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A puzzling study of U.S. pregnancies found that women who had miscarriages between 2010 and 2012 were more likely to have had back-to-back annual flu shots that included protection against swine flu. Past studies have found flu vaccines are safe during pregnancy, though there’s been little research on impact of flu vaccinations given in the first three months of pregnancy. This study focused only on miscarriages, which occur in the first 19 weeks of pregnancy and are common. The study’s authors, two of whom are CDC researchers, saw a big difference when they looked at women who had miscarried within 28 days of getting a shot that included protection against swine flu, but it was only when the women also had had a flu shot the previous season. They found 17 of 485 miscarriages they studied involved women whose vaccinations followed that pattern. Just four of a comparable 485 healthy pregnancies involved women who were vaccinated that way. Some of the same researchers are working on a larger study looking at more recent data to see if a possible link between swine flu vaccine and miscarriage holds up.

Note: Shortly after publication, this article was removed from the ABC News website. The complete article text is available here. The study in Vaccine can be found on this page. An important article on this study by Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. on this webpage further states "in women who received the H1N1 vaccine in the previous flu season, the odds of spontaneous abortion in the 28 days after receiving a flu vaccine was 7.7 times greater." Could it be that the major media don't want to lose the huge revenue gained by drug ads by pharmaceuticals?

The sperm count of men in Western countries has been declining precipitously with no signs of “leveling off,” according to new research, bolstering a school of thought that male health in the modern world is at risk, possibly threatening fertility. An international team of researchers ... looked at semen samples from 42,935 men from 50 countries from 1973 to 2011. They found that sperm concentration - the number of sperm per milliliter of semen - had declined each year, amounting to a 52.4 percent total decline, in men from North America, Europe, Australia and New Zealand. Total sperm count among the same group also tumbled each year for a total decline of 59.3 percent over the nearly 40-year period. Decreasing sperm count was first reported a quarter century ago, but the new analysis shows that “this decline is strong and continuing,” said Dr. Shanna H. Swan, one of the study’s authors. A 2005 study, Dr. Swan said, showed that prenatal exposure to phthalates, also called plasticizers, affected the development of sons. Phthalates are a group of chemicals used to make plastics more flexible and harder to break. They have been shown to disrupt the operation of male hormones like testosterone and have been linked to genital birth defects in male infants. Professor Skakkebaek, an author of a 1992 study that suggested chemicals play a role in the steady decline in semen quality, has since indicated that a rise in abnormal male reproductive systems may be linked to exposures to endocrine-disrupting chemicals.

Note: Exposure to endocrine-disrupting chemicals has also been linked to "lower IQ, adult obesity and 5% of autism cases". For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing health news articles from reliable major media sources.

Pressure to feel upbeat can make you feel downbeat, while embracing your darker moods can actually make you feel better in the long run, according to new UC Berkeley research. "We found that people who habitually accept their negative emotions experience fewer negative emotions, which adds up to better psychological health," said study senior author Iris Mauss. "Maybe if you have an accepting attitude toward negative emotions, you're not giving them as much attention," Mauss said. "And perhaps, if you're constantly judging your emotions, the negativity can pile up." The study ... tested the link between emotional acceptance and psychological health in more than 1,300 adults. People who commonly resist acknowledging their darkest emotions, or judge them harshly, can end up feeling more psychologically stressed. By contrast, those who generally allow such bleak feelings as sadness, disappointment and resentment to run their course reported fewer mood disorder symptoms than those who critique them or push them away, even after six months. "It turns out that how we approach our own negative emotional reactions is really important for our overall well-being," said study lead author Brett Ford. "People who accept these emotions without judging or trying to change them are able to cope with their stress more successfully."

Note: Explore a treasure trove of concise summaries of incredibly inspiring news articles which will inspire you to make a difference.

