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Physician Discusses HIV Testing, 'Frank' Conversations With Teenagers
The Baltimore Sun"s blog "Picture of Health" features comments from Allison Agwu, a pediatric infectious disease specialist at Johns Hopkins Children"s Center, who discussed HIV awareness and testing among teenagers. According to the blog, Agwu said doctors and parents "need to do a better job talking frankly to teens about sex and the risk for HIV, particularly in a city like Baltimore with higher than average rates of the disease." The blog states, "There"s no easy way to combat this, Agwu admits. But engaging teens in a constant frank conversation about the disease is a start" (Brewington, 7/8).
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Trinam(R) Phase III Study Enrols First Patient
Ark Therapeutics Group plc ("Ark" or the "Company") announces that the first patient has been enrolled into the US Phase III study for Trinam®. Trinam® is Ark"s novel gene-based medicine to prevent blood vessels blocking in kidney dialysis patients who have undergone vascular access graft surgery. The product is an adenovirus-mediated VEGF D gene delivered with a novel biodegradeable local delivery device (EG001).
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Advertising From Interest Groups Ramps Up As Lawmakers Return To Congress To Work On Health Reform
Advertisements from interest groups on health reform have increased in recent days, as the congressional session resumes next week and lawmakers continue to work on reform legislation, the New York Times reports. Spots from Health Care for America Now advocate coverage for all U.S. residents and a public health insurance option. One of the group"s ads is airing in Maine and urges viewers to contact Sens. Olympia Snowe (R) and Susan Collins (R) to express support for the public insurance option. The group has spent $200,000 on ads in the last month, according to spokesperson Jacki Schechner. Business Forward -- a new coalition that includes AT&T, Microsoft and IBM -- is running ads to encourage business executives to work with the Obama administration and congressional lawmakers in "reforming health care" (Pear, New York Times, 5/28). Also, Healthy Economy Now has an ad campaign to support reform efforts (Dann, CongressDaily, 5/27).Conservatives for Patients" Rights, a group founded by former Hospital Corporation of America CEO Richard Scott, has been airing a 30-minute video on cable networks showing British and Canadian doctors and patients who are not satisfied with their respective countries" health systems. The group is spending $1.2 million on the video and a campaign of short TV spots and earlier this year spent $2.5 million on similar ads, according to spokesperson Keith Appell. The Americans for Prosperity Foundation has spent $800,000 on television ads in eight states. In its spot, a woman from Canada describes her experience with the Canadian health system and how she ended up receiving treatment in the U.S. According to the Times, similar campaigns "helped sink President Clinton"s plan for universal coverage 15 years ago" (New York Times, 5/28).
Public Health

Drug-Free Flipping Of The Brain's Addiction Switch

When someone becomes dependent on drugs or alcohol, the brain"s pleasure center gets hijacked, disrupting the normal functioning of its reward circuitry. Researchers investigating this addiction "switch" have now implicated a naturally occurring protein, a dose of which allowed them to get rats hooked with no drugs at all. The research will be published Friday in the journal Science. "If we can understand how the brain"s circuitry changes in association with drug abuse, it could potentially suggest ways to medically counteract the effects of dependency," said Scott Steffensen, a neuroscientist at Brigham Young University who co-authored the study with two of his undergraduate students, one of his grad students, and a team of researchers at the University of Toronto. Chronic drug users, as noted by previous research, can experience an increase of a naturally-occurring protein called BDNF (brain-derived neurotrophic factor) in the brain"s reward circuitry, a region scientists call the ventral tegmental area. In this study, the researchers took the drugs out of the equation and directly infused extra BDNF onto this part of the brain in rats. The Toronto team noted that a single injection of BDNF made rats behave as though they were dependent on opiates (which they had never received). Though rats instinctively prefer certain smells, lighting and texture, these rats left their comfort zone in search of a fix. "This work may reveal a mechanism that underlies drug addiction," said lead author Hector Vargas-Perez, a neurobiologist at the University of Toronto. The BYU team confirmed that the protein is a critical regulator of drug dependency. After the BDNF injection, specific chemicals that normally inhibit neurons in this part of the brain instead excited them, a "switch" known to occur when people become dependent on drugs. Steffensen, who teaches in BYU"s psychology department, says this work suggests that BDNF is crucial for inducing a drug dependent state, one important aspect of drug addiction. BYU undergrad and study co-author Micah Hansen researched in Steffensen"s neuroscience lab from his freshman year through his graduation one month ago. Fellow BYU undergrad Christine Walton, also a coauthor, completed her degree a year earlier and now works as an addiction researcher at the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, Md. David Allison, a psychology graduate student at BYU, is also a co-author. Joe Hadfield Brigham Young University


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