Chelation doesn't help kids with autism: study

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Removing heavy metals from the body through a process traditionally used to treat mercury and lead poisoning doesn't help relieve autism symptoms, a new analysis suggests.During chelation therapy, patients are given injections of a chemical that binds to heavy metals, lowering their concentration in the blood and ultimately allowing the metals to be excreted through urine.Chelation...

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Violence, fear & suspicion imperil Pakistan's war on polio

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan (Reuters) - Pakistani health worker Bushra Bibi spent eight years trekking to remote villages, carefully dripping polio vaccine into toddlers' pursed mouths to protect them from the crippling disease.Now the 35-year-old mother is too scared to go to work after masked men on motorbikes gunned down nine of her fellow health workers in a string of attacks this week."I have seen so...

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Link between pot, psychosis goes both ways in kids

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Marijuana (cannabis) use may be linked to the development of psychotic symptoms in teens - but the reverse could also be true: psychosis in adolescents may be linked to later pot use, according to a new Dutch study."We have focused mainly on temporal order; is it the chicken or the egg? As the study shows, it is a bidirectional relationship," wrote the study's lead author...

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Obesity declining in young, poorer kids: study

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - The number of low-income preschoolers who qualify as obese or "extremely obese" has dropped over the last decade, new data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention show.Although the decline was only "modest" and may not apply to all children, researchers said it was still encouraging."It's extremely important to make sure we're monitoring obesity in this low-income...

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Kids Lead Crowd-Funded Scientific Mission to Nicaragua: Science Education Is the Tide That Lifts All Boats

Enzo, Haley and Emma are ordinary kids working on an extraordinary mission. They are joining up with a team of Special Forces medics and elite, global surgeons to deliver medical aid to the Rama Indians of Nicaragua in the spring of 2013.In partnership with HumaniTV, the journey will be beamed to tens of thousands of kids around the globe by satellite as the three middle school students trek through...

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Boehner says Obama pushing U.S. toward "fiscal cliff"

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Republican House Speaker John Boehner accused President Barack Obama of pushing the country toward the "fiscal cliff" on Friday and of wasting another week without making progress in talks.With three weeks left before a combination of steep tax hikes and deep spending cuts kicks in unless Congress intervenes, Boehner said the administration had adopted a "my way or the highway"...

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Charleston, like many cities, on edge of "fiscal cliff"

CHARLESTON, South Carolina (Reuters) - For 37 years straight, Joseph P. Riley Jr. has sat behind the mayor's desk here, shaping this city and its budget.On a recent afternoon, Riley, 69, reached for a draft copy of next year's spending plan and wondered aloud about what might get cut should politicians in Washington fail to find an agreement this month, unleashing $600 billion worth of spending reductions...

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Surprise: New insurance fee in health overhaul law

WASHINGTON (AP) — Your medical plan is facing an unexpected expense, so you probably are, too. It's a new, $63-per-head fee to cushion the cost of covering people with pre-existing conditions under President Barack Obama's health care overhaul.The charge, buried in a recent regulation, works out to tens of millions of dollars for the largest companies, employers say. Most of that is likely to be...

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Study: Talk Therapy May Help Depression when Medications Inadequate

A first-of-its-kind large scale research study concluded that the addition of talk therapy to a medication regimen helps to relieve the symptoms of depression, the leading cause of disability in the United States in those ages 15 years to 44 years, according to the National Institute of Mental Health .Cognitive Behavioral Therapy as an Adjunct to Medication TreatmentOnly one-third of people with...

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More Than Half of Hispanic Coloradans Lack Dental Insurance

The organization Colorado Trust reported on Monday that the results of a new Colorado Health Access Survey shows that more than half of Hispanics in the state do not have dental insurance. The overall number of people in the state without dental insurance grew 17 percent in in two years. Here are the details.* The results of the 2011 Colorado Health Access Survey, released this month, show that 52.8...

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