Health News Roundup: Additional dose of measles vaccine; vaping around kids

Amid U.S. measles outbreak, who needs an additional dose of the vaccine?

The United States is in the midst of its largest measles outbreak in 25 years, with the disease mainly hitting people who have failed to receive the recommended two doses of the live measles vaccine. While the vast majority of measles patients are unvaccinated children, up to 10 per cent of patients in the current outbreak are adults who received at least one dose of the measles-mumps-rubella vaccine.

U.S. doctors use medical records to fight measles outbreak

U.S. doctors are tapping into their electronic medical records to identify unvaccinated patients and potentially infected individuals to help contain the worst U.S. measles outbreak in 25 years. New York's NYU Langone Health network of hospitals and medical offices treats patients from both Rockland County and Brooklyn, two epicentres of the outbreak. It has built alerts into its electronic medical records system to notify doctors and nurses that a patient lives in an outbreak area, based on their Zip code.

Trans teens face higher sexual assault risk when schools restrict bathrooms

Transgender adolescents may be less likely to be sexually assaulted when they can use school bathrooms and locker rooms that match their gender identity rather than their sex assigned at birth, a U.S. survey suggests. The survey of 3,673 trans and nonbinary teens in American middle schools and high schools found that more than one in four reported being sexually assaulted in the previous 12 months.

Pfizer gets U.S. approval for $225,000 a year heart drug

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration on Monday approved Pfizer Inc's oral drug, tafamidis, to treat a rare and fatal heart disease called transthyretin amyloid cardiomyopathy, the U.S drugmaker said. Pfizer, which has touted tafamidis as a potential blockbuster product, set a list price of $225,000 a year for the medicine, which would be sold under the brand name Vyndaqel. It is the first approved medicine for the disease in the United States.

GW Pharma's epilepsy drug meets main goal in a late-stage trial

GW Pharmaceuticals Plc said on Monday its drug Epidiolex was successful in treating seizures in patients with a rare form of childhood epilepsy called tuberous sclerosis complex during a late-stage trial. In June, the drug became the first cannabis-based medicine to be approved in the United States after regulators permitted the treatment for two other forms of childhood epilepsy.

U.S. reports 60 new measles cases in worst outbreak since 1994

The most widespread U.S. measles outbreak in a quarter-century has infected 60 new patients in the last week, raising the total number of confirmed cases to 764, federal health officials said on Monday. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported an 8.5 per cent increase in the number of measles cases since April 26, also confirming that the worst outbreak of the measles in the United States since 1994 has now reached 23 states.

FDA grants Jacobus Pharma approval for rare disease drug

Jacobus Pharmaceutical Co Inc on Monday won U.S. approval for the first drug to treat children with Lambert-Eaton myasthenic syndrome, a rare autoimmune disorder. The drug, Ruzurgi, was approved for use in patients aged between 6 and 17, the FDA said.

Parents vape around kids, even kids with asthma

American adults are more likely to use e-cigarettes when they have children at home, especially when kids have asthma, a U.S. study suggests. Nationwide, 4.4 per cent of adults reported current e-cigarette use in 2016 and 2017, the study found. The proportion was higher - 4.9 per cent - among adults with kids, and higher still - 5.6 per cent - among adults who lived with a child with asthma.

U.S. government website for comparing doctors lacks data on most MDs

Physician Compare, a U.S. website created to help patients find high-quality doctors, is missing so much information on individual providers that it may not be helpful, a new study suggests. Quality reporting has been a work in progress for almost three decades since a landmark 1999 report from the Institute of Medicine, `To Err is Human,' concluded that tens of thousands of patients deaths each year were the direct result of medical errors.

High levels of sunscreen ingredients end up in the bloodstream: study

The active ingredients of commonly-used sunscreens end up in the bloodstream at much higher levels than current U.S. guidelines from health regulators and warrant further safety studies, according to a small study conducted by U.S. Food and Drug Administration researchers and published on Monday. The over-the-counter products originally marketed to prevent sunburn with little regulation are widely used to block radiation from the sun that can cause skin cancer, the most common malignancy in the United States.

(With inputs from agencies.)