Human stem cells transplanted into mice eventually developed into working, mouse-sized human kidneys, researchers report in a new study The results offer hope that investigators may one day be able to grow human-sized kidneys in humans, potentially saving the lives of the more than 50,000 people in the US alone who need a new kidney but must await a donor. The human stem cells were between 7 and 8 weeks of gestational age, meaning they had been extracted from aborted fetuses.

These cells are similar to embryonic stem cells, which are extracted from embryos created at in vitro fertilization clinics that are not going to be used. Fetal cells are easier to obtain than embryonic stem cells, however: the latter are currently mired in controversy, for embryos are inevitably destroyed when stem cells are extracted. The researchers also succeeded in growing a mouse-sized pig kidney in the mice using stem cells extracted from pig embryos. The pig-derived organs also appeared to be accepted by human immune system cells injected into the mice. Donating organs from one species to another, a field known as xenotransplantation, has long been stymied by several glitches--most notably, the fact that the human immune system often identifies the implanted pig organ as a foreign invader and destroys it, a process known as rejection. So the fact that pig kidneys escaped detection by human cells suggests that one day, doctors may be able to offer humans an organ grown from pig cells, boosting the supply of kidneys even further.

The researchers, led by Dr. Yair Reisner of the Weizmann Institute of Science in Rehovot, Israel, published their findings in the advance online edition of Nature Medicine. Importantly, Reisner and colleagues discovered that stem cell-derived kidneys were nourished by blood flowing from the mice's own blood vessels, and not from blood vessels derived from the donor animal. This could significantly reduce the risk that the host's body would reject the organ, thinking it is foreign, the authors note.

Vaccine for Cervical Cancer

A vaccine to protect women from cervical cancer could be on the horizon.Early tests found an experimental vaccine to be 100 percent effective against the virus responsible for half of the cases of cervical cancer, according to a study published in the New England Journal of Medicine.The vaccine targets viral strain Type 16 of the human papillomavirus (HPV). HPV causes almost all cases of cervical cancer and also causes genital warts in men and women.Researchers tested the vaccine on 1,533 women aged 16 to 23 at 16 sites throughout the United States.The women were injected with either the vaccine or a placebo and followed for an average of almost 18 months.By the end of that period, none of the 768 women who'd gotten the vaccine tested positive for Type 16 HPV infection, and none showed signs of precancerous cervical tissue.

Of the 765 women who got the placebo shot, 41 were diagnosed with HPV infection and nine had precancerous tissue.The researchers could not say how long the vaccine's protection might last, and The Associated Press quotes other experts who say it needs to be tested over longer periods. Because there are multiple strains of HPV that can cause cervical cancer, it may not be possible to wipe out the disease entirely with one vaccine, the AP says.

Heart Health :Cholesterol busting foods

A combination of cholesterol-busting foods offers as much heart protection as cholesterol-lowering drugs, a Canadian study finds The diethad four components: Soy-based.soy-based meat substitutes such as soy burgers, soy hot dogs, soy cold cuts and , soy milk as a dairy substitute Sticky fiber : natural psyllium product Metamucil. Plant-sterol enriched margarine Nuts. a handful of almonds every day.

The drop in the study participants' cholesterol level was almost entirely due to a drop in "bad" LDL cholesterol. This drop was roughly the same as that seen by patients taking the cholesterol-lowering drugs known as statins. Jenkins speculates that patients with very high cholesterol could add statins to get an even better effect. To get the maximum anti-cholesterol effect, a person would have to eat several portions of each type of cholesterol-lowering food every day. It would also be important to stay away from animal fats, foods with high levels of saturated fats, and foods high in cholesterol"My advice is try a little of all of these foods," Jenkins says. "A few nuts are never a bad thing -- just a handful of almonds is enough

Germany takes crisis measures to cap Health spending

Within weeks of re-election, the German health minister, Ulla Schmidt, is trying to stop the rapid increase in the health budget by introducing a bill of emergency measures. The pharmaceutical companies, drug retailers, and pharmacists will have to lower their drug prices by a total of €1.35bn (£0.86bn; $1.36bn). New drugs with existing patents will be sold at a fixed price. The German Hospital Association foresees the loss of at least 40 000 jobs at a time when hospitals already cannot adhere to the legal working hours. Parts of the pharmaceutical industry that have not already moved their research and development to other countries, such as the United States and the United Kingdom, have threatened to leave the country.