About one out of every 12 U.S. doctors gets money, lunch or something else of value from companies that make opioid drugs, researchers reported Wednesday. Companies are spending much more time and effort marketing opioids to doctors than they are other, less addictive painkillers, the researchers found. They say their findings help explain why doctors have played such an important role in the opioid overuse epidemic. “A large proportion of physicians received payments - one in 12 physicians overall,” said Dr. Scott Hadland of the Boston Medical Center. “Tens of millions of dollars were transferred for marketing purposes for opioids. In some cases they are money provided directly to physicians - for example, the speaking fees, the consultant fees and the honoraria. In other cases it is reimbursement for things like travel,” Hadland said. Between 2013 and 2015, the team found 375,266 payments worth $46 million made to more than 68,000 doctors. “The top 1 percent of physicians (681 of them) received 82.5 percent of total payments in dollars,” the team wrote in their report. A study published last year found that physicians who accepted even one meal sponsored by a drug company were much more likely to prescribe a name-brand drug to patients later. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says doctors are definitely helping drive the addiction crisis. The result is deadly. More than 30,000 Americans died from opioid overdoses in 2015.

Note: The city of Everett, Washington is currently suing Purdue Pharma, maker of the opioid pain medication OxyContin, for the company's alleged role in the diversion of its pills to black market buyers. For other reliable information on pharmaceutical involvement in the huge increase in opioid deaths, see Dr. Mercola's excellent article. For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing pharmaceutical corruption news articles from reliable major media sources.

Americans take more pills today than at any other time in recent history - and far more than people in any other country. Much of that medication use is lifesaving or at least life-improving. But a lot is not. The amount of harm stemming from inappropriate prescription medication is staggering. Almost 1.3 million people went to U.S. emergency rooms due to adverse drug effects in 2014, and about 124,000 died from those events. That’s according to estimates based on data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Food and Drug Administration. Other research suggests that up to half of those events were preventable. All of that bad medicine is costly, too. An estimated $200 billion per year is spent in the U.S. on the unnecessary and improper use of medication, for the drugs themselves and related medical costs. Our previous surveys have found that higher drug costs - including more expensive drugs and higher out-of-pocket costs - also strain household budgets, with many people telling us they had to cut back on groceries or delay paying other bills to pay for their prescriptions. Total spending on drug ads targeting consumers reached $6.4 billion last year, 64 percent more than in 2012. That’s $1.3 billion more than the FDA’s entire 2017 budget. Drug companies spend even more - $24 billion in 2012 alone - on marketing just to doctors through ads in medical journals, face-to-face sales, free medication samples, and educational and promotional meetings.

Note: For more, see this informative article . For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on Big Pharma profiteering and health.

Hypnosis isn’t just for hucksters and Hollywood villains any more. Clinical trials have demonstrated its effectiveness in treating anxiety, phobias, skin rashes, irritable-bowel syndrome and acute and chronic pain. In North America, medical centres such as the Mayo Clinic have added hypnosis to their pain-management tools. As with mindfulness meditation, hypnosis harnesses the brain’s natural abilities to regulate the body and control the random thoughts that ricochet through our minds, says Dr. David Patterson, a University of Washington psychologist. But, he adds, meditation can take weeks or months of practice before it helps patients. With hypnosis, “the relief is just a lot quicker and more dramatic.” About 10 per cent to 15 per cent of adults are “highly hypnotizable,” meaning they can easily slip into a trance and act on hypnotic suggestions. The same percentage of adults do not respond to hypnosis at all, while the rest are somewhere in between. In hypnosis circles, the word “powerful” comes up a lot. But it’s hardly an overstatement when you consider the work of Dr. Marie-Elisabeth Faymonville, director of the pain clinic ... at the University Hospital of Ličge, Belgium. Hypnosis allows patients to avoid general anesthesia in surgeries ranging from mastectomies to heart-valve replacements, Faymonville says. Since 1992, she has treated more than 9,500 surgery patients with “hypno-sedation,” combining hypnosis with small amounts of local anesthesia. Of those patients, just 18 had to switch to general anesthesia.

