing by Mark Potter)

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Daylight savings tied to bump in heart attack rates

(Reuters) – Setting the clock ahead for daylight savings time may set the scene for a small increase in heart attacks the next day, according to a U.S. study – which suggests that sleep deprivation may be to blame.

Researchers at two hospitals in the U.S. state of Michigan, whose findings appeared in the American Journal of Cardiology, reviewed six years of records and found that they treated an average of 23 heart attacks on the Sunday when the United States switched to daylight savings time. That compared to 13 on a typical Sunday.

“Nowadays, people are looking for how they can reduce their risk of heart disease and other ailments,” said Monica Jiddou, the study’s lead author and a cardiologist at William Beaumont Hospital in Royal Oak.

“Sleep is something we can potentially control. There are plenty of studies that show sleep can affect a person’s health.”

A 2008 Swedish report, for instance, found that the chance of a heart attack increased in the first three weekdays after the switch to daylight savings time, and decreased the Monday after the clocks returned to standard time in the autumn.

Jiddou told Reuters Health that her team wanted to see if their respective hospitals experienced the same increase and decrease in heart attacks seen in the Swedish study.

For the new study, she and her colleagues reviewed records for the 328 patients who were diagnosed with a heart attack during the week after a time change between 2006 and 2012, and for the 607 heart attack patients who were treated two weeks before and after the time shifts.

They found that except for the small increase on the Sunday that daylight savings time kicked in, there were no significant differences in heart attack rates in the first week after the spring clock change or in the fall, when people set clocks back.

The authors note, however, that the small trends they observed suggest shifts to and from daylight savings time may be linked with small increases in heart attacks in the spring, and small decreases in the fall.

They speculate that sleep deprivation resulting from the time changes could raise levels of stress hormones and inflammatory chemicals just enough to trigger a heart attack, especially in those already at high risk.

Though the slight increase in heart attacks in the days following time shifts were so small they could have been due to chance, Jiddou told Reuters Health that she believes the problem was the size of the study population.

“The numbers weren’t necessarily striking, but the trends make you stop and think,” she said.

But Steven Nissen, a cardiologist who is chair of the Robert and Suzanne Tomsich Department of Cardiovascular Medicine at the Cleveland Clinic, said that people should be carefully interpreting the findings.

“We haven’t generally thought that missing an hour of sleep causes heart attacks. This may or may not hold up,” Nissen said.

He added that while the study looks at a good question and he applauds the researchers’ efforts, but stressed the limitations of the results and noted that the size of the effect is not huge. SOURCE: http://bit.ly/W391bW

(Reporting from New York by Andrew Seaman; editing by Elaine Lies)

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California home for developmentally disabled faces abuse inquiry

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – California health officials have threatened to shut down part of the state’s oldest home for developmentally disabled adults due to evidence of physical abuse and neglect, in a move that could displace nearly 300 of its residents.

The state-run Sonoma Developmental Center could lose its license to run one unit if it does not fix the problems, according to a letter the state health department sent this week to the director of the sprawling facility in Eldridge.

Monitors this month and last “documented incidents of abuse constituting immediate jeopardy, as well as actual serious threats to the physical safety of female clients in certain units,” the California Department of Public Health letter said.

Among the incidents were physical abuse, a staff member exposing himself to a female client and inadequate monitoring of a patient who had propensity to swallow inedible items, leading to surgery, said Pam Dickfoss, assistant deputy director of the California Center for Health Care Quality.

The threat of sanctions against the board-and-care center in the heart of wine country represents a significant blow to a historic facility that opened at its current site in 1891 next to the bucolic town of Sonoma.

The center is northern California‘s only state-run residential facility for developmentally disabled adults and sits on 1,000 acres of land, including a petting zoo and sports fields.

Closure of the unit under scrutiny, the Intermediate Care Facility, could require moving 290 of the center’s more than 500 residents, officials said. It is unclear where they would be sent and officials say they hope that will not be necessary.

Administrators have vowed to correct deficiencies and said they plan to appeal the move to potentially strip them of federal funding and a state license for the unit under scrutiny.

“We are moving quickly to fix this center and protect our residents,” said Terri Delgadillo, director of the state Department of Developmental Services, which oversees the center.

She said the problems forced the removal of the center’s executive and clinical directors as well as other staff changes.

State monitors identified 57 deficiencies during a July visit, including four that posed an immediate danger to residents, and dozens of other threats to residents in more recent visits, the letter said.

The facility gets $ 117,000 a day in federal funding, said Nancy Lungren, a spokeswoman for the California Department of Developmental Services.