Male Hormonal Contraceptive

Pharmaceutical companies Schering AG and Organon saidthey aim to produce a marketable hormone contraceptive for men in five to seven years . Trials for the product -- a long-term implant accompanied by an injection every three months - will start next year, with the goal of marketing the product in the United States and Europe, the companies said.

The implant would contain a hormone belonging to the progestin class, which would stop production of both sperm and the male hormone testosterone. Injections of a testosterone derivative would replace natural levels of the hormone, necessary for normal sexual functioning. Organonwould make the implant - a version of its already existing Implanon female birth control implant.Schering would produce the injected testosterone derivative, known as testosterone undecanoate. Schering spokeswoman acknowledged that some might find the delivery method inconvenient, requiring visits to the doctor to have the implant inserted in the upper arm and to have the injections. Researchers in Australia also say they have successfully tested a progestin-testosterone combination.

New revolution from Biotechnology based Targeted Treatments

The pharmaceutical industry is poised a revolution which will oust the blockbuster drugs, and usher in targeted treatments based on a fresh understanding of human biology, anIBM Business consulting services report said. The drugs industry is suffering a crisis which saw the number of new drugs approved in the US fall to a seven-year low of 24 last year despite a doubling of investment in research. US patents on 35 blockbuster drugs will expire by 2008, yet only 14 potential new best-sellers are in the pipeline.

The new generation of drugs will be based largely around larger molecules, such as proteins, whose composition is becoming the focus of increasing research. Such molecules, although complex, will be faster to develop thanks to the help of biochemistry software. The report noted the importance of a "much better grasp of the biological sciences and a massive increase in computer power". The treatments' speed of development will also make them cheaper to produce, putting them within the budget of developing countries which often have more severe health concerns, yet little cash to pay for treatments. "Most [current] drugs only work in between 40-60% of the patients for whom they are prescribed," the report said. "And drugs which work well in some patients cause intolerable side effects in others. "Most medicines for adult patients are prescribed without regard for variations in body size even though there is a roughly threefold difference between the biggest and smallest adults."

While some firms have sought to bolster their drug "pipelines" by buying biotechnology firms with promising products, uncertainty within the industry and worries about the accuracy of research, has reduced the appetite for takeovers. The last report by IBM Business Consulting Services into the pharmaceuticals industry, published in 1998, predicted the spate of mergers and acquisitions which has reduced the number of sector giants from 20 four years ago to just 13 today.

Vitamins ( E&C) No Benefit To Heart Disease

New research offers still more evidence that hormone replacement therapy does more harm than good in older women with heart disease, and it also raises doubts about the safety of the antioxidant vitamins E and C. Until recently, hormone replacement therapy (HRT) was widely prescribed to postmenopausal women for the prevention or treatment of heart disease. Millions also take antioxidant vitamins in the belief that they protect the heart In this study, researchers evaluated the role of HRT and antioxidant vitamin supplements in the treatment of postmenopausal women with heart diseaseVitamin supplementation involved daily consumption of 800 international units of vitamin E and 1 gram of vitamin C. Women were given estrogen plus progesterone or estrogen alone if they had had a hysterectomy. Participants were followed for roughly three years. The results showed women on hormone therapy had a poorer outcome than those who did not take HRT -- they continued to have narrowing of the arteries, which indicates continued progression of heart disease. Likewise, women taking the antioxidants fared worse than women on the placebo treatment. Fourteen patients died in the HRT group, compared to eight in the group that did not receive HRT. And 16 patients died in the group receiving the vitamins, compared to six in the no-vitamin group. The researchers concluded that postmenopausal women with coronary disease should be discouraged from using both HRT and high doses of vitamin E and C. But the Council for Responsible Nutrition releasesaysthat, "the WAVE study should not be considered the final word" on the safety of vitamins E and C in patients with heart disease.

