END POLIO----Africa polio eradication scheme launched

A campaign has been launched to eradicate polio in west and central Africa, targeting 85 million children.

Some 400,000 health workers and volunteers will go from door-to-door in 19 countries, giving oral polio vaccine to children under the age of five.

Africa has made significant progress in the fight against polio, which attacks the nervous system, but the virus has still not been stamped out.

Previous efforts at eradication failed as too few children were vaccinated.

The effort is a joint campaign by the Red Cross and United Nations.

Many analysts believe the key to its success lies with Nigeria.

In the past, campaigns in the north of the country were met with suspicion by religious leaders, some of whom even suggested the vaccinations were an attempt to spread sterility and HIV.

But religious groups are now showing support for vaccination drives, and correspondents say there is optimism that the debilitating, sometimes fatal, virus can be eradicated.

Vaccine 'could end Nigeria polio'

Polio could be wiped out in Nigeria - one of the world's last blackspots of the disease - thanks to an improved vaccine, research suggests.

An Imperial College London team found a recently introduced polio vaccine is four times more effective at protecting children than previous vaccines.

They say it could eradicate type 1 polio - the most common form - in Nigeria if it reaches enough children.

TNigeria is one of only four countries in the world where polio has yet to be eliminated, and 82% of global cases reported so far this year have been in the country.

Polio is highly infectious and it primarily affects children under five years of age. A small minority of infected people develop permanent paralysis, which can be fatal.

The monovalent oral poliovirus vaccine, known as mOPV1, has been used in Nigeria since February 2006 and the number of reported cases of polio in the country fell by 75% between 2006 and 2007.

The latest study shows that just one dose of mOPV1 gives a child in Nigeria a 67% chance of being protected, compared with a 16% chance after receiving the standard trivalent vaccine.

However, the researchers warn that although the monovalent vaccine is proving very effective, many more children need to be immunised if the polio virus is to be eliminated in Nigeria.

In the north west zone of the country, where the majority of new cases are found, 21% of children report never having received a single dose of the vaccine and a further 55% have received fewer than the recommended four doses.

Concern raised

Earlier this year the World Health Assembly expressed alarm over a dramatic increase in type 1 cases in Nigeria because of poor immunisation in the north of the country.

The Nigerian government subsequently established a presidential taskforce to identify barriers to immunisation, and potential solutions.

Researcher Helen Jenkins, based at Imperial's MRC Centre for Outbreak Analysis and Modelling, said: "Nigeria and India are responsible for the vast majority of new global polio cases.

"In Nigeria, we now have an effective vaccine to use and we've seen the start of improvements in vaccine uptake.

"These last pockets of unvaccinated children now need to be reached to achieve elimination in Nigeria and this in turn will have a dramatic impact on the prospects of worldwide eradication."

In a statement the World Health Organization said the study proved the new vaccine was a "highly effective tool" - but operational problems stood in the way of successfully eradicating polio.

"To overcome the remaining operational challenges, full political oversight and engagement at all levels is necessary, as demonstrated by states such as Kebbi, where case numbers have declined following such engagement."

The researchers reached their conclusions after analysing the vaccination histories of 21,815 children with acute flaccid paralysis, 14% of whom had polio, collected between January 2001 and December 2007. he study appears in the New England Journal of Medicine.

by bbc news

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Google Street View hits Antarctic

Privacy concerns for Google's Street View may now extend to penguins, following the service's extension to a seventh continent - Antarctica.

The Antarctica imagery is so far limited, showing panoramas of the coast and penguins of Half Moon Island.

Google says its service now covers 25 nations on all the world's continents.

Street View has expanded massively since its launch in 2007 but has encountered a number of protests over its data collection.

Wi-fi concerns

Brian McClendon, vice-president of Engineering, Google Earth and Maps, announced the extension to Antarctica - and also to Brazil and Ireland - on Google Blog.

Google Street View's images are normally taken from a fleet of adapted cars but the Antarctica shots are a combination of Google and user photographs.

The Half Moon Island shots are a view of penguins and one of the landscape.

"The blue dots you see throughout the continent when dragging the pegman are user-contributed photos," Mr McClendon said.

He added: "We often consider Street View to be the last zoom layer on the map. And a way to show you what a place looks like as if you were there in person, whether you're checking out a coffee shop across town or planning a vacation across the globe.