Most of the center’s residents suffer from cerebral palsy, epilepsy, autism, or a combination of those conditions. Many have lived their entire adult lives at the center.

Leslie Morrison, director of the investigations unit of Disability Rights California, a watchdog group, said she was troubled by reports from the facility over the past year.

“This has been developing for a long period,” Morrison said. “They have been trying to correct things, but it’s going to take a long time.”

(Editing by Alex Dobuzinskis and Eric Walsh)

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Newtown Shooting: Young Kids Cope With Horror

Witnesses at Sandy Hook Elementary School reported horrific scenes as a shooter took 27 lives today — the shattering sounds of gunshots, children locked in the bathrooms and parents crying outside in the parking lot.

Experts say that the young children who saw events first-hand can have lasting psychological scars, but those whose home lives are stable and supportive will have fewer long-term scars.

“It was horrific,” said Kaitlin Roig, a 29-year-old teacher, who was in a morning meeting when the gunman entered the school.

“Suddenly, I heard rapid fire, like an assault weapon,” the first grade teacher told ABC. She rounded up her 14 students and locked them and herself in the bathroom. “I helped kids climb on the toilet dispenser [so they could all fit in].

“I thought we were going to die.”

CLICK HERE for more on the Newtown, Conn., School Shooting.

Children in such a situation “are terrified, and they don’t have the cognitive or emotional capacities to make sense of this,” said Dr. Nadine Kaslow, professor and vice chair of the department of psychiatry at Emory School of Medicine.

“Not that any of us can make any sense of this,” said Kaslow. “It’s truly inconceivable.”

At least 27 people, mostly children under the age of 10, were shot and killed at the K-to-4 school this morning, federal and state sources tell ABC News.

The massacre drew SWAT teams to the school and the town of Newtown locked down all its schools, authorities said today.

According to federal sources, the gunman was identified as Adam Lanza, 20. His mother, who worked at the elementary school, was one of the victims.

CLICK HERE for more photos from the scene.

One mother named Christine who has a child at Sandy Hook told ABC about the chaos that ensued when she arrived at the school this morning.

“When I got there, there were just parents running into the firehouse because they were directing us there. That’s where children had been evacuating to, and we went in and people were just grabbing their children and hugging and crying. There were lots of children crying.”

She said another parent who had been at the school at the time was “pretty broken up.” Many parents didn’t know where their children were.

In 1996 in Dunblane, Scotland, 15 children and a teacher were killed in a similar massacre.

Parents and caregivers play the most important role in a child’s recovery from a traumatic event, according to Dr. Gene Beresin, director of training in child and adolescent psychiatry at Massachusetts General Hospital.

“Children need to know that they are safe,” he said. “Are people taking care of me? How is this going to affect my life? They need to be reassured.”

“Thinking about kids in all disasters, you think about the airlines — when the oxygen mask drops, you put your mask on first and then help the child next,” said Beresin.

“Parents need to take care of themselves first. [The children] need to know you are calm and in control,” he said.

Adults and community support is critical, according to Beresin.

Young children who witness violence can have acute or post-traumatic stress disorder. “The immediate reaction is shock and horror,” he said.

After events like this, communities typically set up crisis centers in a church or other public place where people can seek professional and spiritual help.

Turn the television off, say experts, but answer your children’s questions. Don’t disregard an older sibling who is watching the news unfold and is worried. They need assurance, too, he said.

According to Beresin, young children may not have “discreet memories” of the event, but they can still have an emotional reaction, experiencing nightmares or, conversely, emotional numbing, said Beresin.

“Some kids shut down,” he said. “They may actually turn off and not want to be hugged or cuddled — that’s a normal response. Some kids are clingy, and others will withdraw.”

Kids can also regress in the aftermath of a traumatic event.

Parents should not force a child to open up, but “don’t let them be alone,” he said.

One way young children can work out problems are through reenactment. “They may be playing a game about shooting and dying, and parents should not stop that,” said Beresin. “Let them do it.”

Young children can also ask questions that don’t directly relate to the event, according to Rahill Briggs, assistant professor of pediatrics at Montefiore Medical Center in New York City.

“They can ask directly or less directly about guns, or heaven or death or about a pet that died,” she said.

In studies of 9/11 one of the findings — not a surprising one — after the terrorist attacks was that those who were most directly affected “suffered the most,” according to Briggs. Coping with grief long-term depended on the cohesion of the child’s family — “how well the caregiving system responds to distress. When it is proactive, by definition the children do better.”

