Daily Independent
Nigeria

July 16, 2011

The reality in recent times that there is a rapid decline in the age at menarche, that is, age at which young girls see their menstruation as well as increased schooling among girls are two key events that have prolonged the period of adolescence.

Increased schooling in particular has made teenagers less dependent on parents and family, and has postponed the age at marriage, and thereby the age of socially sanctioned sexual relations.

Sub-Saharan Africa in general and Nigeria in particular are facing the grim impact of this growing problem as increased sexual activity among teenagers has resulted in many unplanned pregnancies and induced abortions.

Maternal mortality rate in Nigeria especially among teenagers is on the rise and unsafe abortion has been noted as a risk factor for maternal death. Teenagers contribute up to 80 per cent of abortion-related complications in hospitals.

Further still, complications of pregnancy and childbirth are the leading causes of mortality among women between the ages of 15 and 19 in developing countries.

Maternal mortality rate in Nigeria especially among teenagers is on the rise and unsafe abortion has been noted as a risk factor for maternal death. Teenagers contribute up to 80 per cent of abortion-related complications in hospitals.

Many factors lead to teenagers becoming pregnant, some of which include:

Early marriage, increased (unprotected) sexual activity, inadequate knowledge of or access to conventional methods of contraception, contraceptive failure due to incorrect/inappropriate use, sexual abuse (e.g. rape, poverty (economic hardship) leading to promiscuity and prostitution.

Unhealthy childhood environment (women exposed to abuse, domestic violence and family strife in childhood are more likely to become pregnant as teenagers).

The impact of teenage pregnancy on the teenager, the child and the society as a whole is enormous.

Teenagers face a higher risk of some complications of pregnancy (e.g. hypertensive disorders, obstructed labour, anaemia, malaria, malnutrition) than do older women.

Complications of pregnancy result in the death of an estimated 70,000 teen girls in developing countries each year. The World Health Organisation estimates that the risk of death following pregnancy is twice as great for women between 15 and 19 years than in those between the ages of 20 and 24. The maternal mortality rate (MMR) can be up to five times higher for girls aged between 10-14 than for women of about 20 years of age.

Illegal abortion also holds many risks for teenage girls in areas such as Sub-Saharan Africa.

Teenage pregnancy could also impact negatively on the teenager in the following ways:

Higher school drop-out rates, lower levels of educational attainment, reduced opportunities for well paying jobs, lower incomes, psychological distress due to stigmatisation, lack of social support networks and the overwhelming burden brought about by indecision as to whether to have the child or to terminate it.

The burden of raising a child, especially for a teenager who herself is still growing can also be overwhelming.

Children born to teenage mothers are more likely to be born preterm, low birth weight, and small-for-gestational age. They are also more likely to have suffered intrauterine growth restriction than those born to adult mothers. These factors thus lead to an increased risk of infant morbidity and mortality.

Early motherhood can also affect the psychosocial development of a child.

The occurrence of developmental disabilities and behavioural issues is increased in children born to teenage mothers.

Children of teenage mothers may also show poor academic performance.

Daughters born to adolescent mothers are also more likely to become teenage mothers themselves thus repeating the cycle.

Increased sexual activities among teenagers not only leads to an increase in the number of teenagers getting pregnant but also contributes to population explosion which has negative implications for national growth and economic development.

Increased sexual activities also lead to an increasing prevalence of sexually transmitted infections including HIV/AIDS thus contributing to the national burden of disease.

National productivity is also negatively affected as high school drop out rates due to teenage pregnancy and low education levels means lower human capital development, consequently leading to lower incomes and reduced contributions to the Gross Domestic Product.

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Read the complete article and related information at Teenage pregnancy prevention

Yahoo Lifestyle
United Kingdom & Ireland

Could lead to global health emergency

An international team of scientists has discovered a new strain of the sexually transmitted infection (STI) gonorrhoea that is resistant to all currently available antibiotics.

Gonorrhoea is currently a widespread but easily treatable condition. It is estimated to be one of the most common STIs in the world, with around 700,000 cases annually in the US alone.