"You can now see images from around the world spanning from the beaches of Brazil, to the moors of Ireland, to the icy terrain in Antarctica."

Google Street View was launched in May 2007, covering San Francisco, Las Vegas, Denver, New York and Miami, allowing users to navigate virtual streets from photographs gathered from directional cameras on special vehicles.

The service has been hugely successful but has brought problems of privacy in some countries.

In May, Google admitted that for the past three years it had wrongly collected information people had sent over unencrypted wi-fi networks.

The issue came to light after German authorities asked to audit the data the company's Street View cars gathered. It emerged the wi-fi data collection had occurred in more than 30 countries.

Investigations are ongoing in France, Germany and Australia, while in Spain, the firm has been summoned to appear before a judge on 4 October.

This month, the office for personal data protection in the Czech Republic refused to grant Google a licence to collect fresh data in the country.

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END MALARIA---Malaria funding 'falling short'

There is a 60% global shortfall in funds for malaria control, according to a report by UK and African experts.

Researchers found only 21 out of 93 countries where malaria is common have received enough money to implement effective control measures.

African countries have seen the biggest funding increases but billions are still needed elsewhere, the experts say in the Lancet medical journal.

The Roll Back Malaria Campaign warned $4.9bn (£3.1bn) was needed this year.

The researchers, led by Professor Bob Snow of Oxford University and Kenya's Kenyatta National Hospital, found that annual international funding had increased by 166% - from $730m to $1.94bn - since 2007.

They said: "Any decline in malaria-funding commitments will run the risk of a resurgence of malaria in countries that have enjoyed the benefits of this funding to provide protection from malaria since 2002.

"Sustained funding in these countries is crucial or $9.9bn invested since 2002 will have been in vain."

While financing for malaria control has increased as part of international efforts to reach the Millennium Development Goals, the amount received from domestic sources varies greatly.

Twenty-one countries, 12 of them in Africa, now receive adequate donor money, according to the research.

But a further 50, including Niger and Sierra Leone, as detailed in the Lancet paper, do not get enough from the international community.

Professor Snow said: "Poor countries with inadequate donor assistance and large sectors of their population at risk of malaria must remain the focus of attention if global ambitions for malaria control are to be realised.

"The challenge will now be on finding more money, making sure funding is linked to performance and putting pressure on malaria-endemic countries with large domestic incomes to do more for themselves.

"A failure to maintain the momentum will mean money spent so far will have been for nothing."

The authors also argue that some countries like China and India, which have their own space programmes, could perhaps contribute funds to help other countries rather than being recipients, thereby increasing the financial support available.

But the work only assesses external funding.

Commenting on the study, Professor Anne Mills, from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine in the UK, said that external funding may be low because a country may be funding its own malaria programmes.

Cerebral malaria may have passed from gorillas to us

Humans may have originally caught malaria from gorillas, scientists say.

Until now, it was thought that the human malaria parasite split off from a chimpanzee parasite when humans and chimpanzees last had a common ancestor.

But researchers from the US, three African countries, and Europe have examined malaria parasites in great ape faeces.

They found the DNA from western gorilla parasites was the most similar to human parasites.

Cerebral malaria

Malaria is caused by a parasite called Plasmodium, and is carried by mosquitoes.

The most common species found in Africa, Plasmodium falciparum, causes dangerous cerebral malaria. Over 800,000 people die from malaria each year in the continent.

Until now, scientists had assumed that when the evolutionary tree of humans split off from that of chimpanzees - around five to seven million years ago - so had Plasmodium falciparum.

DNA analysis

To study the DNA of infections in wild apes, you cannot use blood samples. So the team collected 2,700 samples of faecal material from two species of gorilla - western and eastern - and from common chimpanzees and bonobos, also known as pygmy chimpanzees.

They tried sequencing Plasmodium DNA from the faeces with techniques that use a large sample, and drew a genetic family tree to see which parasites were related. Dr Hahn said "When we did conventional sequencing, the tree didn't make any sense, because each sample contained a mixture of parasites."

They diluted the DNA so that they had just one parasite's genome represented in a single sample, and then amplified the DNA from there. This means they were able to separate the DNA from different species of the parasite much more effectively.

