Health News

Two people in China who received swine flu vaccinations died in the past week but at least one death appears unrelated to the vaccine and the other was being investigated. Read More

Federal health regulators have found tiny particles of trash in drugs made by Genzyme, the second time this year the biotechnology company has been cited for contamination issues. Read More

Federal health officials have approved a new drug as the first non-hormonal treatment for heavy menstrual bleeding. Read More

Now that drug giant Pfizer Inc. has announced plans to pull out of a Connecticut city that was embroiled in an epic eminent domain fight, residents are questioning why the battle was ever waged. Read More

The Food and Drug Administration is challenging makers of alcohol-infused energy drinks to prove their beverages are safe, citing complaints that the products can cause risky behavior and injury. Read More

Organizers of big sporting and cultural events should take steps to prevent the spread of swine flu, especially if local health systems aren't prepared to handle mass gatherings, the World Health Organization said Friday. Read More

Estimates of deaths caused by the swine flu have grown to nearly 4,000 since April, roughly quadrupling previous estimates. But that doesn't mean swine flu suddenly has worsened. Read More

Cigarette smoking rose slightly for the first time in almost 15 years, dashing health officials' hopes that the U.S. smoking rate had moved permanently below 20 percent. Read More

U.S. health officials say the largest U.S. outbreak of mumps in three years is occurring in New York and New Jersey. Read More

Doctors should give anti-viral drugs to pregnant women, young children and other at-risk groups as soon as they show clinical symptoms of swine flu to prevent them developing serious complications, the World Health Organization said Thursday. Read More

Analysis of a dozen published studies testing possible new uses for a Pfizer Inc. epilepsy drug found that reporting of the results was often misleading, indicating the medicine worked better than internal company documents showed. Read More

Health officials revise the number of Americans who have likely died from swine flu, saying the figure is roughly four times higher than originally thought. The Center for Disease Control now reports the virus has claimed more than 4,000 lives. Read More

Nearly 200 million children in poor countries have stunted growth because of insufficient nutrition, according to a new report published by UNICEF Wednesday before a three-day international summit on the problem of world hunger. Read More

If you're among the hundreds of thousands of Americans with clogged kidney arteries, you might want to consider trying medicines before rushing into angioplasty to open them up. The pricey procedure is no more effective and carries surprisingly big risks, a study found. Read More

Nearly 200 million children in poor countries have stunted growth because they don't get enough to eat, according to a new report published Wednesday by UNICEF. Read More

Male factory workers in China who got very high doses of a chemical that's been widely used in hard plastic bottles had high rates of sexual problems, researchers reported Wednesday. Read More

Health care, a giant in the U.S. economy, may be a gentle giant when it comes to greenhouse gases. Read More

The American Medical Association on Tuesday voted to oppose the military's "don't ask, don't tell" policy, and declared that gay marriage bans contribute to health disparities. Read More

EDITOR'S NOTE: Ten years and $2.5 billion in research have found no cures from alternative medicine. Yet these mostly unproven treatments are now mainstream and used by more than a third of all Americans. This is one in an occasional Associated Press series on their use and potential risks. Read More

British scientists begin a new study on Tuesday to consider how human DNA is used in animal experiments and to determine what the boundaries of such controversial science might be. Read More