Researchers Turn Stem Cells Into Intestinal Tissue in Lab

Researchers say they've turned human stem cells into functioning human intestinal tissue in a laboratory setting. The study team described its accomplishment as a "significant step" forward in efforts to better understand the function and development of the human intestine. They also expressed hope that the innovation will spur the development of new strategies to combat intestinal diseases, while opening up new avenues for the generation of transplantation tissue.

"The hope is that our ability to turn stem cells into intestinal tissue will eventually be therapeutically beneficial for people with diseases such as necrotizing enterocolitis, inflammatory bowel disease and short bowel syndromes," explained study senior author James Wells, a researcher in the division of developmental biology at Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center, in a hospital news release. Wells and his colleagues report their findings in the Dec. 12 online issue of Nature.

The authors used two types of so-called "pluripotent" stem cells -- cells that have the chameleon-like ability to differentiate into any one of about 200 distinct cell types. Human embryonic stem cells, which are known to have such transformative abilities, were one type. For the other, the researchers looked to "induced" stem cells cells harvested from patients and reprogrammed in the lab to function as pluripotent stem cells. Though less well-tested than embryonic stem cells, induced cells theoretically have the advantage of minimizing the risk for cell rejection when replanted back into the host patient.

Black Smokers May Face Higher Death Risk Than Whites: CDC

A study conducted in Missouri suggests that smoking may be even more lethal for blacks than it is for whites. In fact, researchers say the smoking related death rate for blacks is nearly one-fifth higher than it is for whites in that state. The study was conducted by researchers at the Office on Smoking and Health at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. They analyzed data from 2003-2007 found that the average annual smoking-attributable death rate was 358 per 100,000 for blacks in Missouri and 286 per 100,000 for whites, a difference of 18 percent. That racial difference was larger among men than among women.

Blacks had a 26 percent higher smoking-related death rate for cancer and a 53 percent higher smoking-related death for circulatory diseases, but a 32 percent lower smoking-related death rate for respiratory diseases. Overall, smoking caused about a third of all cancer deaths, 15.3 percent of all circulatory disease deaths, and 46.5 percent of all respiratory disease deaths in Missouri between 2003 and 2007, according to the study. The findings appear in this week's issue of Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report. Based on the data, the CDC says that "states should continue to implement population-wide tobacco control interventions that reach all racial groups."

FDA Expected to Ban Caffeinated Alcohol Drinks

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration was set to rule Wednesday on the safety of caffeinated alcoholic beverages that have reportedly left dozens of young adults sick or hospitalized. The announcement comes amid a growing backlash against so-called energy drinks that mix caffeine and alcohol, even though such beverages are becoming increasingly popular with college students and even children. The drinks are regularly consumed by 31 percent of 12- to 17-year-olds and 34 percent of 18- to 24-year-olds, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates.

New York Sen. Charles Schumer, who has supported a ban on the drinks that are marketed under such names as Four Loko and Joose, reported Tuesday on his Web site that the FDA would outlaw the products because they are an "unsafe food additive to alcoholic beverages." Schumer, a Democrat, also said the Federal Trade Commission planned to notify manufacturers that "they are engaged in the potential illegal marketing of unsafe alcoholic drinks." Meanwhile, the maker of Four Loko said Tuesday that it would remove caffeine and other stimulants from its four different flavors of alcoholic drinks.

Four Loko has up to 12 percent alcohol in a 23.5-ounce can, according to published reports. Four Loko's manufacturer, Chicago-based Phusion Projects, insists that the drinks are safe. But, in a statement posted on the company's Web site, it said it was removing the caffeine "after trying unsuccessfully to navigate a difficult and politically charged regulatory environment at both the state and federal levels." The company said it doesn't agree that mixing caffeine and alcohol is inherently unsafe.

Omega-3 Supplements Won't Fight Irregular Heartbeat

Omega-3 fatty acid supplements don't cut back on recurrences of atrial fibrillation, a type of irregular heartbeat that can cause stroke, new research suggests. "We now have definitive data that they don't work for most patients with AF," said Dr. Peter R. Kowey, lead author of a study appearing in the Dec. 1 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association that is also scheduled to be presented Monday at the American Heart Association's annual meeting in Chicago. "Although we can't exclude the possibility of efficacy in sicker AF patients, it would be hard to believe that it would work in that population and not in healthier patients. So for practical purposes, yes, the end of the line in AF."

