Researchers asked U.S. regulators to pull some sunscreens from the market, including brands such as Coppertone, Banana Boat and Neutrogena, saying they’ve found evidence of a potential carcinogen.
Scientists petitioned the Food and Drug Administration to remove from sale all sunscreens containing the active ingredient octocrylene. Products made with the chemical may contain benzophenone, a suspected carcinogen that also can interfere with key hormones and reproductive organs, according to a group led by Craig Downs, executive director of the nonprofit Haereticus Environmental Laboratory that studies risks to health and the environment.
International Health Management, Across 17 Countries, 60 Clinics, and 350 Staff — Dr. James Allen, Health Systems Thinkers, LLC.
Dr. James Allen is a primary care internal medicine specialist who developed a fascinating career in international health management and leadership.
Dr. Allen served in the U.S. public health service before moving to Indonesian Borneo in 1994. For the next 22 years he worked in community and occupational health across Asia, managing health teams in 14 countries. As Chevron’s Asia Pacific medical director, he led projects for TB control in Myanmar, primary care in the Philippines, Indonesia, Vietnam, and Bangladesh; and emergency medicine in Azerbaijan and rural China.
After moving to California headquarters in late 2015, Dr. Allen created a global strategy on corporate responsibility for health, establishing a data-based approach in alignment with the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation of Seattle. As Chevron’s senior consulting health scientist, he advised social investment teams in Australasia, Central Europe, Latin America, North America, and West Africa. Dr. Allen completed his career at Chevron in 2021 by leading the implementation of Covid-19 management practices for a consortium of oil and gas companies in Angola.
In 2012, Dr. Allen became an adjunct faculty member for the Levinson Institute’s Strategic Leadership for Healthcare Executives, previously affiliated with Harvard Medical School, and now with Pariveda Solutions and Rice University. His education includes a BA from Antioch College, MS from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, and his medical degree from Kirksville, MO. He is certified in internal medicine by the American Board of Internal Medicine, and has completed graduate studies in public health, occupational medicine, tropical medicine, toxicology, and healthcare finance and systems management from various institutions – Cornell, the Medical College of Wisconsin, NY Medical College and Singapore Management Institute.
Dr. Allen serves on the Global Advisory Board for the Texas Children’s Hospital HOPE project (Hematology and Oncology Pediatric Excellence), to improve cancer care for children across sub-Saharan Africa. His most recent endeavor is a start-up organization to help corporations and private donors effectively invest in community health in low-resource settings, called Health Systems Thinkers, LLC.
Some kinds of water pollution, such as algal blooms and plastics that foul rivers, lakes, and marine environments, lie in plain sight. But other contaminants are not so readily apparent, which makes their impact potentially more dangerous. Among these invisible substances is uranium. Leaching into water resources from mining operations, nuclear waste sites, or from natural subterranean deposits, the element can now be found flowing out of taps worldwide.
In the United States alone, “many areas are affected by uranium contamination, including the High Plains and Central Valley aquifers, which supply drinking water to 6 million people,” says Ahmed Sami Helal, a postdoc in the Department of Nuclear Science and Engineering. This contamination poses a near and present danger. “Even small concentrations are bad for human health,” says Ju Li, the Battelle Energy Alliance Professor of Nuclear Science and Engineering and professor of materials science and engineering.
Now, a team led by Li has devised a highly efficient method for removing uranium from drinking water. Applying an electric charge to graphene oxide foam, the researchers can capture uranium in solution, which precipitates out as a condensed solid crystal. The foam may be reused up to seven times without losing its electrochemical properties. “Within hours, our process can purify a large quantity of drinking water below the EPA limit for uranium,” says Li.
The last year has turned all our worlds upside down. Even if we had our diet, exercise and sauna routine locked down before, suddenly all the venues were closed, or we did not feel comfortable visiting them as they were too crowded and too enclosed.
But we can sauna at home these days, and it is relatively affordable, but are they as good as the commercial saunas we had been using? Are sauna tents worth the money? Are portable steam saunas, and infrared saunas as good as the professionally installed home saunas that cost a fortune, and are either of them as good as the ones we used to visit that are run commercially as established premises with all the benefits they offer?
Well, in an attempt to answer these questions, I have looked at all the pros and cons of both and dissected them to try and help you make that decision.
Whether you are rich or poor, I have considered your options and attempted to answer those questions.
So follow me, as we take a stroll into the wonderful world of getting a bit sweaty… and all so we can live longer and healthier.
Links to related videos mentioned Steam Vs Infrared Portable Sauna. TESTED. https://youtu.be/DeGNtvAQexc.
The Pfizer coronavirus vaccine may be linked to a form of eye inflammation called uveitis, according to a multicenter Israeli study led by Prof. Zohar Habot-Wilner from Tel Aviv’s Sourasky Medical Center.
The research was conducted at Rambam Health Care Campus, Galilee Medical Center, Shaare Zedek Medical Center, Sheba Medical Center in Tel Hashomer, Kaplan Medical Center and Sourasky. It was accepted for publication by the peer-reviewed ophthalmology journal Retina.
Habot-Wilner, head of the Uveitis Service at the hospital, found that 21 people (23 eyes) who had received two shots of the Pfizer vaccine developed uveitis within one to 14 days after receiving their first shot or within one day to one month after the second.