Note: Explore a treasure trove of concise summaries of incredibly inspiring news articles which will inspire you to make a difference.

Public money and public universities boost Big Pharma’s profits, so shouldn’t the public be able to afford the drugs? Almost 1 in 2 people used a prescription drug in the past month, and more than 1 in 5 used three or more. As the population ages and deals with more chronic diseases like diabetes, heart disease and depression, the percentage of people needing prescription medicines is growing. But what really sets us apart is how much they cost. Medicines in the US cost 2 to 6 times more than the rest of the world. 1 in 5 Americans - 35 million people - do not get their prescriptions filled because they don't have enough money. Big Pharma says high prices are necessary to invest in breakthrough research. But corporations don't actually do much of that, [and] have shifted money away from new-drug research to quick-profit minor variations on proven moneymakers. So who funds new-drug and breakthrough-drug research? Taxpayers. 84% of new-drug research is funded by the government. The public also subsidizes drug research through generous R&D tax credits. Using public research (plus charging high prices) gives corporations big profits. Drug companies' annual stock returns are twice the standard.

Note: A comprehensive infographic showing Big Pharma's preferential treatment by US regulators can be found at the link above. For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on corruption in government and in the pharmaceutical industry.

Leaked internal emails appear to show employees at one of the world’s leading pharmaceutical companies calling for “celebration” over price hikes of cancer drugs. After purchasing five different cancer drugs from British firm GlaxoSmithKline, [Aspen Pharmacare] tried to sell the medicines ... for up to 40 times their previous price. When bargaining over drug prices in Spain, the pharmaceutical giant is said to have threatened to stop selling the cancer treatments unless the health minister agreed to price rises of up to 4,000 per cent. Now another leaked email appears to reveal that staff at Aspen discussed destroying their supplies of the drug in the row. The price increases were made possible by a loophole that allows drug companies to change the price of medicines if they are no longer branded with the same name. The loophole is designed to make drugs cheaper once their patents have expired – but if drug companies have no competition, they are free to rise prices as well. A ruling by the Italian competition watchdog found Aspen had taken an “aggressive” approach to negotiations in the country. The company said it would stop supplying Italy with the drugs in October 2013 if authorities did not agree to price rises of up to 2,100 per cent in three months.

Note: For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing Big Pharma corruption news articles from reliable major media sources.

High doses of vitamin C injected into the blood stream could prove effective in treating cancer, according to new research. Scientists said vitamin C infusions, which were up to 1,000 times higher than recommended intake levels, selectively targeted tumour cells in cancer patients. This increased the rates of cell deaths and sensitised them to radiation and chemotherapy. The treatment also appeared to be safe, producing mild side effects such as frequent bathroom trips and a dry mouth. Eleven brain cancer patients were given three infusions of vitamin C a week for two months followed by a further two per week for seven months while receiving standard radiotherapy and chemotherapy. Tests showed that iron in their tumours reacted with the vitamin to form highly reactive and destructive “free radical” hydrogen peroxide molecules. The free radicals were thought to cause selective DNA damage in cancerous, but not healthy, cells. This in turn was expected to lead to enhanced cancer cell death as well as sensitisation to radiation and chemotherapy drugs. US researcher Dr Garry Buettner, from the University of Iowa, said: “This paper reveals a metabolic frailty in cancer cells that is based on their own production of oxidizing agents that allows us to utilise existing redox active compounds, like vitamin C, to sensitise cancer cells to radiation and chemotherapy.” The safety study sets the stage for larger Phase II trials investigating whether high-dose vitamin C injections can extend the lifespan of cancer patients.

Note: This study was published in the journal Cancer Cell. For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on promising cancer research.

