Call for ban on codeine - health

THE widely used painkiller codeine doesn't work in some people and can be fatal in others, so its use should be halted, say researchers at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, Canada.

Codeine works by being metabolised to morphine in the body, but the extent of that metabolism depends on a person's genetic make-up, so the amount of morphine produced varies.

In an editorial published in the Canadian Medical Association Journal this week, Stuart MacLeod and Noni MacDonald say the problem is especially relevant for infants, citing examples of two children who died after being given codeine following a tonsillectomy, and two studies that show non-fatal toxicity to infants being breastfed by mothers taking codeine.

The Hospital for Sick Children in Toronto, Canada, has stopped using codeine. The authors are calling for others to follow suit.

The UK Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency currently has no plans to stop codeine being sold over the counter. "As only 1 to 2 per cent of the population has an enhanced metabolism most patients could continue to take codeine," says Florence Palmer of the MHRA.

US Scientists ID key Ebola virus structure

Scripps Research Institute scientists say they've identified the structure of a key Ebola virus protein -- a major step that might help lead to a treatment.

The Ebola virus, although rare, is one of the deadliest viruses on Earth, killing 50 percent to 90 percent of those infected, scientists said.

There is currently no cure for Ebola hemorrhagic fever, no vaccine and no drug therapy. But the researchers said their finding of how a key component of the Ebola virus, called VP35, blocks the human immune system, allowing the virus uncontrolled replication, is an important advancement in understanding how the deadly virus works.

"After infection, the virus and immune system are in a race," said Associate Professor Erica Ollmann Saphire, who led the three-year study. "If the virus can hide its molecular signatures, it can suppress immune responses and replicate unchecked. This new understanding of the mechanism that Ebola virus uses to evade the immune system opens the door for developing drug therapies."

A signature of Ebola virus infection is its double-stranded RNA, which, when detected by immune system proteins, triggers a full immune response. The new research describes how the VP35 protein of the Ebola virus masks the double-stranded RNA to prevent the immune response.

The study is detailed in the early online edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Read More.....

Chimps can Transmit SIV to Humans (HIV)

The discovery that chimpanzees can develop an AIDS-like illness after infection with simian immunodeficiency virus (SIV), may have implications for future AIDS research and the prevention of HIV infection.

Until now, it was thought that SIV infection in chimps did not result in disease. However, after following 94 wild chimps in Gombe Stream National Park in Tanzania for nine years, Beatrice Hahn, of the University of Alabama at Birmingham, and colleagues have shown that SIVcpz, the virus that jumped from chimps to humans as HIV-1, can and does cause an AIDS-like illness.

Over the 9 years of the study, SIVcpz infection caused an increased risk of mortality. "Up to 41 per cent in adults and 100 per cent in infants, and lower birth rates," says Hahn, "but we need longer-term follow-up to determine what proportion of infected animals develop an AIDS-like illness."

Unique opportunity
Hahn suspects that compared to HIV-infected humans, a greater proportion of SIV-infected chimps do not go on to develop fatal disease. "But this is not simple to test because chimpanzees don't just walk into clinics and give you a blood sample."

However, Hahn hopes that future research into animals which have long-term infection without developing an AIDS-like illness will yield insights that will enable us to better tackle HIV infection.

Unique Opportunity
The team believes that these findings provide a unique opportunity to compare the disease-causing mechanisms of two closely related viruses – SIVcpz and HIV-1 – in two closely related species. Such work has also already yielded information on mortality rates, prevalence and routes of spread of HIV and SIV.