Scientists successfully identified a previously unknown variant of the bacterium that causes gonorrhoea, Neisseria gonorrhoeae. This new strain, called H041, was found to have extreme resistance to all cephalosporin-class antibiotics, the last remaining drugs still effective in treating gonorrhoea.

Commenting on the findings, study leader Dr Makoto Ohnishi said: “This is both an alarming and a predictable discovery – since antibiotics became the standard treatment for gonorrhoea in the 1940s, this bacterium has shown a remarkable capacity to develop resistance mechanisms to all drugs introduced to control it.”

He warned that new treatments need to be developed to meet the threat posed by the new bug.

“The history of newly emergent resistance in the bacterium suggests that it may spread rapidly unless new drugs and effective treatment programs are developed,” Dr Ohnishi said.

If left untreated, gonorrhoea can lead to serious and irreversible health complications in both women and men.

Read Full Article…

Read the complete article and related information at New gonorrhoea strain resistant to all available antibiotics

Read the complete article and related information at HPV Affects Half Of U.S. Men

Science News

Read the complete article and related information at Half of adult males carry HPV

Your Canterbury

February 27, 2011

Sexual health doctors have urged the Government to vaccinate against genital warts as part of the school-based jabs programme.

Cases of the sexually transmitted infection (STI) have soared, with an increase of 33 per cent across the South East since 2000.

More than 400 new cases per 100,000 of the population were diagnosed in Kent in 2009.

Medway had the highest rate of the infection at 167 in 2009. Recent figures from Medway’s GUM (genitor-urinary medicine) clinic show cases of genital warts rose 36 per cent from 302 to 412 between 2004 and 2010.

The British Association of Sexual Health and HIV (BASHH) is campaigning for the Government to switch the vaccine given to young girls to protect against cervical cancer caused by the human papillomavirus (HPV) to one that also protects against genital warts, which are caused by the same virus.

Dr Colm O’Mahoney, a consultant in genitor-urinary medicine and spokesman for BASHH, said: “Genital warts are incredibly common, 150,000 cases are now recorded every year and that is a massive number of cases.

“I work on the frontline in sexual health and 50 per cent of my work load is managing and treating genital warts.

“It is a very distressing condition and I see many young women who find they have this ugly and disfiguring condition down below.

“It has a huge psychological impact.

Read Full Article…..

Below is the comment I tried to post on the site…but due to an internal error it was unable to take it. LCB.

There are some things your readers – and the physicians in the UK should be aware of before pushing for Gardasil.

According to Diane Harper, the lead researcher on Merck’s Gardasil project, the vaccine’s efficacy for genital warts lasts only two years.

There are now 106 VAERS (U.S. Vaccine Adverse Reporting System) reports of anogenital warts post HPV vaccination indicating that Gardasil may not even be effective for the two years, or another HPV strain has replaced the role of the wart causing strains in Gardasil.

For more information go to: http://sanevax.org

Read the complete article and related information at Call for jabs to protect against STI

Natural News

Wednesday, February 23, 2011
by: Rosemary Mathis, Director of SANE VAX, INC.

All drugs are associated with some risks of adverse reactions and vaccines are no exception. In weighing risks versus benefits, one has to keep in mind that vaccines represent a special category of drugs since they are generally given to healthy individuals. If there are uncertain benefits from a vaccine, only a small level of risk of harmful effects may be acceptable. If the benefits are certain, then a greater risk of side effects may be tolerated. Here I review the current evidence which indicates that the former case applies to Gardasil, the quadrivalent human papillomavirus (qHPV) vaccine:

1) The efficacy of Gardasil in preventing cervical cancer has not been demonstrated and the marketing campaign has been misleading. The efficacy of Gardasil remains unsubstantiated since the vaccine hasn’t been adequately tested on the primary age group to which it is currently given.

Merck promoted Gardasil primarily as a vaccine against cervical cancer, rather than promoting it as a vaccine against HPV infection or sexually transmitted diseases.

