scholarly journals The contribution of drug-related deaths to the US disadvantage in mortality

2018 ◽  
Vol 48 (3) ◽  
pp. 945-953 ◽  
Author(s):  
Magali Barbieri

Abstract Background The USA ranks last in life expectancy among high-income countries. Since 2000, excess US mortality has been particularly concentrated in the working ages, which are also the ages hardest hit by the increase in drug deaths. This study measures the effect of drug-related mortality on the gap in life expectancy between the USA and other countries. Methods Data from the Human Mortality Database and the World Health Organization were combined to construct age-standardized mortality rates for 2000–14 in 12 high-income countries and the USA for seven broad causes of death, including drug use. The contribution of each cause to the difference in life expectancy between the USA and the other 12 countries was estimated. Results In 2014, the increase in drug-related deaths accounted for 10–15% of the US disadvantage in mortality, but with marked differences by age group. For working-age men, the increase in drug-related deaths accounted for up to 38% of the difference. Overall, American mortality is higher than the comparison countries across a wide range of causes. Conclusions The severity of the drug epidemic appears to be specific to the USA, but it only partly contributes to the American shortfall in mortality.

2020 ◽  
Vol 117 (13) ◽  
pp. 6998-7000 ◽  
Author(s):  
Neil K. Mehta ◽  
Leah R. Abrams ◽  
Mikko Myrskylä

After decades of robust growth, the rise in US life expectancy stalled after 2010. Explanations for the stall have focused on rising drug-related deaths. Here we show that a stagnating decline in cardiovascular disease (CVD) mortality was the main culprit, outpacing and overshadowing the effects of all other causes of death. The CVD stagnation held back the increase of US life expectancy at age 25 y by 1.14 y in women and men, between 2010 and 2017. Rising drug-related deaths had a much smaller effect: 0.1 y in women and 0.4 y in men. Comparisons with other high-income countries reveal that the US CVD stagnation is unusually strong, contributing to a stark mortality divergence between the US and peer nations. Without the aid of CVD mortality declines, future US life expectancy gains must come from other causes—a monumental task given the enormity of earlier declines in CVD death rates. Reversal of the drug overdose epidemic will be beneficial, but insufficient for achieving pre-2010 pace of life expectancy growth.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Wissam Al-Janabi ◽  
Ahmed Abras

This article sheds light on the up to date details of COVID-19 and why it began in Wuhan. Further, it discusses the available treatment options and their effects on patients with COVID-19, and which drugs patients and clinicians should avoid. It elucidates the common signs and symptoms and the stages of the severity of patients' condition with COVID-19, including its definition, according to the World Health Organization (WHO). It shows possible ways to break up the transmission mechanism by giving a simple table with a clear and concise caption for each point. Moreover, it announces three ways to diagnose COVID-19, including the latest five-minutes test that was approved by the US Food Drug Administration (FDA) on March 28, 2020. It also elaborates on the main features that can be found on the Chest Computed Tomography Scan (CT-scan) and its four stages. This article will show the difference between previous similar virus attacks like Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) and Middle Eastern Respiratory Syndrome (MERS). It talks briefly about children and pregnant women with COVID. It shows the latest toll of death from COVID-19 and the number of new cases for several countries.


2010 ◽  
Vol 7 (4) ◽  
pp. 90-92 ◽  
Author(s):  
Carol A. Bernstein ◽  
Bruce Hershfield ◽  
Deborah C. Cohen

The USA has the world's largest economy and the highest per capita spending on healthcare, but it lags behind other countries on a number of key health measures. It ranks 23rd in healthy life expectancy and 32nd in infant mortality (World Health Organization, 2009). In 2000, the World Health Organization ranked the US healthcare system as 1st in responsiveness, 37th in overall performance, and 72nd by overall level of health (among 191 member nations in the study).