“What was the most incredibly predictive five years out was how everyone was doing before the incident,” said Briggs. “It is the same for mental health in general, those who are coping well in their lives before a trauma are the most likely to cope well afterwards — even if they saw the towers fall.”

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Vision insurance tied to better eye health

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) – Older adults’ eyesight may suffer irreversibly if they don’t have vision insurance, suggests a new study that argues eye health should be a mandatory part of regular health insurance policies.

Researchers found that people between 40 and 65 years old with vision insurance were twice as likely to see an eye doctor in the past year, compared to those without coverage.

And people who saw an eye doctor were more likely to be able to read printed material and to recognize someone from across the street.

“The study finds that having vision insurance increases the likelihood of an eye care visit, and that a prior-year eye care visit is associated with better vision status,” the researchers write in the Archives of Ophthalmology.

Led by Yi-Jhen Li at the University of South Carolina in Columbia, the team notes that by 2020 it’s estimated that over 5.6 million Americans will have an age-related eye disease that may lead to vision loss.

But the researchers add that permanent vision loss from some of those eye diseases – including glaucoma and cataracts – can be staved off with early detection and treatment.

“We want to get them in the door. If they get in the door, they’re likely get what they need,” said John Crews, a health scientist at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta, who was not involved in the research.

“The problem from a public health point of view is, ‘what is impeding people from getting access to care?’” Crews said.

For the new study, Li and colleagues wanted to see if lack of vision insurance might stand in the way of working-age adults’ ability to go to an eye doctor and whether that would affect their vision.

They used a 2008 survey of 27,152 people from across eight U.S. states. Of those, 11,541, or 43 percent, did not have vision insurance.

Of the 15,611 people who did have vision insurance, about 64 percent had seen an eye doctor in the previous year, compared to about 45 percent of people without coverage.

After taking certain traits – such as age, sex and race – into account, the researchers also found that generally healthy people with vision insurance were 24 percent more likely to report that they had no trouble recognizing friends from across the street and 34 percent more likely to say they could read printed material without problems, compared to those without the insurance.

The difference was even greater among a subsample of people who had common eye ailments like glaucoma, cataracts or age-related macular degeneration – those with vision insurance were 37 percent more likely to say they could read and 45 percent were more likely to recognize a friend from afar.

In both the general population and those with eye diseases, people who saw a doctor within the past year were also more likely to report better vision.

Li and colleagues, who were not available for comment, note in their paper that the age group they focused on, between 40 and 64, are too young to be covered by Medicare but are “at high risk for eye diseases that cause gradual vision loss that is preventable.”

Theirs is the first study, they add, to examine how having vision insurance, versus general health insurance, influences how often people in this working-age segment of the population get regular eye care.

While 85 percent of the people in their sample had health insurance, the researchers write, just about 68 percent of those with health insurance had vision coverage. And, they say, their study indicates that it is vision insurance, but not health insurance, that determines not only whether people go to the eye doctor, but also the quality of their reported vision.

Making vision coverage a mandatory part of standard insurance policies would raise costs by about three percent, they conclude, calling that a “good value” compared to the costs of the vision loss that could be prevented.

The American Academy of Ophthalmology says older adults should have regular eye checkups every two to four years. The group recommends that people 65 years old and up see an eye doctor every one or two years.

SOURCE: http://bit.ly/UiObja Archives of Ophthalmology, online December 10, 2012.

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Mandela’s Infection May Be Pneumonia

Nelson Mandela is being treated for a lung infection, a term often used synonymously with pneumonia.

Elderly people are at an increased risk for infections in general – more so if the person has many chronic medical problems, but as people age their immune systems are less capable of fighting off infections.

South African officials say Mandela’s lung infection is “recurring.” The former president is 94 years old.

As elderly people become more and more infirm, they have a decreased cough response and may aspirate oral secretions into their lungs, raising the risk of infections. And if someone is bedridden, their breaths become more shallow, raising the risk even more.

It may seem surprising that it took so long for Mandela’s diagnosis to be made public. However, it’s possible that it took this long to make a diagnosis.

Elderly people respond differently to pneumonia, meaning they might lack common symptoms like fever and cough, and instead show signs of confusion. The evaluation of change in physical or mental condition in someone of Mandela’s age is broad with much testing needed to make a diagnosis.

There are different types of pneumonia including viral (caused by influenza), bacterial (caused by pneumococcus or tuberculosis), fungal and parasitic. I suspect Mr. Mandela most likely has a viral or bacterial pneumonia. If he does, they are likely treating him with antibiotics and providing respiratory support.

Pneumonia is a leading infectious cause of death in the elderly. But with proper treatment, many do recover.

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