According to recent reports published in two highly respected scientific journals, Nature Biotechnology and Journal of American Medical Association (JAMA):

“Most genital infections are asymptomatic and resolve spontaneously, but the virus can persist and cause precancerous lesions that can become malignant over the subsequent 20-30 years.” (Nature Biotechnology, 2007 2)

“So how should a parent, physician, politician, or anyone else decide whether it is a good thing to give young girls a vaccine that partly prevents infection caused by a sexually transmitted disease (HPV infection), an infection that in a few cases will cause cancer 20 to 40 years from now? (JAMA, 2009 3).

The fact is that malignant cervical cancer takes decades to develop and yet the longest clinical trial on Gardasil was only four years in duration. In other words, Gardasil was never shown to prevent cervical cancer [emphasis added]. Furthermore, in all clinical trials conducted by Merck the cervical intraepithelial neoplasia (CIN) 2/3 precancerous lesion was used as the efficacy endpoint for evaluating the Gardasil. What is the problem with using the CIN 2/3 lesion as the standard for efficacy? First, if the marketing claim for Gardasil is that the vaccine “protects against cervical cancer” then cervical cancer should have been used as the endpoint for efficacy, not a surrogate marker such as a CIN 2/3 precancerous lesion [emphasis added]. Second, in the natural course of cervical cancer, only a small fraction of the CIN 2 lesions will progress to CIN 3 lesions and only a small fraction of CIN 3 lesions will eventually progress to cervical cancer. Furthermore, even CIN 3 lesions are heterogeneous (there are early small lesions and old advanced lesions and we do not know what proportion of the small lesions, which serve as clinical endpoints in current studies, would persist to become large, advanced CIN3 lesions). Therefore, in any female population (and that includes those who have undergone Gardasil clinical trials) there are many more CIN 2 lesions than a combination of CIN 3 lesions and cervical cancers. As a result, the vast majority of the “CIN 2/3 or worse” cases used for evaluation of efficacy, and listed in Merck’s report to FDA Vaccines and Related Biological Products Advisory Committee (VRBPAC Background Document on Gardasil HPV Quadrivalent Vaccine 8), must have been CIN 2 lesions.

Read the complete article and related information at Gardasil vaccination: Evaluating the risks versus benefits

SANE Vax, Inc. is Concerned about Missing Data in the Reports

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

PRLog (Press Release) – Feb 21, 2011 – The media went wild last week announcing the report published in the Feb. 3 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine, (NEJM) was funded by the vaccine’s maker, Merck & Co., 1 stating Gardasil was 90 percent effective in older teenaged boys and young men.

Gardasil was approved for use for boys ages 9 through 26 in 2009 by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention advisory panel voted against routine use of the vaccine in boys and men.

Am sure the researchers/marketers at Merck decided a study announcing that Gardasil was equally effective in preventing genital warts would increase uptake/sales of the vaccine. This is a marketing tactic – not a study – and not even an independent study.

The study was conducted on 4065 healthy boys and men 16 to 26 years of age, from 18 countries in a randomized, placebo-controlled, double-blind trial at the H. Lee Moffitt Cancer Center and Research Institute in Tampa, Fla., The primary efficacy objective was to show that the quadrivalent HPV vaccine reduced the incidence of external genital lesions related to HPV-6, 11, 16, or 18.2.

SANE VAX, Inc. is asking – What about boys ages 9 to 15? Why weren’t they included? By the time a 9 year old reaches the age of 16 – the vaccine will no longer be effective.

SANE Vax wants to know the length of time for the study. Months? Years? Even NEJM does not even report this. Where are the long term results? How can there be any?

Fred Wyand, director of the HPV Resource Center at the American Social Health Association stated; “Studies like this underscore the ‘human’ in human papillomavirus.”3. Well, let’s look at human viruses. They lay dormant, and they mutate. Genital warts come and go in both male and female populations. Viruses are triggered/stimulated by environment and stress – as well as lifestyle. Viral patterns are impossible to predict. The only thing in life that is constant is “change.”

Gardasil is only effective for 5 years. What happens after that? What if the viruses come back in full force? Oh, yeah another vaccine.

Healthy boys? What kind of study is that? Define “healthy.” What about unhealthy boys – boys with pre-existing or a family history of allergies or autoimmune diseases. The same “healthy” demographic was used in the clinical trials for adolescent girls – and there are now 21,292 reported adverse reactions and 93 deaths reported to VAERS.

