FSM Friends’ News and Articles
What do consumers think about homeopathic remedies? “Homeopathy is a good example of the friction between the profession of pharmacy, and the business of pharmacy. Pharmacists are health care professionals, but pharmacies sell lots of nonsense that isn’t evidence based or credible… There is equally a strong interest by homeopathy manufacturers to get the veneer of credibility (and plausible consumer confusion) by packaging, labelling and marketing these drugs in pharmacies, just as if they are actually medicine.”
General
We can reverse antibiotic resistance in Australia. Here’s how Sweden is doing it: The burden of antibiotic resistant infections continues to grow – but there are steps we can take to minimise spread of antibiotic resistance.
3 things to know about medical advice on social media: This article concerns making decisions for your baby but is generally applicable to using social media for making medical decisions. We’ve all seen the strange posts on Facebook and ads that pop up on browser pages. How do you know what you can trust? Short answer: you can’t. Social media is a great place to get advice, but that advice must be run past your doctor to ensure it is sound. If you could control your diabetes by eating fava beans, well that’s what we would be doing. So, if it sounds too good to be true, chances are it is.
Samoan Government to close its offices amid measles crisis that has left 53 dead: A measles outbreak in Samoa has killed 5 adults and 48 children with 3700 cases reported. That’s at least 1.86% of the Samoan population infected. The measles vaccine is extremely safe, but local vaccination rates plummeted to 31% in the face of public distrust after an accident in which nurses accidentally contaminated vaccines with a muscle relaxant, leading to the death of two infants last year.
The Samoan government is responding with a massive vaccination drive. Prime Minister Tuilaepa Sailele Malielegaoi said “Let us work together to … convince those that do not believe that vaccinations are the only answer to the epidemic. Let us not be distracted by the promise of alternative cures,” Tuilaepa said. The WHO reports there were more measles cases worldwide during the first six months of 2019 than in any other year since 2006. The Democratic Republic of Congo, Madagascar and Ukraine have reported the highest numbers of cases this year. The United States has reported its highest measles case count in 25 years.
Great Moments in Health and Science
The Discovery of Cells: The fundamental building blocks of all life, the existence of cells was completely unknown until 1665.
Today’s Abused Health Concept
Pay-to-Play Clinical Trials. Would you pay $1 million to enrol in a phase 1 clinical trial of an “anti-aging” gene therapy? Why would you trust a group that charges participants $1million to enrol them in a phase 1 safety trial?