Health

Health practitioners in the Democratic Republic of Congo on Tuesday concluded vaccination of Ebola patients in the city of Mbandaka with experimental vaccine, as they try to contain a disease that has killed around 25 people, the health ministry said.

Ebola virus disease easily spreads through bodily fluids and the medical strategy involves vaccinating all the people a patient may have infected and then vaccinating all the people a patient may have infected and then vaccinating a second "ring" of contacts around each of those potential sufferers.

Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) researchers, working with scientists from Brigham and Women's Hospital, have developed a new way to power and communicate with devices implanted deep inside the human body.

The devices which are powered by a radio frequency waves which can safely pass through human tissues, could be used to deliver drugs, monitor conditions inside the body, or treat disease by stimulating the brain with electricity or light.

While conducting tests on animals, the researchers found that the waves can power devices located 10 centimeters deep in tissue, from distance of 1 meter.

As many as 70 percent of women with the most common form of breast cancer may be able to skip chemotherapy, based on their score on a genetic test, researchers said Sunday. Until now, women have faced a great deal of uncertainty about whether to add chemo to hormone therapy after a diagnosis with hormone-receptor positive, HER-2 negative breast cancer at an early stage before it has spread to the lymph nodes.

Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) president, Ayuba Wabba, says Isaac Adewole, minister of health, has no right to deny the Joint Health Sector Union (JOHESU) members of their salaries.

Wabba said this while fielding questions from journalists after the union suspended its six weeks nationwide strike on Thursday in Abuja.

The minister had earlier threatened not to pay the salaries of JOHESU members for the number of days they went on strike while some were not paid the April salary.

The antibiotic resistance crisis which is threatening to render many diseases untreatable is being fuelled not just by overuse of the drugs, but a fragile supply chain that is at risk of collapse, experts have warned.

The authors of a white paper by the Dutch non-profit organisation Access to Medicine say a lack of access to specific antibiotics can lead to less appropriate drugs being prescribed for an infection, or even the use of lower doses – both of which increase the risk of antibiotic resistance – as well as delay for treatment. What’s more, they say, low stocks can lead to price hikes and mean poor quality medicines become rife.

The Nigeria HIV and AIDS Indicator and Impact Survey (NAIIS) has assured the public of utmost confidentiality during the National AIDS and Hepatitis survey commencing from June 18. Dr Adebobola Bashorun, Director, Advocacy Communication and Social Mobilisation of NAIIS, who stated in Abuja said that all information that would be collected from respondents would be treated with privacy in line with international standard practice.