July 6, 2004
Vol. LVI, No. 14
Native American Powwow Initiative Begins 4th Year
Hepatocellular Carcinoma on Rise in U.S., Say Experts
NIH'ers Capture Communication Awards from NAGC
2nd Annual Parenting Festival a Success
CIT Training Program
for Summer
News Briefs
New Appointments
Awardees
Retirees
Study Subjects Sought
Final Photo
U.S. Department of
Health and Human Services
National Institutes of Health
NIH Record Archives
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'Transforming America, Transforming Health Care'
At NIH, HHS Secretary Urges Individual Health, Unified Effort
By Carla Garnett
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Secretary Tommy Thompson (l) gets CRC tour from CC director Dr. John Gallin. |
Unsanitary hospitals in Afghanistan and unexpected optimism in Africa have changed Tommy Thompson. Three times as HHS Secretary he has traveled to Afghanistan and witnessed multiple surgical procedures performed back to back without seeing medical staff wash their hands or instruments in between. With no clean running water, it was explained, there's no use in scrubbing. In a country where women are forbidden to practice medicine and are also not allowed to be examined by male physicians, the rates of death and disease for mothers and children are about as high as can be imagined. "You'd be hard-pressed to go there and not come away a different person," he said during a June 8 visit to NIH, recalling some of the horrible health care conditions he had found on his global journeys. "It's the worst country in the world for maternal deaths. I don't think there was a dry eye."
M O R E . . .
Society, Not Succimer, Must Get the Lead Out
By Rich McManus
Hopes were high 10 years ago as scientists began a study that would determine whether a stinky white powder called succimer —which can leach lead out of the bloodstreams of youngsters — could reverse the IQ deficits they suffered from their lead exposure. But after 7 years of studies on an initial cohort of almost 800 kids — most of them poor and black — in four cities, scientists led by Dr. Walter Rogan of the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences determined that, although it lowered blood lead levels, the drug didn't budge average IQ scores.
M O R E . . . |