This study, the largest of its kind, looked at patients with AF who were otherwise healthy. "We cannot say there is any convincing evidence of a role for omega-3 in the prevention of atrial fibrillation," added Dr. Ranjit Suri, director of the Electrophysiology Service and Cardiac Arrhythmia Center at Lenox Hill Hospital in New York City, who was not involved with the trial. The study was funded by GlaxoSmithKline. Omega-3 fatty acids, which are found in fatty fish such as salmon and albacore tuna, had showed some promise in preventing heart disease in earlier trials. Of the total 663 outpatient participants, 542 had paroxysmal atrial fibrillation, which appears suddenly and resolves on its own, and 121 had persistent atrial fibrillation, which needs treatment.

Participants were randomized to receive either a placebo or 8 grams of omega-3 supplements daily for the first week, followed by 4 grams a day for the remaining 23 weeks of the trial. The doses used in the study are available only by prescription and are "higher than doses previously published in studies," said Dr. Robert Block, a cardiologist and assistant professor of community and preventive medicine at the University of Rochester Medical Center. At the end of six months, 46 percent of those in the placebo group and 52 percent of those taking omega-3 supplements experienced recurrences. The numbers of paroxysmal AF patients in the placebo and treatment groups who had AF recurrences were about equal, the investigators found.

Number of Uninsured American Adults Hits Record High

Nearly 50 million Americans have gone without health insurance for at least part of the past year up from 46 million people in 2008, federal health officials reported Tuesday. Those people included not only those Americans living in poverty, but an increasing number of middle-income people, according to a report from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. "The bottom line is that uninsurance of young and middle-class adults increased by 4 million people from 2008 to the first quarter of 2010," CDC Director Dr. Thomas R. Frieden said during a news conference Tuesday.

What's more, the number of people without insurance for a year or more increased from 27.5 million in 2008 to 30.4 million in the first quarter of 2010, Frieden said. "That's an increase of 3 million of chronically uninsured adults." These findings debunk two myths about health insurance, Frieden said. "The first myth is that it's only the poor who are uninsured. In fact, half of the uninsured are over the poverty level," he said. "The second myth is that it's only healthy people who are uninsured and that young healthy people make a choice not to have health insurance. In fact, more than two out of five individuals who are uninsured at some point during the past year had one or more chronic diseases," he said.

During the past 10 years, the number of U.S. adults without insurance for at least part of the year has risen an average of 1.1 million people a year, and about half are middle-income adults, according to the report. People without health insurance are more likely to skip medical care because of cost. This can lead to poorer health, higher long-term health care costs and early death, the report said. Uninsured adults with chronic medical problems are three times more likely to skip medical care, compared to those with insurance. For instance, more than 40 percent of people without insurance who suffer from diabetes, high blood pressure or asthma skipped getting care due to costs, the report found.

U.S. Hispanics Outlive General Population: CDC

Hispanics in the United States outlive whites by almost three years and blacks by almost eight years, according to a new report. The report, released by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Wednesday, confirms the so called "Hispanic paradox" that despite reports of poverty and health issues, Hispanics live longer than others. "We have known that Hispanics have had a longer length of life," said Jane L. Delgado, president and CEO of the National Alliance for Hispanic Health, who was not involved in the research.

But the findings may surprise the average person, "because most of the time what people hear about is what problems Hispanics have," she said. These include lower income, lack of health insurance, high-risk jobs, limited access to health care and being overweight and diabetic, she said. Life expectancy for Hispanics at birth is 80.6 years; for whites, 78.1 years and for blacks, 72.9 years. In 2006, life expectancy for all Americans at birth was 77.7 years.

"Although seemingly paradoxical, these results are consistent with the findings of numerous studies, which show a Hispanic mortality advantage despite this population's lower socioeconomic status," report author Elizabeth Arias from CDC's National Center for Health Statistics, said in a CDC news release. So what's the secret? Although various theories have surfaced, experts can't say for sure why Hispanics enjoy greater longevity, but Delgado said studies are under way. "It's probably not genetic," Delgado said. "The longer people are in the United States they start to lose some of these health advantages."

As Science Unlocks Secrets, Cancer Rates Fall

Cancer is one of the most feared diseases on the planet, and the second leading cause of death in the United States. But medical science is slowly conquering cancer, according to an assessment of cancer trends produced by the U.S. National Cancer Institute in conjunction with the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the American Cancer Society and the North American Association of Central Cancer Registries. Death rates and diagnosis rates from all cancers combined are declining significantly, both for men and women overall, and for most racial and ethnic populations within the United States, the report found.