Author(s):  
Seungil Yum ◽  

Introduction. Government institutes, such as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the US Department of Health and Human Services, play important but different roles dealing with COVID-19 in the USA. Method. This study used NodeXL between June 7 and June 8 to visualise the social networks of the Centers and the Department by collecting 5,166 (the Centers) and 2,940 tweets (the Department). Analysis. Examined the characteristics of centrality of the two networks and used cluster analysis to identify communication groups. Results. Findings confirmed that the Centers demonstrate characteristics of people-based online networks, whereas the Department appears as an institutes-based online networks. Second, offline social networks play an essential role in online social networks. Third, the Centers had a greater impact on the networks in the Department network than the effect the Department had on the Centers. Fourth, some key players, such as the World Health Organization, play a pivotal role in both networks. Conclusions. Governments should explore the different types of health information of government institutes to effectively cope with the COVID-19 pandemic.


2019 ◽  
Vol 70 (7) ◽  
pp. 2330-2334
Author(s):  
Mihaela Ciopec ◽  
Adina Negrea ◽  
Narcis Duteanu ◽  
Corneliu Mircea Davidescu ◽  
Iosif Hulka ◽  
...  

Arsenic content in groundwater�s present a wide range of concentration, ranging from hundreds of micrograms to thousands of micrograms of arsenic per litter, while the maximum permitted arsenic concentration established by World Health Organization (WHO) is 10 mg L-1. According to the WHO all people, regardless of their stage of development and their social economic condition, have the right to have access to adequate drinking water. The most efficient and economic technique used for arsenic removal is represented by adsorption. In order to make this remediation technique more affordable and environmentally friendly is important to new materials with advance adsorbent properties. Novelty of present paper is represented by the usage of a new adsorbent material obtained by physical - chemical modification of Amberlite XAD polymers using crown ethers followed by iron doping, due to well-known affinity of arsenic for iron ions. Present paper aims to test the obtained modified Amberlite polymer for arsenic removal from real groundwater by using adsorption in a fixed bed column, establishing in this way a mechanism for the adsorption process. During experimental work was studied the influence of competing ions from real water into the arsenic adsorption process.


2020 ◽  
Vol 2020 (12) ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael Kmeid ◽  
Breanne Gillie ◽  
Armand Asarian ◽  
Philip Xiao

Abstract Squamous cell carcinomas (SCC) accounts for roughly 20% of lung cancers in the USA. The 2015 World Health Organization classification of lung tumors further categorizes SCC as three subtypes: keratinizing, non-keratinizing and basaloid variant. The non-keratinizing subtype is a poorly differentiated tumor that can present histologically in different ways, and one of which is a rare variant that strongly resembles small cell carcinoma. As a result, histological diagnosis alone is not sufficient to properly diagnose lung carcinomas. Immunohistochemistry has been increasingly used over the past few years to differentiate between lung tumors. The combination of morphological and immunohistochemical staining should be the mainstay for diagnosis of all lung carcinomas as more targeted therapies become more available.


Toxins ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (7) ◽  
pp. 451
Author(s):  
José María Gutiérrez ◽  
Laura-Oana Albulescu ◽  
Rachel H. Clare ◽  
Nicholas R. Casewell ◽  
Tarek Mohamed Abd Abd El-Aziz ◽  
...  

A global strategy, under the coordination of the World Health Organization, is being unfolded to reduce the impact of snakebite envenoming. One of the pillars of this strategy is to ensure safe and effective treatments. The mainstay in the therapy of snakebite envenoming is the administration of animal-derived antivenoms. In addition, new therapeutic options are being explored, including recombinant antibodies and natural and synthetic toxin inhibitors. In this review, snake venom toxins are classified in terms of their abundance and toxicity, and priority actions are being proposed in the search for snake venom metalloproteinase (SVMP), phospholipase A2 (PLA2), three-finger toxin (3FTx), and serine proteinase (SVSP) inhibitors. Natural inhibitors include compounds isolated from plants, animal sera, and mast cells, whereas synthetic inhibitors comprise a wide range of molecules of a variable chemical nature. Some of the most promising inhibitors, especially SVMP and PLA2 inhibitors, have been developed for other diseases and are being repurposed for snakebite envenoming. In addition, the search for drugs aimed at controlling endogenous processes generated in the course of envenoming is being pursued. The present review summarizes some of the most promising developments in this field and discusses issues that need to be considered for the effective translation of this knowledge to improve therapies for tackling snakebite envenoming.