They then found the tree made much more sense. But they also found some surprising results.

The human Plasmodium was not very closely related to chimpanzeePlasmodium, as had been thought - but it was very closely related to one out of three species of gorilla Plasmodium from western gorillas in Central and West Africa.

There was more genetic variety in the gorilla parasites than in human parasites, and Dr Hahn said this means the gorilla is likely to be the "reservoir" - the origin of the human parasite.

"Other studies have just looked at chimps, so didn't find the gorilla parasite," said Dr Hahn. She added that some studies have looked at animals in captivity - so it is possible any parasites have "jumped" from their human keepers.

Cross-infection

The researchers, who report their findings in Nature, are now going to investigate further to see exactly how different the gorilla and human parasites are. Dr Hahn says that it is possible they are even the same species, and that cross-infection between humans and gorillas may be going on now.

Members of the team Dr Martine Peeters and Dr Eric Delaporte of the University of Montpelier in France are working with hunters and loggers in Cameroon, who spend a lot of time in the forests.

They will investigate whether these workers carry malaria parasites from the gorillas, which would suggest that new infections from other species can still happen.

They also do not yet know how badly apes are affected by malaria. Dr Hahn said that the team would now like to find out whether apes are able to catch the malaria parasite, without getting ill or dying in the way that humans do.

Scientists say they have genetic proof malaria spread by mosquitoes jumped species from chimpanzees to humans.

By looking at blood samples, a US team discovered all world strains of the human malaria parasite falciparum stem from a malaria parasite in chimps.

They tell Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences how the species shift probably happened 10,000 years ago when humans turned to agriculture.

Man's encroachment upon the natural forest habitat of chimps is blamed.

It brought the two species into close contact and the deforestation created pools of stagnant water and other conditions favourable for mosquito breeding.

"Today, human encroachment into the last forest habitats has further extended, leading to a higher risk of transfer of new pathogens, including new malaria parasites," the researchers warn.

Species jump

Previously, malaria's origin in humans had been unclear.

But this latest work suggests malaria, like HIV, has jumped species from one of our closest relatives.

Although chimps were known to harbour a parasite - Plasmodium reichenowi - that is closely related to the most common of the human malaria parasites, Plasmodium falciparum, many scientists had assumed that the two had co-existed separately.

But blood tests on 94 wild and captive chimpanzees in Cameroon and the Ivory Coast suggest falciparum evolved from reichenowi.

Francisco Ayala, of the University of California, Irvine, and colleagues found eight new strains of reichenowi that had striking similarities to falciparum and were genetic precursors to the human disease.

The leap could have happened as early as two to three million years ago, but most likely to our Neolithic ancestors as recently as 10,000 years ago.

The scientists hope their discovery will help others looking for new drugs and vaccines to stop human malaria.

Professor Brian Greenwood, a malaria expert at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, said: "This is interesting work.

"There has been dispute about how long falciparum has been around for and as genetic techniques get better we can get a more accurate idea."

Malaria-proof mosquito engineered

Scientists in the US have succeeded in genetically engineering a malaria-resistant mosquito.

The researchers, from the University of Arizona, introduced a gene that affected the insect's gut, meaning the malaria parasite could not develop.

They report the advance, which also reduced the insects' lifespan, in the journal PLoS Pathogens.

They say that the ultimate goal is to introduce malaria-resistant mosquitoes into the environment.

"Before we do this, we have to somehow give the mosquitoes a competitive advantage over the disease-carrying insects," explained Professor Michael Riehle from the University of Arizona a principle investigator on the project.

In the study the researchers altered a gene that codes for a "signalling molecule".

This molecule, a protein, enables the mosquito's cells to communicate with each other, and is crucial for parasite development inside the mosquito.

The genetic tweak artificially increased its production, disrupting the whole process, and also shortened the insect's lifespan.

The team was able to add a fluorescent tag to the gene, to ensure that it had been successfully "expressed" by the mosquito larvae.

Professor Riehle said: "This is the first time that we've been able to completely block the parasite from developing in the mosquito."

Gareth Lycett, a malaria researcher from Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine in the UK, said it was an important advance.

