A new study shows that the microbial communities we carry in and on our bodies—known as the human microbiome—have the potential to uniquely identify individuals, much like a fingerprint.
Most Europeans who have tried electronic cigarettes (e-cigarettes) are young, current smokers, or those who recently tried quitting regular cigarettes, according to a new study from Harvard School of Public Health. Nearly 30 million Europeans have tried the battery-operated cigarettes, in spite of the fact that not much is known about their potential risks to health or whether they help smokers trying to quit.
Boston, MA — A new poll by The Boston Globe and Harvard School of Public Health finds, eight years into the state’s universal health insurance legislation enacted in 2006, 63% of Massachusetts residents support the law and 18% oppose it, while 7% are not sure, and 12% have not heard or read about the law. The percentage of residents supporting the law remains unchanged since a 2011 Boston Globe/HSPH poll. Support for the law varies by party affiliation.
Boston, MA – Researchers have found the first evidence of an intercellular bacterial infection in natural populations of two species of Anopheles mosquitoes, the major vectors of malaria in Africa. The infection, called Wolbachia, has been shown in labs to reduce the incidence of pathogen infections in mosquitoes and has the potential to be used in controlling malaria-transmitting mosquito populations.
Two widely used neonicotinoids—a class of insecticide—appear to harm honey bee colonies over the winter, particularly during colder winters, according to Harvard School of Public Health researchers. The new study replicated a 2012 finding from the same research group that found a link between imidacloprid and Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD), in which bees abandon their hives over the winter and eventually die. The new study also found that a second neonicotinoid, clothianidin, had the same negative effect.
At the elevated levels of atmospheric CO2 anticipated by around 2050, crops that provide a large share of the global population with most of their dietary zinc and iron will have significantly reduced concentrations of those nutrients, according to a new study led by Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH). Given that an estimated two billion people suffer from zinc and iron deficiencies, resulting in a loss of 63 million life years annually from malnutrition, the reduction in these nutrients represents the most significant health threat ever shown to be associated with climate change.
Boston, MA — In the first four years after Massachusetts instituted comprehensive health reform in 2006, mortality in the state decreased by 2.9% compared with similar populations in states that didn’t expand health coverage, according to a study led by Harvard School of Public Health. The researchers estimated Massachusetts’ health reform law has prevented about 320 deaths per year—one life saved for each 830 people gaining insurance.
Boston—People who increased the amount of coffee they drank each day by more than one cup over a four-year period had a 11% lower risk for type 2 diabetes than those who made no changes to their coffee consumption, according to a new study led by Harvard School of Public Health researchers. The study also found those who decreased their coffee consumption by more than a cup per day increased their type 2 diabetes risk by 17%.
Boston, MA—The most “feminine” girls and “masculine” boys are more likely than their peers to engage in behaviors that pose cancer risks, according to a new study led by Harvard School of Public Health researchers.
Scientists at the Center for Nanotechnology and Nanotoxicology at Harvard School of Public Health have discovered a way to measure the effective density of engineered nanoparticles in physiological fluids, making it possible to determine the amount of nanomaterials that come into contact with cells and tissue in culture.
A study of child growth patterns in 36 developing countries finds economic growth has little to no effect on the nutritional status of the world’s poorest children. The study was by researchers at Harvard School of Public Health, University of Göttingen, ETH Zürich, and Indian Institute of Technology Gandhinagar.
A large international consortium of researchers has produced the first comprehensive, detailed map of the way genes work across the major cells and tissues of the human body.
People with a genetic predisposition to obesity are at a higher risk of obesity and related chronic diseases from eating fried foods than those with a lower genetic risk, according to a new study from researchers from Harvard School of Public Health, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, and Harvard Medical School.
The rapidly emerging diabetes epidemic in Asia has the potential to overwhelm health systems, undermine economic growth, and inflict unprecedented levels of disability on the world’s most populous continent. Researchers at Harvard School of Public Health and Saw Swee Hock School of Public Health at the National University of Singapore are launching a new website—the Asian Diabetes Prevention Initiative (www.asiandiabetesprevention.org)—to provide Asian countries with science-based information to help stop the spread of type 2 diabetes.
