LONDON, June 19 (Reuters) – The new Middle East coronavirus
that has killed 38 people after emerging late last year is a
serious risk in hospitals because it is easily transmitted in
healthcare environments, infectious disease experts said on
Wednesday.

In a study published in the New England Journal of Medicine,
the researchers said the Middle East respiratory syndrome
(MERS)was not only easily transmitted from patient to patient,
but also from the transfer of sick patients to other hospitals.

LONDON, June 18 (Reuters) – The marketing of unhealthy foods
to children has proven “disastrously effective”, driving obesity
by using cheap social media channels to promote fat-, salt- and
sugar-laden foods, the World Health Organisation’s Europe office
said on Tuesday.

The United Nations health agency called for tighter controls
on such marketing, saying tougher regulations were crucial to
winning the fight against childhood obesity.

LONDON (Reuters) – Antibodies to a high-risk type of a virus that causes mouth and throat cancers when transmitted via oral sex can be detected in blood tests many years before onset of the disease, according to a World Health Organisation-led team of researchers.

In a study in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, the researchers said their findings may in future lead to people being screened for human papillomavirus (HPV) antibodies, giving doctors a chance to find those at high risk of oral cancers.

LONDON (Reuters) – Puffing on slim metal tubes loaded with pale yellow liquid, two London businessmen say they have between their lips a cure for what the U.N. calls “one of the biggest public health threats the world has ever faced”.

Electronic cigarettes are the future, they argue. Cheaper, cleaner and cooler than smoking, “vaping” – using a vaporizer to inhale nicotine infused with exotic flavors ranging from pina colada to bubblegum – will spell the end of tobacco.

LONDON, June 13 (Reuters) – Puffing on slim metal tubes
loaded with pale yellow liquid, two London businessmen say they
have between their lips a cure for what the U.N. calls “one of
the biggest public health threats the world has ever faced”.

Electronic cigarettes are the future, they argue. Cheaper,
cleaner and cooler than smoking, “vaping” – using a vaporiser to
inhale nicotine infused with exotic flavours ranging from pina
colada to bubblegum – will spell the end of tobacco.

LONDON, June 13 (Reuters) – Austerity cuts in Spain could
lead to the effective dismantling of large parts of its
healthcare system and significantly damage the health of the
population, according to a study published on Thursday.

Researchers who analysed the situation warned that if
nothing was done to reverse the trend, Spain risked spiralling
health problems and could see increases in infectious diseases
such as tuberculosis and the virus that causes AIDS.

LONDON, June 12 (Reuters) – The outlawing of drugs such as
cannabis, magic mushrooms and other psychoactive substances
amounts to scientific censorship and is hampering research into
potentially important medicinal uses, leading scientists argued
on Wednesday.

Laws and international conventions dating back to the 1960s
have set back research in key areas such as consciousness by
decades, they argued in the journal Nature Reviews Neuroscience.

LONDON (Reuters) – Some 165 million children worldwide are stunted by malnutrition as babies and face a future of ill health, poor education, low earnings and poverty, the head of the United Nations children’s fund said on Friday.

Anthony Lake, executive director of UNICEF, told Reuters the problem of malnutrition is vastly under-appreciated, largely because poor nutrition is often mistaken for a lack of food.

LONDON (Reuters) – Some 165 million children worldwide are stunted by malnutrition as babies and face a future of ill health, poor education, low earnings and poverty, the head of the United Nations children’s fund said on Friday.

Anthony Lake, executive director of UNICEF, told Reuters the problem of malnutrition is vastly under-appreciated, largely because poor nutrition is often mistaken for a lack of food.

LONDON (Reuters) – Some call it neurological diversity, others see it as autism’s fight back. People diagnosed as “on the spectrum” are suddenly in demand by employers seeking a competitive advantage from autistic workers more used to being considered disabled than special.

Expressing a belief that “innovation comes from the edges”, German computer software giant SAP last month launched a recruitment drive to attract people with autism to join it as software testers.