A Japanese pharmaceutical company is investigating 80 deaths possibly linked to a yeast-containing supplement it sells in Japan, the country’s health ministry said Friday, in a shocking increase from an earlier revelation that is focusing attention on how supplements are regulated. The company, Kobayashi Pharmaceutical, in March had reported five deaths potentially linked to its…
Overdose deaths in the United States declined slightly last year, the first decrease in five years, according to preliminary federal data released Wednesday. The rare good news in the decades-old addiction crisis was attributable mostly to a drop in deaths from synthetic opioids, chiefly fentanyl, said researchers at the National Center for Health Statistics, who…
Some Context: A frightening trend examined more closely. Researchers at Virginia Commonwealth University and Children’s Hospital of Richmond had previously revealed that mortality rates among children and adolescents had risen by 18 percent between 2019 and 2021. Deaths related to injuries had grown so dramatically that they eclipsed all public health gains. The group, seeking…
A troubled heart pump that has now been linked to 49 deaths and dozens of injuries worldwide will be allowed to remain in use, despite the Food and Drug Administration’s decision to issue an alert about the risk that it could puncture a wall of the heart. The tiny Impella pumps, about the width of…
The Latest The study found that deaths linked to alcohol in the United States increased in five years by 40,000. The toll is stark: About 178,000 people died in 2021 from excessive drinking, compared with 138,000 in 2016. During that period, the deaths rose by 27 percent among men and 35 percent among women. Dr….
An escalation of the war in Gaza could lead to the deaths of 85,000 Palestinians from injuries and disease over the next six months, in the worst of three situations that prominent epidemiologists have modeled in an effort to understand the potential future death toll of the conflict. These fatalities would be in addition to…
Why It Matters: Penguins are already under pressure. The familiar black-and-white birds are facing numerous threats, including climate change, pollution and commercial fishing. Three Antarctic penguin species — emperor penguins, southern rockhopper penguins and macaroni penguins — are listed as vulnerable or near threatened. Before H5N1 arrived in the Antarctic region last fall, highly pathogenic…
The news Cancer deaths in the United States are falling, with four million deaths prevented since 1991, according to the American Cancer Society’s annual report. At the same time, the society reported that the number of new cancer cases had ticked up to more than two million in 2023, from 1.9 million in 2022. Cancer…