As a social worker, Susannah Rose referred clients with cancer to patient advocacy groups she trusted to dispense unbiased advice - until she heard the groups might be taking money from pharmaceutical companies. So she set out to investigate. Two-thirds of patient advocacy organizations reported receiving industry funding, Rose, now a bioethicist, finds in a new study. Her research was published ... in JAMA Internal Medicine along with other studies showing a host of ways pharmaceutical manufacturers appear to pay for influence. Rose and her colleagues identified 7,865 patient advocacy organizations in the U.S., most involving cancer and rare or genetic disorders. They surveyed a random sample of the organization's leaders. More than 67 percent of 245 patient advocacy groups reported receiving industry funding in the past year. Of those, nearly 12 percent reported that more than half their funding came from industry. When the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention drafted guidelines for prescribing opioids for chronic pain in an effort to curtail a growing epidemic of abuse of the painkillers in 2015, nonprofit organizations stepped in to challenge the effort. The CDC postponed releasing the guidelines and solicited public comments for 30 days. Opioid manufacturers gave money to 45 of 158 patient advocacy and professional organizations that commented on the proposed guidelines. Organizations with funding from opioid manufacturers were significantly more likely to oppose them, researchers found.

Note: It's interesting to note that apparently no other major media picked up this Reuters article. Drug company executives have recently been caught bribing doctors to over-prescribe opioids, and ex-DEA official has publicly accused Congress of helping drug makers avoid responsibility for their role in the US opioid epidemic. For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing Big Pharma corruption news articles from reliable major media sources.

President-elect Donald Trump met with Robert Kennedy Jr., a prominent vaccine skeptic, on Tuesday. According to incoming White House press secretary Sean Spicer, the two discussed “the issues pertaining to vaccines and immunizations.” After the meeting concluded, Kennedy told reporters that Mr. Trump had asked him to “chair a commission on vaccination safety and scientific integrity.” Kennedy said he told Mr. Trump he would chair such a commission, and that their meeting was held at Mr. Trump’s request. Kennedy, the eldest son of liberal icon Sen. Robert Kennedy, was best known as an environmental advocate before increasingly devoting his time to the supposed dangers of vaccines. Mr. Trump has repeatedly shared his belief that there is a link between vaccines and autism. Kennedy has argued that vaccines, specifically those containing the element thimerosal, may cause autism, a view ... dismissed as a conspiracy theory by experts. Many parents continue to insist that their children were damaged by immunizations. Kennedy, who criticized Mr. Trump during the election campaign, has also written a book ... on the subject.

Note: Read Kennedy's most excellent, well researched article "Deadly Immunity" to understand why he questions the current vaccine regimen And then check out an excellent interview from Dec. 2016 on how Kennedy was "dragged kicking and screaming into this brawl," yet ultimately convinced of its importance. What's amazing is that the vast majority of people never knew Robert Kennedy's son was an advocate for safe vaccines. Now they know and the media are attacking him fiercely. For more, see concise summaries of revealing vaccine controversy news articles.

Anti-vaccine rant exposes conflict over hospitals’ embrace of alternative medicine
January 9, 2017, Boston Globe/Statnews.com
https://www.bostonglobe.com/news/science/2017/01/09/anti-vaccine-rant-exposes...

In the span of a few days, the anti-vaccine screed of a Cleveland Clinic doctor prompted a social media firestorm, an apparent retraction from the physician, and promises of disciplinary action by administrators of his prestigious hospital system. The anti-vaccine column that triggered the weekend’s outcry was written by Dr. Daniel Neides, director and CEO of the Cleveland Clinic’s Wellness Institute, which advertises homeopathic remedies and alternative weight loss and pain management treatments. In his commentary posted on Cleveland.com, Neides, who is a family doctor, said that preservatives and other ingredients in vaccines are dangerous and are likely behind the increase in diagnosed cases of neurological diseases such as autism. “Does the vaccine burden - as has been debated for years - cause autism? I don’t know and will not debate that here. What I will stand up and scream is that newborns without intact immune systems and detoxification systems are being over-burdened with preservatives and adjuvants in the vaccines,” he wrote. Adjuvants are added to vaccines to prompt a stronger immune response. Neides issued an apology and apparent retraction on Sunday, saying in a statement released by the Cleveland Clinic: “I fully support vaccinations and my concern was meant to be positive around the safety of them.”