"They have tested it on the most harmful of the malaria parasites, Plasmodium falciparum," he told BBC News. "It is another step on the journey towards potentially assisting malaria control through GM mosquito release."

But Dr Lycett pointed out that the this work had not been carried out specifically on theAnopheles gambiae mosquito. "That is the major vector of malaria in Africa where the disease is most prevalent," he explained.

This study was a collaborative project with the University of California Davis and the University of Georgia funded by the National Institutes of Health.

Slim, Gates and Spain pledge $150m to fight disease

Two of the world's richest men and the Spanish government have pledged $150m (£101.7m) to battle disease and improve health in Central America and Mexico.

Carlos Slim and Bill Gates are to fund a project jointly with Spain aimed at improving nutrition and maternal health and fighting dengue fever and malaria.

The two men and Spain's Princess Cristina announced the project in the Mexican capital, Mexico City.

The project also aims to reduce infant mortality and boost vaccination rates.

The "2015 Meso-American Health Initiative" will benefit Belize, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua and Panama.

The three parties will each donate $50m.

Worth an estimated $53.5bn, Mr Slim - a Mexican telecom mogul - is the world's richest man, according to this year's Forbes magazine "rich list". Mr Gates, founder of Microsoft, is said to be worth $53bn.

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Male infertility gene discovered

A faulty gene could help explain some cases of unexplained male infertility, according to research.

Mutations of the NR5A1 gene were found in a small percentage of infertile men, reports the American Journal of Human Genetics.

Scientists from the Pasteur Institute in France and University College London said it could help doctors investigating men with the condition.

A UK expert said he hoped that further gene defects could be found.

In the majority of cases, doctors can find no cause for male infertility, despite it accounting for up to half of cases in which couples have difficulty conceiving.

Male infertility appears to be more common within certain families, and this leads scientists to believe that there may be a genetic root for some cases, but only a handful of gene mutations which might be responsible have actually been found.

The latest research looks at a gene already known to be involved in sexual development in both men and women - defects in NR5A1 have been linked to physical defects in the development of the testicles or ovaries.

Their findings suggest that, even where there is no physical evidence of a problem, defects in the gene may be hampering the ability to make sperm.

They looked at the gene in 315 apparently healthy men who had an unexplained inability to produce sperm.

From this group, they found mutations in the gene in just seven, and closer examination revealed the men had altered levels of sex hormones and, in one case, mild abnormalities in the cellular structure of the testicles.

The research authors, from the UCL Institute of Child Health in London and the Institut Pasteur in Paris, said: "We conclude that approximately 4% of men with otherwise unexplained failure to produce sperm carry mutations in the NR5A1 gene."

Although the find would affect only a small proportion of infertile men, other specialists believe that other similar discoveries could help build up a clearer picture of the origins of the condition.

Dr Allan Pacey, a senior lecturer in andrology at the University of Sheffield, said that there was still "embarrassingly little" known about the genetics behind male infertility.

"Given the complexity of the sperm production process it is likely that many genes are involved and therefore that may gene defects linked to infertility may be found.

"Although this gene defect affects only a small number of men, we need more studies like this so that we can fill in the gaps in our knowledge and possibly one day build a robust diagnostic test for male fertility based on genetics."

Scientists believe they have discovered a gene which plays a critical role in the development of sperm.

A Howard Hughes Medical Institute team found a defect in the Jhdma2a gene could cause some cases of infertility.
The Nature study found mice lacking the gene were infertile, producing tiny numbers of abnormal sperm.
One of Britain's leading male fertility experts said that he was hopeful it could explain why some men cannot father children.

The reasons behind much male "sub-fertility" are not fully understood.
Some men who are unable to father a child naturally have abnormally shaped sperm, or very small numbers of sperm, and many research teams are hunting for genetic defects which might be responsible for this.
The Howard Hughes team believe their gene is vital for "spermiogenesis" which allows the DNA needed to create an embryo to be compacted into a tight ball inside the head of the sperm so that it can break through the outer surface of the egg.
To test whether Jhdma2a could affect sperm production, they bred mice without the gene.
These mice not only had unusually small testes, but had a very low sperm count, and could not produce offspring.
The few sperm that were produced by the mice had abnormally shaped heads and tails that could not move.
A closer look at these sperm using dyeing techniques under the microscope revealed that the DNA was not being packaged correctly in the head of the sperm.