Boston--A new prostate cancer study by researchers from Uppsala University Hospital, Sweden, Harvard School of Public Health, and colleagues finds a substantial reduction in mortality for men under age 65 with localized cancer who undergo a radical prostatectomy.
Boston, MA -- New federal standards launched in 2012 that require schools to offer healthier meals have led to increased fruit and vegetable consumption, according to a new study from Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) researchers.
AIDS continues to be a staggering global public health problem. However, little is known about the long-term costs associated with providing drugs to AIDS patients in developing countries. To study those long-term cost trends, researchers from the Harvard School of Public Health have performed the first detailed analysis of AIDS drug cost trends in Brazil.
Barry R. Bloom, PhD, Dean of the Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH), will receive today an Honorary Doctorate from Erasmus University Rotterdam in the Netherlands.
Through an international collaboration, more than 200 medical and scientific journals are publishing theme issues this week on the relationship between poverty and human development. The initiative, coordinated by the Council of Science Editors, includes presentations on seven of the journal articles which will be webcast live from the National Institutes of Health on Monday, October 22, 2007.
Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg of New York City has been named the 2007 recipient of the Julius B. Richmond Award, the highest honor given by Harvard School of Public Health. With a series of bold initiatives that recognize public health as a core municipal responsibility and opportunity, Mayor Bloomberg has demonstrated extraordinary leadership in protecting and promoting health.
Growing recognition of the importance of health as a contributing factor to economic development and societal change has prompted the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) to add a new subsection in Sustainable Health to its existing section on Sustainable Development.
Researchers at the Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) and the University of Bristol have examined the extent to which income inequality is predictive of the double burden of overnourishment and undernourishment in India. They found that people living in Indian states with high levels of income inequality experienced a greater risk of both under- and overnutrition, even after adjusting for various demographic, economic, and behavioral variables.
Researchers at the Harvard School of Public Health set out to determine if an obesity prevention program called 5-2-1-Go! could reduce the risk of eating disorder symptoms and harmful weight-control behaviors in adolescents. The study showed that almost 4% of middle-school girls receiving only their regular health education began vomiting or abusing laxatives or diet pills, but just 1% of the girls in the 5-2-1-Go! program did so.
A study by Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) researchers of girls and women who were sex-trafficked from Nepal to India and then repatriated has found that 38 percent were HIV positive. The infection rate exceeded 60 percent among girls forced into prostitution prior to age 15 years. One in seven of the study's participants had been trafficked into sexual servitude prior to this young age.
According to a new survey of people in high-risk hurricane areas conducted by the Harvard School of Public Health Project on the Public and Biological Security, one-third (31%) of residents said if government officials said they had to evacuate due to a major hurricane this season, they would not leave. This is an increase from 2006 when 23% said they would not evacuate.
A new study from the Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) shows that patients who go to hospitals ranked higher according to specific quality measures have a lower chance of dying than patients treated at lower-ranked hospitals.
In a new, large-scale, prospective study exploring the link between levels of urate in the blood and risk of Parkinson's disease, researchers from the Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) have found that high levels of urate are strongly associated with a reduced risk of the disease.
Blocking a single protein with an experimental drug prevented and treated both type 2 diabetes and atherosclerosis in laboratory mice that had been fed unhealthy diets and were genetically predisposed to these common killers, according to a team led by Gökhan Hotamisligil at Harvard School of Public Health.
The link between environmental exposures and asthma has been clearly described, but a new study from researchers at the Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) finds a strong association between domestic violence and asthma. The study, in the International Journal of Epidemiology, raises questions about the role of stress in the development of this common respiratory condition.
In a new study, researchers from the Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) analyzed the costs and health outcomes of control and eradication options. They found that the relatively high short-term costs of global polio eradication will ultimately be much lower than the long-term financial and human health costs required to control polio forever.
