2009 Top Health News Stories

New Delhi: Saturday, 2 January, 2010: Dr K K Aggarwal, President, Heart Care Foundation of India and e medinews has released, last year's top health news stories:

Salmonella Peanut Recall
Minnesota health investigators linked mysterious salmonella infections to peanut products. Soon it became clear that all kinds of products, from ice cream to dog food, might carry salmonella-contaminated peanuts.

Michael Jackson Propofol Death
Acute propofol intoxication killed Michael Jackson, age 50. The anesthetic, along with sedatives, allegedly was administered by Jackson's doctor to help him sleep. The death was ruled a homicide; criminal charges have not yet been filed.

Celebrity Cancer Deaths
Actor Farrah Fawcett, died at age 62 of anal cancer. She gained fame in TV's Charlie's Angels and shared her long cancer fight with the public.
Pancreatic cancer took Patrick Swayze in 2009 at age 57; after being diagnosed in 2008 he was able to shoot 13 new episodes of his TV series.
Senator Ted Kennedy died of brain cancer at age 77. He represented Massachusetts for 46 years and appeared for a key vote just a few weeks after surgery.

Mammogram Guidelines Controversy
The U.S. Preventive Services Task Force recommended that routine screening mammograms start at age 50 for women at average risk. It reversed a previous recommendation to start at age 40, explaining that harms such as radiation exposure, false positives, over treatment, and psychological harm outweigh the benefit.  

Paracetamol Trouble
Citing 56,000 emergency room visits each year for overdoses, an FDA panel recommended lowering the approved dose for adults.

Brown Fat for Easy Weight Loss?
You could lose 9 pounds of fat every year, without having to diet or exercise, if the tiny amount of brown fat in your body were activated. Once thought to be nature's way of keeping babies warm, adults weren't believed to have brown fat. Now the race is on to find a way to make brown fat more active.

AIDS Vaccine's Modest Success