Medical headlines under the fold

The NYTimes has an article on death in childbirth in Africa...
sounds like things haven't changed much in the 30 years since I worked there, except that (after I left) the CSections were done by RN's not Physician assistants...

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PinoyCentric has an article on the diarrhea vaccine against Rotavirus...More information HERE.
the older vaccine had some problems and was taken of the market for a rare side effect, but in the third world, where half a million kids die of simple diarrhea each year, the vaccine saves lives.

The problem is intesusseption. where the intestine ravels inside itself like your sleeve does when you take off a sweater. The anti vaccine types are hysterical about the vaccine, but the vaccine might not cause it, and the numbers are a lot smaller than those who die of the disease:
Before it was licensed, RotaTeq was tested in a clinical trial involving 70,000 children, where half received the vaccine and half received a placebo. No significant increase of intussusception risk was found. For instance 6 cases occurred in the RotaTeq patients and 5 in the placebo group.

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ScienceInsider explains why it takes time to make a new flu vaccine...

again, expect hysteria from the clueless who want to know why it takes so long, and from the antivaccine types on Oprah finding a side effect to fuel their conspiracy theories.