HEALTH AND SCIENCE HIGHLIGHTS

January 25, 2016 (San Diego's East County) -- Our Health and Science Highlights provide cutting edge news that could impact your health and our future.

HEALTH

·         ‘Miraculous’ results from new MS therapy (Telegraph)

·         More Hospitals Are Ditching Antibiotics In The Meat They Serve (NPR)

·         CDC issues guidelines for pregnant women during Zika outbreak (Reuters)

·         Has The World Learned The Wrong Lessons From The Ebola Outbreak? (NPR)

·         U.S. government suspends enrollment in Cigna Medicare Advantage, drug plans

·         Young People Surprised By Risky Synthetic Drugs They Considered Safe (NPR)

SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY

·         A 'Scorcher': 2015 Shatters Record As Warmest Year, NASA And NOAA Say (NPR)

·         Batteries With A Less Fiery Future (NPR)

·         Scientists Find Hints Of A Giant, Hidden Planet In Our Solar System (NPR)

·         Hawking: Threats to human survival likely from new science (AP)

·         Fighting Global Censorship, ProPublica Joins the Dark Web (Reason)

For excerpts and links to full stories, click “read more” and scroll down.

HEALTH

‘Miraculous’ results from new MS therapy (Telegraph)

Wheelchair-bound patients able to walk again after stem-cell therapy.

More Hospitals Are Ditching Antibiotics In The Meat They Serve (NPR)

Hospitals are on the front lines of the battle against antibiotic resistance. Increasingly, they're trying to walk the talk by purchasing meat from animals raised without antibiotics.

CDC issues guidelines for pregnant women during Zika outbreak (Reuters)

CHICAGO (Reuters) - The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Tuesday issued guidelines for doctors caring for pregnant women who might have been exposed to Zika virus, a mosquito-borne infection that can cause brain damage in a developing fetus.

Has The World Learned The Wrong Lessons From The Ebola Outbreak? (NPR)

By focusing on the end of the epidemic, writes infectious disease specialist Nahid Bhadelia, we miss the larger point.

U.S. government suspends enrollment in Cigna Medicare Advantage, drug plans

(Reuters) - The U.S. government has suspended new enrollment in Cigna Corp's Medicare Advantage health insurance and prescription drug plans, saying Cigna had "widespread and systemic failures" that prevented patients from accessing medical services. The government said Cigna did not handle complaints and grievances properly from patients who had been denied coverage for health benefits or drugs, according to a Jan. 21 letter from its regulator, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid.

Young People Surprised By Risky Synthetic Drugs They Considered Safe (NPR)

Cities across the U.S. have seen surges in ER visits and hospitalizations tied to an evolving category of chemical substances, such as K2 or Spice. What can be done?

SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY

A 'Scorcher': 2015 Shatters Record As Warmest Year, NASA And NOAA Say (NPR)

The Northern Hemisphere saw the biggest rise in land temperatures, finishing 2.59 degrees Fahrenheit hotter than the 20th century average.

Batteries With A Less Fiery Future (NPR)

Overheated lithium-ion batteries have been a problem for airplanes, cars and even "hoverboards." A chemical engineer at Stanford University thinks she has a solution to the problem.

Scientists Find Hints Of A Giant, Hidden Planet In Our Solar System (NPR)

Something very big, out beyond Neptune, is warping the orbits of small, icy objects circling our sun. Astronomers haven't seen it yet, but say the culprit could be a planet with 10 times Earth's mass.

Hawking: Threats to human survival likely from new science (AP)

Physicist Stephen Hawking has warned that new technologies will likely bring about "new ways things can go wrong" for human survival.

Fighting Global Censorship, ProPublica Joins the Dark Web (Reason)

ProPublica, the non-profit investigative journalism outfit whose motto is "Journalism in the Public Interest" has become the first major media organization to join the "Dark Web" with the launch of a hidden service version of its site, designed to run on the encrypted Tor Browser.