Why perform a study on another healthy population when the initial study has caused so many injuries to girls ages 9 to 26? SANE Vax Inc. does not think this is science-based medicine at all…. It is more like the fairy tale, “The Emperor has no Clothes.” When are medical consumers and practitioners going to realize that Merck has pulled the wool over our eyes again?

This study would more aptly be titled “One Less Boy to Get Genital Warts.” SANE Vax fears that this campaign will turn into ‘One More Boy Adversely Injured.’ How can the outcome be any different?

SANE Vax Inc. is concerned about the missing data or data not being reported in this study. The line between marketing and science based evidence is getting pretty thin. Medical consumers deserve to have independent studies conducted on the safety and efficacy of any and all medications developed for non-life threatening medical issues. Parents getting the HPV vaccine for their sons need to have the answers to all of these issues for informed consent. The days of blind faith are over.

Sources:
1. New England Journal of Medicine, Feb 3, 2011, Efficacy of Quadrivalent HPV Vaccine against HPV Infection and Disease in Males, http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa0909537
Supported by Merck and by grants (M01-RR-00079 and UL1 RR024131, to Dr. Palefsky) from the National Center for Research Resources and by a grant (RO1 CA098803, to Dr. Giuliano) from the National Institutes of Health.
Drs. Giuliano, Ferris, Moreira, Penny, and Palefsky report receiving grant support from Merck, either personally or through their institution; Dr. Penny reports receiving grant support from GlaxoSmithKline; Dr. Goldstone reports receiving grant support from Qiagen; Drs. Giuliano, Ferris, Moreira, Hillman, and Chang report receiving speaking fees or fees for board membership from Merck; Dr. Moi reports that his institution has received funding from Merck; Dr. Penny reports having stock or stock options in AstraZeneca; Dr. Palefsky reports receiving consulting fees from GlaxoSmithKline; Drs. Giuliano, Palefsky, Goldstone, Moreira, Moi, and Chang report receiving travel reimbursement from Merck; Dr. Bryan reports having an approved, filed, or pending patent related to subject matter discussed in this article; and Dr. Bryan, Dr. Marshall, Dr. Vuocolo, Dr. Barr, Dr. Haupt, Mr. Radley, and Dr. Guris are employees of Merck and own Merck stock or stock options. No other potential conflict of interest relevant to this article was reported.

2. New England Journal of Medicine, Feb 3, 2011, Efficacy of Quadrivalent HPV Vaccine against HPV Infection and Disease in Males, http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa0909537

3. MedlinePlus, Feb. 2, 2011, Gardasil Vaccine Guards Against HPV in Boys, http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/news/fullstory_108399 …

For more information, visit our site at http://sanevax.org/.

# # #

THE SANE VAX MISSION is to promote Safe, Affordable, Necessary & Effective vaccines and vaccination practices through education and information. We believe in science-based medicine.

Read the complete article and related information at Merck Funded Study States – Gardasil Equally Effective for Males and Females

Incidences of chlamydia found in patients suffering from schizophrenia may reveal a link between viruses and mental disorders

The UK Times

by Jerome Burne
September 30, 2005

Chlamydia is already known to cause considerable human misery. Not only is one strain of the micro-organism responsible for Britain’s “epidemic” of sexually transmitted disease, but another variant can cause a serious respiratory-tract infection similar to Sars.

Now comes the surprising finding by a German research team that chlamydia may be linked with schizophrenia. Dr Rudolf Wank, an immunologist at the Ludwig-Maximilians-University in Munich, has reported recently that schizophrenic patients are much more likely to be infected with one or more variants of chlamydia. More importantly, he found that targeting the bug with specially treated immune cells improved the patients’ symptoms dramatically.

About 40 per cent of the 75 patients he studied were infected with chlamydia, compared with 6 per cent in the control group (ie, people who did not have schizophrenia). As Dr Wank explains: “Chlamydia comes in three varieties, two of which can cause a flu-like respiratory infection or pneumonia, while the third causes the sexually transmitted disease. The patients were much more likely to have one or more of these.” The team also found that the risk of developing schizophrenia rose dramatically for patients with a certain group of immune system genes.