In the New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM), Harvard School of Public Health researchers describe the growing momentum for indoor smoking bans across the globe. They identify Ireland's pioneering 2004 comprehensive indoor smoking ban as a likely tipping point for fundamental change in social norms and public health worldwide. A map of smoke-free countries is included.
In the first nationally representative study to examine the relationship between survey measures of household firearm ownership and state level rates of suicide in the U.S., researchers at the Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) found that suicide rates among children, women and men of all ages are higher in states where more households have guns. The study appears in the April 2007 issue of The Journal of Trauma.
In a new study, the largest to date, researchers from the Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) and Muhimbili University College of Health Sciences in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, found that giving daily multivitamin supplements to HIV-negative women during pregnancy significantly reduced the risks of low birth weight and a small- for-gestational age birth size.
Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) today is releasing materials presented to the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) in a scientific briefing requested by the MPAA last February 23, 2007 in Hollywood on the health impact of youth smoking and the behavioral influence of films that depict tobacco use.
A new study from the Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) provides the strongest association to date between trans fat and heart disease. It found that women in the U.S. with the highest levels of trans fat in their blood had three times the risk of CHD as those with the lowest levels.
In a new, large-scale study, researchers examined the link between CHD deaths and firefighting and looked at specific job duties to see which might increase the risk of dying from a coronary event. The landmark study provides the strongest link to date between CHD and emergency firefighting duties. It found that putting out fires was associated with a risk about 10 to 100 times greater than the risk of dying from non-emergency duties.
A new analysis by researchers at the Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) and Brigham and Women's Hospital (BWH) of laws and regulations governing public disclosure of clinical trial data submitted to the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) suggests changes should be made to the way the FDA implements its policy regarding the confidentiality of those data.
In a new large, prospective study, researchers found that midday napping (siestas) reduced coronary mortality by about one third among men and women.
A new report from the Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) that scores the living conditions experienced by children in the 100 largest U.S. metropolitan areas reveals a consistently bleak picture for black and Hispanic children compared to white and Asian children and suggests approaches to address some of the factors behind whether or not a child thrives.
A new study by researchers at the Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) finds that polio vaccination in the United States has resulted in a net savings of over $180 billion, even without including the large, intangible benefits associated with avoided fear and suffering.
A reanalysis of nicotine yield from major brand name cigarettes sold in MA from 1997 to 2005 confirms that manufacturers increased the levels of this addictive agent in cigarettes. Increases in smoke nicotine yield per cigarette averaged 1.6% each year, or about 11% over a 7-year period (1998-2005).
In a new study, researchers at the Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) and Dana-Farber Cancer Institute found that periodontal disease was associated with an increased risk of cancer of the pancreas.
Researchers from the Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) found consistent evidence that smoking is associated with an increased risk of TB; they also found that passive smoking (secondhand smoke) and the burning of biomass fuels was associated with an increased TB risk.
In the first nationally representative study to examine the relationship between survey measures of household firearm ownership and state level rates of homicide, the Harvard Injury Control Research Center found that homicide rates are higher in states where more households have guns.
The longer Black Caribbean immigrants stay in the U.S., the poorer their mental health becomes. That's one finding from a new study that examined the prevalence of psychiatric disorders among Black individuals in the U.S.
Researchers at the Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH), Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and Dutch research institute TNO Quality of Life and Wageningen University, the Netherlands, found that, among hypertensive men, moderate alcohol consumption was associated with a decreased risk of fatal and non-fatal heart attack.
A team of researchers from Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) and the University of Queensland in Australia have re-analyzed data from 27 countries around the world to estimate both the global mortality patterns of the 1918 pandemic and, based on 2004 population data, how a similar pandemic would affect the world today.
In the first large-scale, prospective study to investigate the relationship between vitamin D levels and MS, researchers at the Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) have found an association between higher levels of vitamin D in the body and a lower risk of MS.
Researchers from the Harvard School of Public Health and the Mount Sinai School of Medicine found that 202 industrial chemicals have the capacity to damage the human brain, and they conclude that chemical pollution may have harmed the brains of millions of children worldwide. The authors conclude further that the toxic effects of industrial chemicals on children have generally been overlooked.
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