Note: It is highly unusual that at the time of writing this, the above Boston Globe link automatically forwards to another website. The lack of willingness to entertain the wealth of documented evidence of vaccines dangers by the media is astounding. See the original article on this webpage and note how this very respected physician is being ridiculed by so many who parrot the official line about vaccine safety. For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing vaccine controversy news articles from reliable major media sources.

Last year, the city of Flint, Michigan, burst into the world spotlight after its children were exposed to lead in drinking water. 5 percent of the children screened there had high blood lead levels. Flint is no aberration. In fact, it doesn't even rank among the most dangerous lead hotspots in America. In all, Reuters found nearly 3,000 areas with recently recorded lead poisoning rates at least double those in Flint during the peak of that city's contamination crisis. And more than 1,100 of these communities had a rate of elevated blood tests at least four times higher. The poisoned places ... stretch from Warren, Pennsylvania, a town on the Allegheny River where 36 percent of children tested had high lead levels, to a zip code on Goat Island, Texas, where a quarter of tests showed poisoning. In some pockets of Baltimore, Cleveland and Philadelphia, where lead poisoning has spanned generations, the rate of elevated tests over the last decade was 40-50 percent. Like Flint, many of these localities are plagued by legacy lead: crumbling paint, plumbing, or industrial waste left behind. Unlike Flint, many have received little attention or funding to combat poisoning. Even in some of the highest risk areas around the country, many small children go untested. In South Bend, Indiana, where health officials face a cash crunch, lead testing is in sharp decline even as existing data points to a serious problem. In one tract there, 31 percent of small children tested from 2005 to 2015 had high levels - more than six times Flint's rate last year.

Note: Read more about the widespread lead contamination in low-income neighborhoods throughout the US. For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on government corruption and health.

Seth Ellingsworth of West Richland, Washington, says he got sick in an instant last year, when he briefly inhaled a strange odor at his job at the nearby Hanford Nuclear Site. Seventy years ago, the Hanford Site produced plutonium for America's nuclear arsenal. Today, it's run by the Department of Energy through its contractor, Washington River Protection Solutions. The contractor is managing a $110 billion cleanup of 56 million gallons of chemical and nuclear waste, stored in 177 underground tanks. But the tanks are leaking, and the vapors they emit contain toxic and radioactive chemicals. Some nuclear experts have called Hanford "the most toxic place in America" and "an underground Chernobyl waiting to happen." The DOE has acknowledged in nearly 20 studies conducted over the past 24 years that there is a safety risk to workers at Hanford. But critics say the DOE ... continues to put workers at risk. Neuropsychologist Brian Campbell says he has evaluated 29 people at Hanford with both respiratory and cognitive symptoms, including "some of the worst cases of dementia that I've seen in young people." Dr. Campbell said the DOE doesn't want to acknowledge the injuries. Workers told us that "over and over," the Department of Energy and the contractor on site told them the readings for harmful materials were safe. Former workers also said that in the past they were almost never allowed to opt for protective gear, like the supplied air tanks recommended by many experts.

Note: A Newsweek article describes the Hanford site as an "American Fukushima" that will require 50 more years and $110 billion to adequately clean up. For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing nuclear power news articles from reliable major media sources.

