News a glance
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《加拿大医疗协会学报》
Funds to fight TB: The Global Plan to Stop Tuberculosis (2006–2015), a partnership led by WHO, was launched with a UK commitment of US$74 million and tripling of funding from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation to more than US$900 million. The global plan (www.stoptb.org) calls for a tripling of spending on TB to US$56 billion by 2016 to increase access to TB control programs and accelerate research on new tools to fight the disease, including a vaccine. Some $25 billion is available from affected countries and other donors, leaving a gap of $31 billion. The plan aims to provide treatment to 50 million people and prevent 14 million deaths over the next decade. "Tuberculosis is a disease that should have been eliminated years ago," Mario Raviglione, head of the TB eradication for WHO told reporters in Ottawa on Jan. 27. Each year, 8.8 million people worldwide suffer from TB and 1.7 million die of it. Individual treatment costs less than Can$30 annually.
Sobering thought: Almost 50% of seriously injured snowmobile drivers had been drinking alcohol — double the number from 5 years ago. New data from the Canadian Institute for Health Information confirm that snowmobile incidents are still the number one cause of winter sports and recreation-related injuries treated in trauma units (2003–2004). They accounted for 41% of these types of injuries, more than snowboarding (20%), skiing (20%), hockey (9%), tobogganing (7%) and ice-skating (3%).
Toxic tobacco smoke: California is the first US state to place secondhand tobacco smoke alongside tailpipe and smokestack exhausts as a toxic air pollutant and candidate for regulation. It is expected to revive legislative efforts to ban drivers from smoking when children are in their vehicles and to curb smoking in multifamily dwellings.
Tube feeding: Commercial Alert, a consumer advocacy group, has launched a Web site devoted to ending direct-to-consumer prescription drug advertising (www.stopdrugads.org). More than 200 American medical school professors signed a statement from Commercial Alert opposing drug ads. The statement declared that the drug industry's "onslaught of advertising to promote prescription drugs ... does not promote public health" and increases costs and unnecessary prescriptions. The statement was sent to the US Food and Drug Administration advisory committee hearing on DTC advertising.
Junk TV: American advocacy groups and parents in Massachusetts are suing the Nickelodeon TV network and Kellogg Co. in a bid to stop junk food marketing to children. The plaintiffs are the Center for Science in the Public Interest, a non-profit US advocacy group, the Boston-based Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood, and 2 parents. In a study last fall, CSPI found that of the 168 ads for food that appeared on Nickelodeon, 88% were for foods of poor nutritional quality. Of the 54 Kellogg ads shown during 27.5 hours of Saturday morning programming, CSPI found 98% were for nutritionally poor foods. "Nickelodeon and Kellogg engage in business practices that literally sicken our children," says CSPI Executive Direct Michael F. Jacobson. The lawsuit seeks to stop the companies from marketing junk food when 15% or more if the audience is 8 years old or younger. — Compiled by Barbara Sibbald, CMAJ
Sobering thought: Almost 50% of seriously injured snowmobile drivers had been drinking alcohol — double the number from 5 years ago. New data from the Canadian Institute for Health Information confirm that snowmobile incidents are still the number one cause of winter sports and recreation-related injuries treated in trauma units (2003–2004). They accounted for 41% of these types of injuries, more than snowboarding (20%), skiing (20%), hockey (9%), tobogganing (7%) and ice-skating (3%).
Toxic tobacco smoke: California is the first US state to place secondhand tobacco smoke alongside tailpipe and smokestack exhausts as a toxic air pollutant and candidate for regulation. It is expected to revive legislative efforts to ban drivers from smoking when children are in their vehicles and to curb smoking in multifamily dwellings.
Tube feeding: Commercial Alert, a consumer advocacy group, has launched a Web site devoted to ending direct-to-consumer prescription drug advertising (www.stopdrugads.org). More than 200 American medical school professors signed a statement from Commercial Alert opposing drug ads. The statement declared that the drug industry's "onslaught of advertising to promote prescription drugs ... does not promote public health" and increases costs and unnecessary prescriptions. The statement was sent to the US Food and Drug Administration advisory committee hearing on DTC advertising.
Junk TV: American advocacy groups and parents in Massachusetts are suing the Nickelodeon TV network and Kellogg Co. in a bid to stop junk food marketing to children. The plaintiffs are the Center for Science in the Public Interest, a non-profit US advocacy group, the Boston-based Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood, and 2 parents. In a study last fall, CSPI found that of the 168 ads for food that appeared on Nickelodeon, 88% were for foods of poor nutritional quality. Of the 54 Kellogg ads shown during 27.5 hours of Saturday morning programming, CSPI found 98% were for nutritionally poor foods. "Nickelodeon and Kellogg engage in business practices that literally sicken our children," says CSPI Executive Direct Michael F. Jacobson. The lawsuit seeks to stop the companies from marketing junk food when 15% or more if the audience is 8 years old or younger. — Compiled by Barbara Sibbald, CMAJ