Japan links 81 deaths to cancer Drug Iressa

The drug is made by AstraZeneca Plc, which is Europe's second-largest drug maker, and has so far only been used in Japan, where it was released in July for treatment of non-small-cell lung cancer. The death toll, as of November 25, compares with the ministry's announcement in October of 13 deaths linked to Iressa. The ministry said Iressa is not being withdrawn from the market, but it plans to have experts study the cases of patients who have died or suffered side effects, and to ask them to try to report back by the end of this month.
"The drug has proven effective for some patients, and the cases where there have been side effects do not rule out its efficacy," saidthe ministry official who oversees safety of drugs.

AstraZeneca said in early November it could not rule out a link between Iressa and interstitial pneumonia, a serious lung disease, but it remained confident about Iressa's overall safety profile. A company spokeswoman saidthat fewer than 1% of the 48,000 patients who had received Iressa globally had developed interstitial pneumonia. She said interstitial pneumonia was a well-known complication of lung cancer. The ministry said it had been investigating the link between Iressa and the side effects, but that it had not been able to reach a conclusion since the drug is used by cancer patients who cannot be operated on or whose cancer is recurring.Iressa is the first in a new class of "smart bomb" cancer drugs called epidermal growth factor receptor inhibitors that target proteins produced only by cancer cells, so they do not cause the nausea and hair loss associated with chemotherapy. Regulators in the United States and Europe are currently evaluating the drug, one of a number of new products that AstraZeneca hopes will revitalize its product pipeline in the next few years.

Marketfor infertility drugs

One in six couples in the developed world are estimated to beinfertile.Infertility is typically defined as the failure to become pregnant after one year of unprotected intercourse. In about 30% ofinfertility cases, the problem can be found solely in a medical problem of the woman; in another 30%, male factors alone causeinfertility; and in another 30% of cases, both partners haveconditions that render the couple infertile. In the remaining 10%of cases, no clear cause can be found.

The World Health Organization estimates that 60-80 million people suffer from infertility worldwide With large and relatively wealthy populations but low ART penetration per capita, the US and Japan both present massive latent marketpotential. The US and Japan are two of the most populousindustrialized nations and are ranked first and second in terms oftheir total spend on pharmaceuticals, yet primarily for cost andreimbursement reasons, these markets are substantiallyunder-penetrated in terms of ART procedures conducted per capita.

The market for the drugs used in the assisted reproduction procedures is dominated by a few key companies, with Serono and Organoncurrently commanding the strongest brand awareness among infertility specialists around the globe. Ferring and IBSA also have strongbranding positions in some European countries and in other regions where the cheaper urinary drugs are used more often. The two products with the highest sales in the infertility market, Serono's Gonal-F (follitropin-alpha) and Organon's Puregon/Follistim (follitropin-beta), are likely to remain the dominant infertilitydrugs in the US and much of Europe. While Ferring's Menopur and to a growing extent IBSA's Merional are likely to dominate the morecost-sensitive markets.

ContrceptiveGel fights HIV too

Women who want to protect themselves from sexually transmitted diseases as well as pregnancy may soon have a new option. A new study shows an experimental vaginal gel is an effective contraceptive and HIV and herpes fighter in laboratory tests. Researchers say the results of the study, published in the November issue of Fertility and Sterility, suggest that the new compound merits further study. Although yet to be tested in humans, the compound, known as SAMMA, reduced pregnancy rates by more than 90% in rabbit testing. Laboratory tests showed that the gel was safe and blocked the activity of the HIV virus and two strains of the herpes simplex virus (HSV-1 and HSV-2). SAMMA had a somewhat weaker protective effect against another common sexual transmitted disease, chlamydia, and it inhibited the growth of gonorrhea. Researchers say they have been granted a U.S. patent for SAMMA, and these findings support further evaluation of the contraceptive gel in human trials.