Dr Yi Zhang, who led the project, said: "Defects in this gene could be the cause of some cases of male infertility.
"Because this gene has a very specific effect on the development of functional sperm, it holds great potential as a target for new infertility treatments that are unlikely to disrupt other functions within the body."
'Unique'
However, although the importance of the gene has been proven in mice, there is no certainty that it will play the same role in humans, and the team now plans to look at the DNA of infertile men to see if it is missing in any of them.
Dr Allan Pacey, a senior lecturer in andrology at the University of Sheffield, and Secretary of the British Fertility Society, said that the genes that controlled sperm development were poorly understood.
He said: "The way that sperm DNA is packaged into the sperm head is quite unique and we know even less about that.
"It would be very useful to translate this research into human males and see if it can explain why some men simply don't produce healthy sperm and are therefore sub-fertile." 
by bbc

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9% of U.S. Adults Suffer From Depression: CDC

An estimated 9 percent of adult Americans currently meet the criteria for clinical depression, federal officials reported Thursday.

Rates of depression vary widely from state to state, ranging from a low of 4.8 percent in North Dakota to a high of 14.8 percent in Mississippi, according to researchers from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Overall, more people in the Southeast met the criteria for depression, compared with other parts of the nation, the researchers found.

"This is concerning from the perspective that depression is a very common and treatable mental disorder," said report co-author Lela McKnight-Eily, a clinical psychologist and epidemiologist at the CDC.

"When we see a high prevalence of depression there is definitely a concern, particularly when we see it concentrated in certain groups or concentrated in certain areas of the country," she added.

The clustering of depression in the Southeast may be partly due to chronic health conditions, such as obesity, heart disease, stroke and sleep problems, which are also common in the area, she said.

"In addition, there could also be differences in socioeconomic status, the presence of other mental health conditions and also access to health care and treatment," McKnight-Eily said.

The report is published in the Oct. 1 issue of the CDC's Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report.

For the report, researchers collected data on 235,067 people in 45 states, the District of Columbia and two U.S. territories.

They found that besides state-to-state disparities, those more likely to have major depression -- the most serious kind of depression -- were women, racial and ethnic minorities, those without a high school education, people who were divorced or never married, those unemployed or unable to work, middle-aged people, and those without health insurance.

Of those experiencing another type of depression, the highest rate was found in ages 18-24.

"Depression is definitely undertreated," McKnight-Eily said. "Research has indicated that more people are seeking out treatment, but issues in terms of access to care, health insurance coverage -- particularly mental health coverage -- is an issue. Stigma is another barrier to treatment and care, and so is the availability of mental health providers."

The stigma attached to seeking help for depression keeps many from getting treatment, she noted. "People think they're weak or they have a notion that they should be able to handle it," she said.

The word "depression" is used so commonly to mean one is in a foul mood that people don't realize it's a disease, McKnight-Eily said. "It affects you psychologically and emotionally. It's not just having a bad day," she added.

Symptoms of depression include experiencing crying spells; feeling unhappy, hopeless, guilty or worthless; losing interest in normal activities; having trouble concentrating or making decisions; less interest in sex; sleep problems; and feeling unusual agitation, irritability and restlessness for more than a few weeks' time.

Eva E. Redei, the David Lawrence Stein Professor of Psychiatry in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at the Feinberg School of Medicine of Northwestern University, said "there are no real surprises in the report."

Still, Redei was startled to learn that only 6.8 percent of those 65 and older were depressed. "That is not what I have seen in other statistics," she said.

Although depression is often unrecognized and undertreated, Redei said the current therapies are also not completely effective. "Current treatment possibilities are very limited," she said. "We are in the stone ages, compared to other areas of medicine."

Redei noted that current antidepressants work for only about half the patients. "We don't know enough about depression, and considering how huge the numbers are, I think it's outrageous," she said.

Depression affects more than 13 million U.S. adults each year and costs billions of dollars in treatment, loss of productivity, workers' compensation, and mortality, according to the CDC.

Moreover, depression affects quality of life and is associated with chronic medical problems, including cardiovascular disease, diabetes, obesity and unhealthy lifestyle choices, such as smoking, physical inactivity and binge drinking, the agency noted.

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