1989 ◽  
Vol 4 (2) ◽  
pp. 117-122 ◽  
Author(s):  
J.-F. Dreyfus ◽  
D. Cremniter ◽  
J.D. Guelfi

SummaryWe are still confronted by numerous different nosographic models and problems concerning the objective evaluation of patients progress during treatment. It is interesting to consider the consequences of this situation in psychiatry which still involves a relative diversity of practical methods used in clinical trials. The recommendations of the USA Food and Drug Administration, on the one hand, constitute a highly structured and precise reference. The World Health Organization, on the other hand, promulgates general recommendations resulting from a compromise designed to satisfy the greatest number of clinicians.Despite the apparently diverse principles and the different practical methods they propose, both those sets of recommendations have been useful in inspiring clinicians to reflect upon these different methodological approaches. The qualities of the inclusion criteria used in the study of patients and the sensitivity of the different measuring instruments have allowed psychotropic drug users as well as producers to recognize the need for a certain rigour in clinical trials.The FDA and WHO guidelines have certainly improved the quality of clinical trials in psychopharmacology. However, they also represent a source of resistance to innovation.A series of consensus meetings to first reconcile US and European points of view and later to include new techniques in the recognized sets of methods would therefore be helpful.


Blood ◽  
2012 ◽  
Vol 120 (4) ◽  
pp. 748-760 ◽  
Author(s):  
Cassandra D. Josephson ◽  
Suzanne Granger ◽  
Susan F. Assmann ◽  
Marta-Inés Castillejo ◽  
Ronald G. Strauss ◽  
...  

Age-group analyses were conducted of patients in the prophylactic platelet dose trial (PLADO), which evaluated the relation between platelet dose per transfusion and bleeding. Hospitalized patients with treatment-induced hypoproliferative thrombocytopenia were randomly assigned to 1 of 3 platelet doses: 1.1 × 1011, 2.2 × 1011, or 4.4 × 1011 platelets/m2 per transfusion, given for morning counts of ≤ 10 000 platelets/μL. Daily hemostatic assessments were performed. The primary end point (percentage of patients who developed grade 2 or higher World Health Organization bleeding) was evaluated in 198 children (0-18 years) and 1044 adults. Although platelet dose did not predict bleeding for any age group, children overall had a significantly higher risk of grade 2 or higher bleeding than adults (86%, 88%, 77% vs 67% of patients aged 0-5 years, 6-12 years, 13-18 years, vs adults, respectively) and more days with grade 2 or higher bleeding (median, 3 days in each pediatric group vs 1 day in adults; P < .001). The effect of age on bleeding differed by disease treatment category and was most pronounced among autologous transplant recipients. Pediatric subjects were at higher risk of bleeding over a wide range of platelet counts, indicating that their excess bleeding risk may be because of factors other than platelet counts. This trial was registered at www.clinicaltrials.gov as #NCT00128713.


2021 ◽  
pp. tobaccocontrol-2020-056316
Author(s):  
Lauren Kass Lempert ◽  
Stella Bialous ◽  
Stanton Glantz

The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) issued orders in July 2020 authorising Philip Morris Products S.A. to market its heated tobacco product (HTP) IQOS inside the USA with claims that it reduces exposure to some dangerous substances. FDA’s ‘reduced-exposure’ orders explicitly prohibit the marketing of IQOS with claims that IQOS will reduce harm or the risk of tobacco-related diseases. Under US law, FDA’s IQOS orders are problematic because FDA disregarded valid scientific evidence that IQOS increases exposure to other dangerous toxins and that Philip Morris Products S.A. failed to demonstrate that consumers understand the difference between reduced-exposure and reduced-harm claims. Unfortunately, both ‘reduced-exposure’ and ‘reduced-harm’ are classified as ‘modified risk tobacco products’ under US law. Exploiting this confusion, Philip Morris International used the FDA decision as the basis for marketing and public relations campaigns outside the USA to press governments to reverse policies that ban or regulate the sales and marketing of HTPs, including IQOS. Parties to the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control should reject tobacco companies’ unsubstantiated explicit or implied claims of reduced harm associated with HTPs and resist Philip Morris International’s and other companies’ calls to relax HTP regulations based on the FDA’s actions. Instead, parties should adopt policies aligned with the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control when dealing with HTPs and other novel tobacco products.


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