Side effects of Human growth hormone -anti-ageingdrug

A study led by Marc R. Blackman of the National Institutes of Health determined that human growth hormone, approved by the US FDA to treat children and adults with severe hormone deficiencies, is known to increase muscle and decrease fat in older people but is also known for its serious side effects, such as increased risk of diabetes and carpal tunnel syndrome. Human growth hormone is being used at anti-aging clinics across theUSby up to 35,000 people, according to federal officials. The study, published in the Journal of the American Medical Association, shows that the treatment is not ready for widespread use. The study involved 131 men and women between the ages of 65 and 88 and resulted in 18 men developing diabetes, while only seven men not on the treatment developed the disease. One researcher involved in the study, S. Mitchell Harman, asserts that products taken orally that claim to include human growth hormone are ineffective, because the human growth molecule must be injected to be effective. The FDA is investigating misuse of the product by some companies.

WHO: 25 years of Essential Medicines

The twentieth century opened with only one widely available modern medicine: acetylsalicylic acid (aspirin). In the 1940s the first antibiotic, the first mass produced antimalarial, and the first antitubercular were introduced. The 1950s and 1960s saw the rapid introduction of oral contraceptives, medicines for diabetes, and then medicines for mental illness, many infectious diseases, cardiovascular diseases, and cancer. By the 1970s effective medicines - though not always ideal - existed for nearly every major illness. Yet for half the world's population, it was as if they were still living in the nineteenth century. For them, modern medicines were unavailable, unaffordable, of poor quality, or ineffective because not properly used. In 1975 the World Health Assembly introduced the concepts of "essential drugs" and "national drug policy", and they quickly became part of the lobal public health vocabulary. The Health Assembly was building on precedents set in Scandinavia, North America and some pioneering developing countries, in the hope that they would provide a way to begin closing the huge gap between those who were benefiting from the pharmaceutical harvest of the mid-1900s and those who were not.

In October 1977, WHO produced the first Model List of Essential Drugs. "Essential medicines are those that satisfy the priority health needs of the population. They are selected with due regard to disease prevalence, evidence on efficacy and safety, and comparative cost-effectiveness. Essential medicines are intended to be available within the context of functioning health systems at all times in adequate amounts, in the appropriate dosage forms, with assured quality, and at a price the individual and the community can afford. Thanks partly to the recognition and application of these principles, the situation has changed enormously since 1977. Todayat least 156 countries in total - have adopted national essential medicines lists. National lists are widely used for public procurement systems, reimbursement schemes, training, public education, and other national health activities.WHO has updated its own model list of essential medicines on average every two years for the 25 years.

In 1977, the concept of a national drug policy was unknown to almost everyone. Today, over 100 countries have national drug policies in place or under development. These policies are being introduced at increasing speed in every region. More importantly, a growing number of countries are moving directly from policy to action. The national drug policy is increasingly serving as a framework within which interested parties can work for pharmaceutical sector reform within countries.In 1977 there was virtually no publicly available price information, few countries actively encouraged generic substitution, and many countries forbade generic substitution. During the first half of the 1980s, world market prices for drugs on the WHO model list fell by 40% through increased demand and competition.

At least 12 countries now provide pharmaceutical price information on public web sites.Perhaps most importantly: in 1977, less than half the world's population had regular access to essential medicines, while today nearly two-thirds do, through a combination of public and private health systems. In absolute terms, the number of people estimated to have access to essential medicines grew from roughly 2.1 billion in 1977 to 3.8 billion in the late 1990s. While in many developed countries over 70% of pharmaceuticals are publicly funded through reimbursement plans and other mechanisms, in developing and transitional economies 50-90% of drugs are paid for by the patients themselves. Medicines are the major out-of-pocket health expense for poor households in most developing countries Forgovernments, health insurers and households alike, the price of pharmaceuticals represents asubstantial barrier to access. pharmaceutical prices vary widely among countries and within countries, and differences in wholesale prices commonly vary from fivefold to tenfold. Essential medicines are perhaps the most cost-effective element of public health after immunizations and key health promotion habits such as regular exercise. Safe, effective, quality medicines that are appropriately used already save millions of lives each year and prevent untold suffering.

Compiled from WWW by Dr. Venkat Appaji Padmanabhuni

email : appajipv@hotmail.com