In every state, patient protection is supposed to be the prime directive when it comes to licensing and disciplining doctors. But a 50-state examination by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution found that only a few states have anything close to a comprehensive set of laws that put patients first. “Instead of looking out for victims or possible victims or protecting our society, we’re protecting doctors,” said Rep. Kimberly Williams, a member of the Delaware General Assembly, who sponsored a patient-protection bill last year that was blocked with a veto. The AJC studied five categories of laws in every state in the nation to determine which states are the best - and the worst - at shielding patients from sexually abusive doctors. The statutes examined covered everything from the duty to report bad doctors and the power to revoke the licenses of the worst, to the laws that decide who gets to serve on medical licensing boards and how much information consumers can know about doctors who have gotten into trouble. Not a single state met the highest bar in every category. The AJC’s findings explain how it’s possible for a doctor who has served time on felony charges, molested patients or demanded sex in exchange for prescription drugs to continue seeing patients: In most states, there’s no law against it. It often takes a horrific case or a public expose to get pro-patient legislation passed.

Note: See a list of powerful articles revealing egregious and rampant sexual abuse by doctors around the US. For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on sexual abuse scandals and health.

In the summer of 2005, Jeffrey Karp, a bioengineer at Brigham and Women’s Hospital [read an] article [detailing] how a group of researchers had created a new synthetic material by mimicking the properties of gecko feet – whose tiny, hair-like pillars allow the lizard to stick to and detach from apparently sheer surfaces with ease. His first thought was to use the material to create a new type of medical tape that could replace sutures and staples, which can damage sensitive tissue surrounding wounds. In 2008, MIT’s Technology Review magazine named Karp one of the top innovators in the world under the age of 35. Karp, who is now 40 and runs his own lab ... is what is known in the business as a bioinspirationalist – a person who looks to nature for solutions to scientific problems. The gecko tape was Karp’s first bioinspired invention. Karp’s current projects include surgical staples inspired by porcupine quills, which create smaller punctures in the skin and prevent bacteria from entering wounds, and a new kind of surgical glue inspired by ... marine worms, which is strong enough to bind moving tissue inside major organs. This last invention has helped to cement Karp’s reputation as a rising star in the world of bioengineering. Because he doesn’t just invent cool stuff – he turns his creations into actual products. “When we look to solve problems, it’s not so we can publish papers,” said Nick Sherman, a research technician at Karp Lab. “It’s more like, ‘Is this work going to help patients?’”

Note: Don't miss pictures and detailed descriptions of some of Karp's nature-inspired inventions at the link above. Explore a treasure trove of concise summaries of incredibly inspiring news articles which will inspire you to make a difference.

Concerns about the inner workings of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) have been mounting in recent months amid disclosures of cozy corporate alliances. Now a group of more than a dozen senior scientists have reportedly lodged an ethics complaint alleging the federal agency is being influenced by corporate and political interests in ways that short-change taxpayers. A group calling itself CDC Scientists Preserving Integrity, Diligence and Ethics in Research, or CDC SPIDER, put a list of complaints in writing in a letter to the CDC Chief of Staff and provided a copy of the letter to [a] public watchdog organization. The members of the group have elected to file the complaint anonymously for fear of retribution. “It appears that our mission is being influenced and shaped by outside parties and rogue interests... and Congressional intent for our agency is being circumvented by some of our leaders. What concerns us most, is that it is becoming the norm and not the rare exception,” the letter states. The complaint cites among other things a “cover up” of the poor performance of a women’s health program called ... WISEWOMAN. The complaint alleges there was a coordinated effort within the CDC to misrepresent data given to Congress. “Definitions were changed and data ‘cooked’ to make the results look better than they were,” the complaint states. And the complaint cites as “troubling” the ties between soft drink giant Coca-Cola Co. ... and two high-ranking CDC officials.

Note: For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing news articles on government corruption and health.

