HEALTH AND SCIENCE HIGHLIGHTS

September 2, 2024 (San Diego's East County) -- Our Health and Science Highlights provide cutting edge news that could impact your health and our future

HEALTH

• New COVID-19 booster shots have been approved. When should you get one? (Science News)
• Dozens of pregnant women, some bleeding or in labor, are turned away from ERs despite federal law  (AP)
• US FDA approves Emergent's smallpox vaccine for people at high risk of mpox (Reuters via MSN)
• Finding a therapist who takes your insurance can be nearly impossible. Here's why (NPR)
• WHO declares mpox outbreaks in Africa a global health emergency as new form of the virus spreads (10 News)
• U.S. clinical trials in China questioned by U.S. lawmakers (Reuters)

SCIENCE AND TECH

• Zapping sand to create rock could help curb coastal erosion (Science News)
• Scientists create game-changing device that can turn air pollution into salt within minutes: 'A reaction that the planet has been running for billions of years' (The  Cooldown)
• SpaceX will return stranded astronauts next year.  (BBC)

For excerpts, click “read more” and scroll down.

New COVID-19 booster shots have been approved. When should you get one? (Science News)

As the summer surge of COVID-19 crests, many people are weighing whether they need to get booster shots now to protect against the disease... The U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved updated versions of mRNA vaccines from Pfizer-BioNtech and Moderna on August 22. 

Dozens of pregnant women, some bleeding or in labor, are turned away from ERs despite federal law  (AP)

 Bleeding and in pain, Kyleigh Thurman didn’t know her doomed pregnancy could kill her.Emergency room doctors at Ascension Seton Williamson in Texas handed her a pamphlet on miscarriage and told her to “let nature take its course” before discharging her without treatment for her ectopic pregnancy.  When she returned three days later, still bleeding, doctors finally agreed to give her an injection to end the pregnancy. It was too late. The fertilized egg growing on Thurman’s fallopian tube ruptured it, destroying part of her reproductive system.

US FDA approves Emergent's smallpox vaccine for people at high risk of mpox (Reuters via MSN)

-The U.S. Food and Drug Administration granted expanded approval to Emergent BioSolutions' smallpox vaccine for use by people at high risk of mpox infection, sending the drugmaker's shares surging 20% before the bell on Friday....The Emergent vaccine, however, cannot be taken by those with weakened immune systems, including people with HIV. ...Still, the approval comes at a time when a new mpox strain known as clade Ib has spread rapidly in Africa...Mpox has progressed to become an uncontrolled epidemic in Africa ... creating an enormous need to use all effective tools to extinguish it as a threat," said Dr. Amesh Adalja, an infectious diseases expert at Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security.

Finding a therapist who takes your insurance can be nearly impossible. Here's why (NPR)

... Although federal law requires insurers to provide the same access to mental and physical health care, these companies have been caught, time and again, shortchanging customers with mental illness — restricting coverage and delaying or denying treatment.

WHO declares mpox outbreaks in Africa a global health emergency as new form of the virus spreads (10 News)

The World Health Organization has declared the mpox outbreaks in Congo and elsewhere in Africa a global emergency, with cases confirmed among children and adults in more than a dozen countries and a new form of the virus spreading. Few vaccine doses are available on the continent.

U.S. clinical trials in China questioned by U.S. lawmakers (Reuters)

A bipartisan group of lawmakers on Tuesday called on the Biden administration to ramp up scrutiny of U.S. clinical trials conducted in China, citing the risk of intellectual property theft and the possibility of forced participation of Uyghurs.

SCIENCE AND TECH

Zapping sand to create rock could help curb coastal erosion (Science News)

Low voltages generate minerals that bind grains together into an limestone-like aggregate.

Scientists create game-changing device that can turn air pollution into salt within minutes: 'A reaction that the planet has been running for billions of years' (The  Cooldown)

Scientists at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) and the University of Southern California have made a breakthrough that could immensely reduce carbon emissions in the shipping industry …a joint team of scientists has developed a reactor that will capture the carbon dioxide emissions from vessels and convert them into natural bicarbonate salts, which can hold the carbon dioxide for up to 100,000 years.

SpaceX will return stranded astronauts next year.  (BBC)

Two Nasa astronauts who have been stuck in space for over two months will return to Earth in February 2025 with SpaceX.