New diagnoses for all types of cancer combined decreased an average of almost 1 percent a year from 1999 to 2006, and deaths attributed to cancer decreased 1.6 percent a year from 2001 to 2006, according to the report, an annual evaluation released each December. Doctors predict that the rates will keep falling because research has begun unlocking the secrets of how different cancers begin and develop. "We're beginning to understand that each cancer has an individual pathway to development," said Dr. Alan G. Thorson, president of the American Cancer Society, a clinical professor of surgery and director of colon and rectal surgery at Creighton University in Omaha, Neb. "We know now how to look at cancer, find its source and go for that source, which makes all the difference in the world."

The decrease in cancer incidence and deaths has been driven mainly by advances in detecting and treating the major types of cancer in men and women, according to the report. Incidence and death rates are declining for lung, prostate and colorectal cancer in men, and for breast and colorectal cancer in women, the report said. Also, increases in the other major cancer for women, lung cancer, have tapered off, with rates remaining stable since 2003. There's no single explanation for the decrease in these major cancers, doctors said. Rather, the decreases are chalked up to effective detection and treatment tools designed for each form of cancer. For example, public tobacco policy has been crucial in reducing lung cancer rates in men and leveling them out for women, said Dr. Brenda Edwards, associate director of the Surveillance Research Program at the U.S. National Cancer Institute.

No Gender-Based Difference Seen in Anti-HIV Drug Response

Men and women have the same responses to the anti-HIV drugs darunavir and ritonavir, researchers have found. The new study included 429 HIV-positive patients at 65 sites in the United States, Puerto Rico and Canada. HIV is the virus that causes AIDS. The participants were given 600 milligrams of darunavir and 100 mg of ritonavir twice daily. The treatment response rates were 73 percent in women and 73.5 percent in men, the investigators found. Rates of adverse events were also comparable between the sexes. The most common side effects were nausea, diarrhea and rash. The findings are published in the Sept. 21 issue of the journal Annals of Internal Medicine. The Gender, Race and Clinical Experience (GRACE) study was funded by Tibotec Therapeutics, which markets darunavir.

The study authors noted that 32.8 percent of the female participants dropped out before the end of the study, compared with 23.2 percent of the males. This suggests that more needs to be done to retain women in clinical trials. "It is critical that women are involved in clinical trials to evaluate the efficacy and toxicity of new treatments not just for HIV but for all diseases," lead author Dr. Judith Currier, a professor of medicine and chief of the division of infectious diseases at the David Geffen School of Medicine at the University of California, Los Angeles, said in a UCLA news release.

Most Americans Still Not Eating Enough Fruits, Veggies

In 2000, the U.S. government set modest goals for the amount of fruit and vegetables people should eat, but a decade later the majority of Americans are not even close to reaching those thresholds, health officials said Thursday. In fact, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, in 2009, 67.5 percent of adults ate fruit less than two times daily and 73.7 percent ate vegetables less than three times per day. The goals of Healthy People 2010 were for 75 percent of people to eat at least two servings of fruit and 50 percent to eat at least three servings of vegetables every day. "Over the last decade we have looked at behavioral intervention, like counseling to get people to include their fruits and vegetables," said report co-author Dr. Jennifer Foltz, a researcher in the CDC's National Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion. "But it's not so easy."

"In the next decade, we are going to work on making the healthy choice the easy choice," she said. New programs will involve promoting gardening, farmer's markets and bringing more fruits and vegetables into schools and workplaces, Foltz said. In addition, Foltz said there could be programs to help retailers increase the availability of fruits and vegetables through incentives like tax breaks as well as making it easier for low-income people to afford fresh fruit and vegetables. Foltz noted that low-income Americans are more likely not to have access to fresh fruits and vegetables at affordable prices, which is why programs specifically targeted at this population are needed.

The report is published in the Sept. 10 issue of the CDC's Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report. Despite efforts to increase healthy eating, over the past decade there has been a 2 percent decrease in fruit consumption and no change in the vegetable consumption, the researchers found. No state has yet met the Healthy People 2010 goals, Foltz said. In fact only one state, Idaho, rose in the amount of fruits and vegetables ate while 10 states saw a decrease in fruit and vegetable consumption. The 10 states where significant decreases in fruit and vegetable consumption were seen are Arizona, Kansas, Maryland, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Rhode Island, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee and West Virginia, according to the report.