A new study questions the value of mammograms for breast cancer screening. It concludes that a woman is more likely to be diagnosed with a small tumor that is not destined to grow than she is to have a true problem spotted early. The work could further shift the balance of whether screening’s harms outweigh its benefits. Screening is only worthwhile if it finds cancers that would kill, and if treating them early improves survival versus treating when or if they ever cause symptoms. Treatment has improved so much over the years that detecting cancer early has become less important. Mammograms do catch some deadly cancers and save lives. But they also find many early cancers that are not destined to grow or spread and become a health threat. There is no good way to tell which ones will, so many women get treatments they don’t really need. It’s a twin problem: overdiagnosis and overtreatment. Women were considerably more likely to have tumors that were overdiagnosed than to have earlier detection of a tumor that was destined to become large,” the authors write. Dr. Joann Elmore of the University of Washington School of Medicine in Seattle, writes in a commentary in the journal that it’s time to pay more attention to the “collateral damage” of screening - overdiagnosis. “The mantras, ‘All cancers are life-threatening’ and ‘When in doubt, cut it out,’ require revision,” she wrote.

Note: A previous study by The U.S. Preventive Services Task Force, federal advisory panel, found that annual mammograms greatly increase false-positive cancer diagnoses, leading to unnecessary treatment. For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing health news articles from reliable major media sources.

Not many 25-year-olds can claim to get up at 4am and work weekends to save the world from an impending Armageddon that could cost tens of millions of lives. But for the past three years, Shu Lam, a Malaysian PhD student at the University of Melbourne, has confined herself to a scientific laboratory to figure out how to kill superbugs that can no longer be treated with antibiotics. She believes that she has found the key to averting a health crisis so severe that last week the United Nations convened its first ever general assembly meeting on drug-resistant bacteria. The overuse and incorrect use of antibiotics has rendered some strains of bacteria untreatable, allowing so-called “superbugs” to mutate. Last Wednesday, the problem was described by UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon as a “fundamental threat” to global health and safety. [Lam] believes her method of killing bacteria using tiny star-shaped molecules, built with chains of protein units called peptide polymers, is a ground-breaking alternative to failing antibiotics. Her research, published this month in the prestigious journal, Nature Microbiology, has already been hailed by scientists as a breakthrough that could change the face of modern medicine. Lam successfully tested the polymer treatment on six different superbugs in the laboratory, and against one strain of bacteria in mice. Even after multiple generations of mutations, the superbugs have proven incapable of fighting back.

Note: Explore a treasure trove of concise summaries of incredibly inspiring news articles which will inspire you to make a difference.

Unpublished field trials by pesticide manufacturers show their products cause serious harm to honeybees at high levels, leading to calls from senior scientists for the companies to end the secrecy which cloaks much of their research. The research, conducted by Syngenta and Bayer on their neonicotinoid insecticides, were submitted to the US Environmental Protection Agency and obtained by Greenpeace after a freedom of information request. Neonicotinoids are the world’s most widely used insecticides and there is clear scientific evidence that they harm bees at the levels found in fields. Neonicotinoids were banned from use on flowering crops in the EU in 2013, despite UK opposition. The newly revealed studies show Syngenta’s thiamethoxam and Bayer’s clothianidin seriously harmed colonies at high doses, but did not find significant effects below concentrations of 50 parts per billion (ppb) and 40ppb respectively. Such levels can sometimes be found in fields. However, scientists said all such research should be made public. “It is hard to see why the companies don’t make these kinds of studies available,” said Prof Dave Goulson, at the University of Sussex. “It does seem a little shady to do ... the very studies the companies say are the most important ones - and then not tell people what they find.” Syngenta had told Greenpeace in August that “none of the studies Syngenta has undertaken or commissioned for use by regulatory agencies have shown damages to the health of bee colonies”. Goulson said: “That clearly contradicts their own study.”

Note: CNN News reported in 2010 that Bayer covered up the link between its products and massive bee die-offs. Read more about how these pesticides sicken bees and harm food crops. For more along these lines, see concise summaries of deeply revealing food system corruption news articles from reliable major media sources.

Important Note: Explore our full index to revealing excerpts of key major media news articles on several dozen engaging topics. And don't miss amazing excerpts from 20 of the most revealing news articles ever published.