Featured series 
Tag: Health
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Nation & World
Harvard nutritionists take aim at sugary drinks
Comparing the nation’s obesity epidemic to a house on fire, Harvard nutrition experts took aim at sugar-sweetened beverages Monday (April 20), recommending the creation of a new, low-sugar alternative and urging adults and children alike to quench their thirsts the natural way — with water.
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Nation & World
‘What Just Happened? What’s Next?’
You might think of the little bits of good news that came out last week as the macroeconomic equivalent of the first crocuses of spring. There was the heartening word that initial jobless claims are slowing.
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Nation & World
Neglected diseases leave sufferers with few options
Nicholas De Torrente was at Harvard as part of Harvard Global Health Day 2009, sponsored by the Harvard College Global Health and AIDS Coalition and the International Relations on Campus student groups.
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Nation & World
Breast cancer danger rising in developing countries
Women in developing nations, once thought to have a small chance of contracting breast cancer, are increasingly getting the disease as lifestyles incorporate risk factors common in industrialized nations, panelists at the Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) said Tuesday (April 14).
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Nation & World
Mogae shifts stress to HIV prevention
An African leader whose anti-AIDS programs resulted in one of the continent’s few HIV success stories said Monday (April 13) that he is shifting his efforts from treatment toward prevention in hopes of creating an “HIV-free” generation.
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Nation & World
HMS’s Harlow receives award from melanoma foundation
The Melanoma Research Foundation (MRF) awarded its Established Investigator Grant to Edward E. Harlow, the Virginia and D.K. Ludwig Professor of Cancer Research and Teaching at Harvard Medical School (HMS), on Feb. 24.
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Nation & World
Congo: Just here suffering
Imani was just 15 when soldiers from the rebel group Interahamwe found her on the road in a remote region in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC).
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Nation & World
Saving lives, saving money
Seguro Popular, a Mexican health care program instituted in 2003, has already reduced crippling health care costs among poorer households, according to an evaluation conducted by researchers at Harvard University in collaboration with researchers in Mexico.
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Nation & World
International conference thinks about sustainable cities
What will the cities of the future look like? Harvard’s Graduate School of Design (GSD) offered some ideas last week at a three-day international conference, “Ecological Urbanism: Alternative and Sustainable Cities of the Future,” April 3-5.
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Nation & World
Study shows waist size predictor of heart failure in men and women
Adding to the growing evidence that a person’s waist size is an important indicator of heart health, a study led by investigators at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (BIDMC) has found that larger waist circumference is associated with increased risk of heart failure in middle-aged and older populations of men and women.
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Nation & World
Howard Koh tapped for assistant secretary for health
President Barack Obama announced March 25 his intent to nominate Howard Koh, the Harvey V. Fineberg Professor of the Practice of Public Health at Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH), to be assistant secretary for health in the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS).
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Nation & World
Blumenthal is national coordinator for health information technology
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) announced March 20 the selection of David Blumenthal as the Obama administration’s choice for national coordinator for health information technology.
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Nation & World
Study IDs human genes required for hepatitis C viral replicating
Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) researchers are investigating a new way to block reproduction of the hepatitis C virus (HCV) — targeting not the virus itself but the human genes the virus exploits in its life cycle. In the March 19 Cell Host & Microbe, they report finding nearly 100 genes that support the replication of…
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Nation & World
Training the talent in trouble spots
The Harvard Initiative for Global Health (HIGH) has begun a fellowship program with the aim of identifying and helping train bright young developing-world health professionals in remote regions of the world with the greatest global health challenges.
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Nation & World
Longwood goes smoke-free
The buildings of Harvard Medical School (HMS) at the Longwood campus are entirely smoke-free both inside and out, as of March 16. As part of HMS’s continued commitment to enhancing employees’ quality of life and the environment on campus, smoking is prohibited on all Harvard property in the Longwood Medical Area. This policy applies to…
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Nation & World
Flu continues, shots do too
With influenza activity in the Boston area continuing to increase, the Harvard community is reminded that free flu vaccines are still available to all Harvard faculty and staff through Harvard University Health Services (HUHS).