“Kurt” had been on antipsychotic medication for more than 20 years; he was aggressive, his speech incoherent and he was unable to work. In a report published in the journal Medical Hypotheses, Dr Wank described how, after identification of the strain of chlamydia infecting him and treatment with “treated” immune cells, within a few weeks Kurt’s aggression had disappeared and his speech had improved.

The idea that an infection might cause mental illness has a long history — it is well known, for instance, that certain conditions can have a psychological effect. Hepatitis B may cause depression and the microbes causing syphilis and Aids are linked with dementia.

But the fact that Dr Wank’s patients were more likely to be infected doesn’t prove that the microbe is causing their disorder. What has put Dr Wank ahead of other researchers in this field is that he appears to have shown that if the infection is treated, the symptoms of the disorder improve. “Earlier attempts to fight the infection just with antibiotics failed,” he says. Dr Wank. “But this more precisely targeted approach has been successful.” He is now hoping to carry out a larger double-blind trial.

But schizophrenia is not the only neurological disorder that has been linked with chlamydia. An American researcher believes that a related strain — Chlamydia pneumoniae — might be contributing to Alzheimer’s. Last year Brian Balin, professor of pathology, microbiology and immunology at the Philadelphia College of Osteopathic Medicine, reported that it is much more commonly found in the brains of Alzheimer’s patients.

Meanwhile, Dr Ruth Itzhaki, at the University of Manchester, has been investigating a connection between Alzheimer’s and the Herpes 1 virus — the one usually associated with cold sores on the lips, although it can cause outbreaks elsewhere. She has found signs of the virus in the brains of Alzheimer’s patients, and in a paper earlier this year reported that those who were infected and had the gene ApoE4 were more likely to develop the disease.

An obvious criticism of the idea that bacteria and viruses contribute to Alzheimer’s and schizophrenia is that these infect a substantial proportion of the population without apparently doing any harm. But as Dr Itzhaki points out, that is not uncommon with infectious diseases. “H.pylori, for instance, is firmly linked with ulcers,” she says. “But only about 10 per cent of those infected with the bug actually develop them.” Both Dr Itzhaki and Dr Wank have found that certain gene patterns make it far more likely that the pathogen will have a damaging effect.

This is all very early work, not least because it has proved so hard to get funding, but it does suggest that already established antiviral or antibacterial treatments may have a role to play in the treatment of mental illness.

Read Full Article…

Read the complete article and related information at Could mental illness be infectious?

San Francisco News

February 14, 2011

SAN FRANCISCO (KGO) — San Francisco is the first city in the nation distributing new female condoms for gay men. The idea is to promote another tool that could reduce the risk of sexually transmitted infections.

In San Francisco, there’s always more to Valentine’s Day than just flowers and chocolates. Female condoms were handed out Monday at City Hall courtesy of the health department. It’s the same design as the original version but made of Nitrile.

“That’s the material found commonly in surgical gloves. It’s the non-latex alternative for those people who have latex allergies,” said Susan Philip, M.D., from the San Francisco Health Department.

People on the street were somewhat interested. Others, not so much. Young and not so young said they would give it a try.

The female condoms, called FC2, are meant to avoid unintended pregnancies. But San Francisco made headlines on Monday because the condoms are also meant for gay men. FC2 has been approved by the FDA for use by women, not gay men. But according to the San Francisco Health Department gay men are the ones asking for its approval and distribution. Some say it could be a better option for them as they try to prevent HIV in the gay community.

In fact, posters will appear this week on Muni buses and street cars.

Raymond Dennehy, Ph.D., is a professor of philosophy at USF. He says the Catholic Church opposes condoms for women and now in this case men.

“The Catholic church is teaching it’s the very notion of homosexual activity that’s a frustration of the goal of sex,” said Dennehy.

And the point of sex, he says, is to procreate. The bus carrying the new female condoms headed to San Francisco State where students seemed more receptive to the idea.

“It’s something new. I like experiencing, seeing new things. You know,” said SF State student Judy Tran.

Read more…

Read the complete article and related information at SF first city to pass out female condoms to gay men

The low-down on STIs

Read the complete article and related information at What’s that in my pants?