Destinie was kept in class even after she began vomiting.
This case (whatever its merits) reminds us of how the institutional nature of schools can lead to a child's individual medical problems going ignored by teachers and administrators, who may be too busy keeping general order to pay attention to an individual child.
The artificial turf used in high school football fields may contain dangerous levels of lead:
The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission opened an investigation this month after the New Jersey health department found elevated lead levels in two fields, which then were closed.But until more information comes out, local school districts are not assuming that their fields contain unsafe levels of lead, several officials said.
"I'm not going to alarm parents. There's just not enough data to raise a red flag," said Paula Smith, an assistant superintendent at the Alief Independent School District. "We're in a holding pattern."
Hopefully this is a false alarm. The effects of lead, even small amounts, can be extremely dramatic (though this is usually found in younger children).
Previously, we blogged about a link between bisphenol A and problems in human development. As the article says, the advisory panel to the National Toxicology Program (part of the NIH) had previously dismissed all concerns about this as "minimal." This new report concludes that there is reason for "some concern." Bisphenol A can cause problems for fetuses, babies, and young children, but apparently not for adult humans.
Plastic industry representatives argued that there are no "serious or high-level concerns", and the National Toxicology Program concedes that more research is needed.
Nevertheless, the bottle maker Nalgene Outdoor Products has decided to stop using plastic containing bisphenol A . This may have something to do with the new report, and may also be related to Canada's plans to declare bisphenol A toxic. In any case, hopefully more studies will be done to determine how much of a threat this is to young children.
Given the frequent confusion over what drugs and foods are and are not dangerous to breastfeeding infants, mothers will be relieved to kow that breast-feeding while on seizure medications does not have any apparent harmful effects on children. From the article:
"Our early findings show breast-feeding during anti-epilepsy drug treatment doesn't appear to have a negative impact on a child's cognitive abilities," study author Kimford Meador, of the University of Florida at Gainesville, said in a prepared statement. "However, more research is needed to confirm our findings, and women should use caution due to the limitations of our study."
The study will follow up on these children until they reach the age of six.
The migrant worker parents of a 3-year-old Florida boy have won a significant settlement from Ag-Mart Produce, arguing that their child's birth defects were caused by exposure to pesticides in Ag-Mart's fields. This is enough to provide for the boy's expenses for the rest of his life, as the plaintiff's lawyer says. From the article:
Terms of the settlement have been kept private, but the family's attorney, Andrew Yaffa, said the money is "significant." Carlitos will not have to worry about medical care the rest of his life."Hopefully, someday, some way through medical research, they will be able to equip him with a wheelchair so he can gain some independence," Yaffa said.
Carlitos' parents said the boy is representative of many more children affected by pesticides, but their families are afraid to come forward. Yaffa credited the family for exposing deplorable conditions in farm work and creating changes that will benefit others for years to come.
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From the linked article:
Ileana Arias, who leads injury-prevention efforts at the centers, said, “The findings do demonstrate a clear pattern of early neglect and physical abuse that is largely preventable.”Because this is the first data looking at babies to age 1, it is unclear whether abuse is increasing or decreasing, said a centers epidemiologist, Rebecca Leeb.
The report said 905,000 American children of all ages were victims of maltreatment in 2006. Maltreatment is the third-leading cause of death of American children under 3, Ms. Arias said.
The article suggests an intriguing reason for these refusals:
It is the absence, or close to it, of some illnesses in the United States that keep some parents from opting for the shots. Worldwide, 242,000 children a year die from measles, but it used to be near one million. The deaths have dropped because of vaccination, a 68 percent decrease from 2000 to 2006.“The very success of immunizations has turned out to be an Achilles’ heel,” said Dr. Mark Sawyer, a pediatrician and infectious disease specialist at Rady Children’s Hospital in San Diego. “Most of these parents have never seen measles, and don’t realize it could be a bad disease so they turn their concerns to unfounded risks. They do not perceive risk of the disease but perceive risk of the vaccine.”
Most of these concerns, however, are unfounded: the safety risk of most vaccines are negligible. And failing to vaccinate not only puts the non-vaccinated child at risk, but also his or her playmates. Even effective vaccines do not work 100% of the time, so a vaccinated child is not necessarily protected from his or her non-vaccinated friends.
For more information, see the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) fact sheet on common vaccinations.
The Healthy Start Program for reduction of infant mortality in Anne Arundel County, Maryland is at risk after its recent loss of $610,000 in federal funding.
From the article:
The black infant mortality rate became a "widespread concern" for the county five years ago, when data indicated that the rate increased to 23 infant deaths for every 1,000 live births, the Capital reports. Currently, the infant mortality rate for blacks in Anne Arundel County is four times higher than that of whites, and 21 black infants in the county die before age one for every 1,000 live births, a rate three times higher than the national average.County Health Officer Frances Phillips hopes to "cobble together a diminished Healthy Start program," but nurses would be unable to complete the 500 home visits or address the 3,000 in annual referrals as they did before, according to the Capital. If county or state funds are not made available for the program, it "would be catastrophic" for the health department, Phillips said, adding, "There is no fat. There is no ability to shave [that much money]."
The loss of funding for this program threatens to have a serious effect on the infant mortality rate in Anne Arundel County.
Today, the Medicine and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) in the United Kingdom has removed these medications from the shelves. Most of them will be allowed back on the shelves after the addition of a warning label saying that they should not be used on children under 2. From the article:
Sara Coakley, spokesperson for the MHRA, told BBC News it was a precautionary measure and the medicines are not dangerous.
"There's nothing wrong with these medicines, it was the way that they had been given," she said.
There was no need to panic, said Coakley, they would not be on the shelves in the first place if they were inherently dangerous.
The alert concerns 12 active ingredients: brompheniramine, chlorphenamine, dextromethorphan, diphenhydramine, ephedrine, guaifenesin, ipecacuanha, phenylephrine, pholcodine, pseudoephedrine, oxymetazoline, and xylometazoline.
According to Times Online, at least 5 deaths of children under the age of two and more than 100 cases of serious adverse events have been linked to cough and cold medicines in Britain.
The danger occurs when a child is given too much of the cough medicine or has more than one at the same time. Small children are more at risk of overdose because of their smaller body size, said the MHRA.
The MHRA is encouraging parents to give their children simple remedies like honey and lemon.
For more information, see the older discussions linked at the beginning of this post.
A smoking cessation program involving four computerized sessions is effective for teens, new research indicates. From the article:
Fritz studied 128 teenagers, 14-19 years old, divided in half for control and experimental groups. The experimental group completed four CASCP computer sessions as well as questionnaires and post-intervention testing. Not only did the experimental group report more quit attempts than the control group subjects, who did not participate in the computer sessions, but 23% of the teens actually quit smoking.
Researchers have suggested many possible causes for this, including the following:
-lack of pre-natal care
-lack of health insurance and health care generally
-physiological impact of the chronic stress of racism
This statistic is just one of many that indicates a highly disturbing healthcare apartheid for children in America.
From the article:
Her parents, Scott and Katey Taylor, lobbied for tougher regulations to help prevent similar injuries, and in December, Congress approved legislation in December to ban the manufacture, sale or distribution of drain covers that don't meet anti-entrapment safety standards.
The Taylors also brought suit against the golf club where the pool injury occurred and the pool equipment manufacturer, Sta-Rite Industries owned by Pentair.