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Nation & World
Congressmen highlight challenges of mental illness, substance abuse
In 2008, 54 million Americans suffered with mental illness; 35,000 Americans committed suicide due to untreated depression; and 180,000 people died as a direct result of an untreated addiction. Congressmen Jim Ramstad (R-Minn.) and Patrick Kennedy (D-R.I.) spoke at the John F. Kennedy Jr. Forum Monday (March 2) on the truths and realities of mental…
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Nation & World
Runyon Foundation names fellows from Harvard
The Damon Runyon Cancer Research Foundation has named six Harvard affiliates among its 13 new fellows. The recipients of this prestigious, three-year award are outstanding postdoctoral scientists conducting basic and translational cancer research in the laboratories of leading senior investigators across the country.
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Nation & World
Capillary formation’s mechanical determinants
Harvard researchers have established a link between the growth of blood vessels and the mechanical stresses caused by the environment within which the vessels grow, a new understanding that researchers hope can lead to novel disease treatments based on manipulating blood flow to living tissues.
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Nation & World
Counteracting stress at work
Herbert Benson, associate professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School and director emeritus of the Benson-Henry Institute for Mind Body Medicine, will deliver a lecture, “Counteracting stress at Harvard: The relaxation response,” in which he will discuss the harmful effects of stress, lead the audience through his Relaxation Response strategy, and explain how stress can…
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Nation & World
Flu continues, shots do too
With influenza activity in the Boston area continuing to increase, the Harvard community is reminded that free flu vaccines are still available to all Harvard faculty and staff through Harvard University Health Services (HUHS). The flu shots will be given on the third floor of HUHS in Holyoke Center during regular weekly office hours. Similarly,…
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Nation & World
Patients untapped resource for improving care
As the United States transitions to a new administration, and as the health care crisis mounts, the debate about how to buttress primary care delivery with information technology is getting louder. While much of the attention — and controversy — is focused on how to better equip physicians, little focus appears to be aimed at…
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Nation & World
Low-income diabetic women at increased risk for postpartum depression
Researchers at Harvard Medical School (HMS) and the University of Minnesota have found that living just above the poverty line and having diabetes increases by 50 percent a woman’s chance of developing postpartum depression — a serious illness that affects about one in 10 new mothers.
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Nation & World
Calorie reduction key to weight loss, not food type
Many popular diets emphasize either carbohydrate, protein, or fat as the best way to lose weight. However, there have been few studies lasting more than a year that evaluate the effect on weight loss of diets with different compositions of those nutrients.
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Nation & World
Flu shots still available
Free flu vaccines are still available to all Harvard faculty and staff through Harvard University Health Services (HUHS). The flu shots will be given on the third floor of HUHS in Holyoke Center during regular weekly office hours. Similarly, faculty and staff may also receive flu shots at satellite HUHS offices at the Longwood Medical…
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Nation & World
Attendance grows at Dental School’s ‘free care day’
Despite historic increases in health insurance coverage in Massachusetts, fewer than 20 percent of the commonwealth’s dentists accept patients insured through public programs such as Medicaid. Although state-subsidized insurance programs include dental care, the insurance mandate does not require employers to cover dental care. Dental schools are considered affordable sites for treatment, but even reduced…
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Nation & World
Flu shots still available
Free flu vaccines are still available to all Harvard faculty and staff through Harvard University Health Services (HUHS).
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Nation & World
HSPH’s David Bloom chosen for global health research group
Renowned health economist and demographer David Bloom, chair of the Department of Global Health and Population at the Harvard School of Public Health and Clarence James Gamble Professor of Economics and Demography, has been selected to join a group of 25 ambassadors in the Paul G. Rogers Society for Global Health Research with Research!America.
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Nation & World
Art and science: Healing in harmony
What do Julie Andrews and Mozart have in common? And what links Hillary Clinton, Che Guevara, and Cameron Diaz? The former have absolute or perfect pitch; the latter are tone-deaf. How our brains differ to create these disparities was one of the subjects of “Crossing the Corpus Callosum,” a first-of-its-kind symposium held Jan. 10 at…
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Nation & World
Gene therapy demonstrates benefit in patients with rheumatoid arthritis
Researchers have reported the first clinical evidence that gene therapy reduces symptoms in patients with rheumatoid arthritis (RA), an important milestone for this promising treatment . Described in the February issue of the journal Human Gene Therapy, the findings stem from a study of two patients with severe rheumatoid arthritis conducted in Germany and led…