HEALTH AND SCIENCE HIGHLIGHTS

August 10, 2016 (San Diego's East County) -- Our Health and Science Highlights provide cutting-edge news that could impact your health and our future.

HEALTH

• Zika linked to baby joint deformities (BBC)
• A Study Takes the Globe's Blood Pressure and Finds a Dramatic Rise (NPR)
• Is medical marijuana the future for breast cancer therapy?  (CS World)
• Most Americans support late-term abortion in cases of Zika-linked birth defects (Huffington Post)
• Hacking nerves can control disease (BBC)
• What happens to developmentally disabled as parents age, die? (PBS)
• Young Inventors Work On Secret Proteins to Thwart Antibiotic-Resistant Bacteria (NPR)
• FDA bans e-cigarette sales to minors: why is it cracking down now? (Christian Science Monitor)

SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY

• How to deal with toxic waste buried in Greenland’s rapidly melting ice caps (Christian Science Monitor)
• Facebook to suppress clickbait messages (BBC)
• Tesla unveils a battery to power your home, completely off grid (Minds.com)

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

HEALTH

Zika linked to baby joint deformities (BBC)

Zika infection during pregnancy may cause limb joint deformities in the baby, experts now fear.

A Study Takes the Globe's Blood Pressure and Finds a Dramatic Rise (NPR)

According to the research, hypertension is now a more common disease in low- and middle-income countries than in wealthy nations.

Is medical marijuana the future for breast cancer therapy?  (CS World)

Statistics show that breast cancer is the most common tumor among women and accounts for 22.9% of all cancers in women across the globe.

Most Americans support late-term abortion in cases of Zika-linked birth defects(Huffington Post)

The poll found that 59 percent of Americans favor allowing a woman to obtain a legal abortion after 24 weeks of pregnancy “if a woman is infected with Zika virus and a health professional believes there is a serious possibility that the baby would be born with a severe birth defect that includes an abnormally small head and brain damage,” which is known as microcephaly. Less than a quarter (23 percent) of respondents favor legal abortion at the same stage of pregnancy when the question does not mention the Zika-related birth defect.

Hacking nerves can control disease (BBC)

Controlling human nerve cells with electricity could treat a range of diseases including arthritis, asthma and diabetes, a new company says.

What happens to developmentally disabled as parents age, die? (PBS)

Ever since she was 4, when a caregiver force-fed her with a spoon, Caroline Munro has not let anyone feed her but her mother. The 22-year-old has cerebral palsy and an intellectual disability. She doesn’t speak and functions at a preschool level. Her mother, Beth Munro, feeds her with a fork or her hand. As Beth ages — she’ll be 68 in October — she wonders who will care for Caroline when she’s no longer around.

Young Inventors Work On Secret Proteins to Thwart Antibiotic-Resistant Bacteria (NPR)

Many of the most powerful antibiotics have lost their punch. Some Stanford students think they've found a different way to attack bacteria that the germs can't overcome.

FDA bans e-cigarette sales to minors: why is it cracking down now? (Christian Science Monitor)

On Monday, the US federal regulator started a ban on sales of e-cigarettes to people under 18 and requires products on the market since 2007 to undergo federal review

SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY

How to deal with toxic waste buried in Greenland’s rapidly melting ice caps (Christian Science Monitor)

…Camp Century was a US military base built on and under the Greenland ice sheet in 1959 to test nuclear missiles during the height of the cold war. But the United States decommissioned the military base in 1967, leaving behind the various waste from a nuclear reactor such as gasoline, sewage, and radioactive coolant.

Facebook to suppress clickbait messages (BBC)

Clickbait articles tend to carry intriguing headlines which suggest there is more to the story than there actually is. They are famous for employing alluring phrases such as "you'll never guess what happened next" in order to drive web traffic. Facebook says it can now automatically suppress these stories.

Tesla unveils a battery to power your home, completely off grid (Minds.com)

…[Elan] Musk refers to it as changing the "entire energy infrastructure of the world." The batteries will begin shipping over the summer of 2015 and mount on the wall.