Health Highlights: Oct. 21, 2009

Here are some of the latest health and medical news developments, compiled by editors of HealthDay:

CDC Panel Recommends HPV Vaccine Cervarix

An advisory panel to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Wednesday recommended the cervical cancer vaccine Cervarix for use in girls and women.

If approved for widespread use, the vaccine, made by GlaxoSmithKline PLC, would join Merck & Co.'s Gardasil, which gained approval in 2006, Dow Jones Newswires reported. The CDC currently recommends that Gardasil be offered to girls 11 and 12 years old, since the vaccine is most effective before the onset of sexual activity.

Cervarix gained approval last week from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, which recommended the shot for females ages 10 to 26. Both Cervarix and Gardasil protect against strains 16 and 18 of the human papilloma virus (HPV), thought to be the cause of nearly 70 percent of all cervical cancers.

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Check Commercial Drivers, Ship Pilots for Sleep Apnea: NTSB

Commercial truck and bus drivers and merchant ship pilots need to be screened for sleep apnea, the U.S. National Transportation Safety Board says in letter sent to the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration and the Coast Guard.

The NTSB said medical examiners should be required to ask commercial drivers and ship pilots about sleep apnea and develop programs to identify the disorder, which involves disruptions of breathing during sleep, the Associated Press reported.

Earlier this year, the agency made similar recommendations for airline pilots and train operators.

The letters cited a number of incidents in which sleep apnea was believed to play a role in fatal incidents, including a 2008 bus crash in Utah that killed nine and injured 43, and a 2001 train crash in Michigan that killed two crew members, the AP reported.

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Most Owners Would Perform CPR on Pets: Survey

A new survey finds that 63 percent of dog owners and 53 percent of cat owners in the United States would be at least somewhat likely to attempt CPR on their pet in a medical emergency.

Women were much more likely than men (65 percent vs. 50 percent) to say they'd perform CPR on their pets, according to the Associated Press-Petside.com poll of 1,166 pet owners.

Among the other findings:

• Only 20 percent of pet owners have a pet first-aid kit in the home and 54 percent don't have a fire evacuation plan for their pets.
• About 41 percent of respondents said they'd had at least one situation that required an emergency trip to the vet and 11 percent have had a pet hit by a car.
• Seven percent said their pets have eaten something poisonous and 16 percent said their pets have had suffered allergic reactions.
• One-third of cat owners and 62 percent of dog owners said they let their pets ride in their cars unrestrained, instead of in a special pet carrier, while 11 percent of respondents said they leave their pets unattended in a vehicle.

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Samsung Fined for Laptop Pesticide Claims: EPA

Samsung has been fined $205,000 for claiming that its netbook and notebook computer laptop keyboards had antimicrobial properties that inhibited germs and bacteria, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency said Wednesday.

The EPA said Samsung's labels and promotional material for the laptops would render the products pesticides that require registration with the agency. The company was found to be in violation of the federal pesticide law.

"Pesticides can be beneficial in killing off harmful bacteria, but they can also be dangerous if they don't work as claimed," George Pavlou, EPA acting regional administrator, said in a news release. "Members of the public think their health is being protected when it actually is not. Making sure that public health claims are true is part of the reason EPA governs the use of pesticides, and it is absolutely essential that those using pesticides register with EPA so that the agency can ensure the safety of all involved."

Along with paying the fine, Samsung will remove all pesticide-related claims made about the laptops. The company has notified retailers and distributors to remove such claims from labels, promotional brochures and Internet content, the EPA said.

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FDA Cracks Down on Misleading Food Labels

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration announced Tuesday that it plans to put an end to food labeling it believes makes consumers think foods have more nutritional value than they do.

The agency will target the front panels of packages bearing logos or language suggesting that the product is healthier than the actual ingredients indicate, FDA Commissioner Margaret Hamburg said in a news conference Tuesday afternoon, the Chicago Tribune reported.

"There's a growing proliferation" of symbols that suggest healthfulness and "some nutritionists have questioned whether this information is more marketing-oriented than health-oriented. Judging from some of the labels we've seen, this is a valid concern," Hamburg said.

The front of packages often catch consumers' eyes, while shoppers are less likely to read the nutritional information boxes on the side or back of packages, Hamburg explained.

While not naming specific products, she said some that are labeled with the "check mark" logo under the industry-supported "Smart Choices" food rating program "are almost 50 percent sugar."

Smart Choices has emerged as a lightning rod among some nutritionists, who say its ratings are too lax, the Tribune reported. The program is under investigation by the Connecticut attorney general for its labeling practices.

Mike Hughes, chairman of the Smart Choices program, said it's unfair to focus on one ingredient in a single product. "I think you should look at the whole product and what it delivers," he said.

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Sperm Donor Passed Heart Defect to Children

A potentially fatal genetic heart condition was passed from a U.S. sperm donor to nine of his 24 offspring, one of whom died of heart failure at age 2, according to a report in the Journal of the American Medical Association.

The report also said that two of the children, now teenagers, have developed symptoms and are at risk for sudden cardiac death. The man had no symptoms of genetic heart disease and no obvious family history when he donated his sperm, the Associated Press reported.

The case -- the second documented instance of a sperm donor passing a genetic condition to his offspring -- illustrates the need to thoroughly screen sperm donors, said the authors of the report and an accompanying editorial.

The San Francisco sperm bank involved in this case now requires all donors to undergo electrocardiogram tests to detect those with genetic heart problems. The study authors said all other sperm banks should do the same, the AP reported.

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U.S. Med School Enrollment Up Again: Report

For the 11th consecutive year, enrollment is up at U.S. medical schools, says an Association of American Medical Colleges report.

First-year enrollment this year was nearly 18,400 students, two percent higher than in 2008. The number of applicants remained at about 42,000. The association also said that four new medical colleges opened this year and several others expanded class size to meet the nation's growing need for physicians, the Associated Press reported.

There was a slight increase in the number of black and Asian first-year medical students, while the number of Hispanic enrollees remained about the same. About 70 percent of first-year students are white.

More residency training positions are needed to accommodate the growing number of medical school students, said the association's president, the AP reported.

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White Wine Erodes Tooth Enamel: Study

White wines can be bad for your teeth because their high acidity erodes tooth enamel far more than red wine, say German researchers.

They soaked adult teeth in white wine for a day and found the enamel surface lost the minerals calcium and phosphorus to depths of 60 micrometers -- a significant amount. Riesling wines, which have the lowest pH, had the greatest impact on tooth enamel, BBC News reported.

If you're a regular drinker of white wine, brushing your teeth after drinking does little good because years of constant exposure still takes a toll on teeth, said the researchers at Johannes Gutenberg University. However, eating cheese may help protect your teeth, the scientists said.

The study was published in the journal Nutrition Research.