On 8 May 2020, the Institute of Agrifood Research and Technology (IRTA) reported the case of the first cat infected with SARS-CoV-2 in Spain. It was a 4-year-old cat called Negrito, who lived with a family affected by COVID-19, with one case of death.
Coinciding with these facts, the animal presented severe respiratory difficulties and was taken to a veterinary hospital in Badalona (Barcelona), where it was diagnosed with hypertrophic cardiomyopathy. Due to a terminal condition the hospital decided to do a humanitarian euthanasia.
The necropsy, performed at the High Biosafety Level Laboratories of the Animal Health Research Center (CReSA) at IRTA, confirmed that Negrito suffered from feline hypertrophic cardiomyopathy and had no other lesions or symptoms compatible with a coronavirus infection.
Private sector solutions to major social problems — stephanie smith — director, humanitarian & development, mastercard.
Stephanie Smith is a Director, in the Humanitarian & Development group, at Mastercard (https://www.mastercard.us), the American multinational financial services corporation.
Stephanie is responsible for operations of the Humanitarian & Development group at Mastercard, and ensuring the team’s efficient, consistent, and effective delivery against their vision to provide digital tools and access for education, health, commerce, and other critical services for marginalized individuals and communities. The Humanitarian & Development group is focused on driving commercially sustainable social impact in collaboration with governments, NGOs, and other private sector companies.
After graduating from Oxford University, Stephanie began her professional career at a rapidly growing technology company, Applied Predictive Technologies / APT (acquired by Mastercard) delivering analytics software and consulting engagements to Fortune 500s.
Stephanie is particularly passionate about diversity & inclusion and solving social problems, and has experience delivering projects and technologies that drive a lasting social impact.
Stephanie led a pro bono project in partnership with the city government of New Orleans and a non-profit, that pioneered how APT applied data assets and technology to facilitate and measure inclusive growth. Stephanie also proactively took on new projects in social-impact oriented industries (for example, applying Test & Learn analytics to education), and co-led APT’s global Women’s Leadership Network (a business resource group to connect female leaders and build a more inclusive workplace).
Stephanie is also on the Working Group of the Partnership for Central America (https://www.centampartnership.org/) working to support private sector efforts to address the root causes of irregular migration from Central America through coordinated, sustained, and transparent impact across the region.
Stephanie is a passionate mentor of junior staff, and outside of work, volunteers time as a mentor with the Girls Network in London, and fundraising with Girls on the Run in Washington D.C.
Polymer semiconductors—materials that have been made soft and stretchy but still able to conduct electricity—hold promise for future electronics that can be integrated within the body, including disease detectors and health monitors.
Yet until now, scientists and engineers have been unable to give these polymers certain advanced features, like the ability to sense biochemicals, without disrupting their functionality altogether.
Researchers at the Pritzker School of Molecular Engineering (PME) have developed a new strategy to overcome that limitation. Called “click-to-polymer” or CLIP, this approach uses a chemical reaction to attach new functional units onto polymer semiconductors.
Bio-Digital Twins, Quantum Computing, And Precision Medicine — Mr. Kazuhiro Gomi, President and CEO, and Dr. Joe Alexander, MD, Ph.D., Director, Medical and Health Informatics (MEI) Lab, NTT Research.
Mr. Kazuhiro Gomi, is President and CEO of NTT Research (https://ntt-research.com/), a division of The Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Corporation, commonly known as NTT (https://www.global.ntt/), a Japanese telecommunications company headquartered in Tokyo, Japan. Mr. Gomi has been at NTT for more than 30 years and was involved in product management/product development activities at the beginning of his tenure. In September of 2009, Mr. Gomi was first named to the Global Telecoms Business Power100 — a list of the 100 most powerful and influential people in the telecoms industry. He was the CEO of NTT America Inc. from 2010 to 2019 and also served on the Board of Directors at NTT Communications from 2012 to 2019. Mr. Gomi received a Masters of Science in Industrial Engineering from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, and a Master of Science in Electrical Engineering from Keio University, Tokyo. Mr. Gomi is a member of the board at US Japan Council, a non-profit organization aimed at fostering a better relationship between the US and Japan.
Dr. Joe Alexander, is Director of the Medical and Health Informatics (MEI) Lab at NTT Research, where he oversees the MEI Lab research in multi-scale Precision Cardiology platforms such as the cardiovascular bio-digital twin, as well as heart-on-a-chip technology, specifically aimed at developing the infrastructure for a digital replica of an individual’s heart. In addition, the MEI Lab is working on nano-and micro-scale sensors and electrodes, other organ-on-a-chip micro-fluidics technologies, as well as wearable and remote sensing to support future bio-digital twin applications.
Before coming to NTT Research, Dr. Alexander spent 18 years at Pfizer, Inc., where he had most recently served as Senior Medical Director, Global Medical Affairs, working in cardiovascular medicine, worldwide clinical imaging and measurement technologies, medical devices and pulmonary hypertension, and regularly conducting modeling and simulation research in many of these areas. He previously worked for two years at Merck, Inc. and spent eight years at Vanderbilt University, where he completed a two-year residency in internal medicine and served as a professor of medicine and biomedical engineering. Dr. Alexander obtained his M.D. and Ph.D. (in biomedical engineering) degrees at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine.
