Eideard

Researchers describe the first successful use of a human patient’s cloned infection-fighting T cells as the sole therapy to put an advanced solid-tumor cancer into long-term remission. A team led by Cassian Yee, M.D., reports these findings in the New England Journal of Medicine.

Yee and colleagues removed CD4+ T cells, a type of white blood cell, from a 52-year-old man whose Stage 4 melanoma had spread to a groin lymph node and to a lung. T cells specific to targeting the melanoma were then expanded vastly in the laboratory using modifications to existing methods. The lab-grown cells were then infused into the patient with no additional pre- or post-conditioning therapies, such as growth-factor or cytokine treatment. Two months later, PET and CT scans revealed no tumors. The patient remained disease free two years later, when he was last checked…

Yee cautioned that these results, presented in the journal’s “Brief Report” section, represent only one patient with a specific type of immune system whose tumor cells expressed a specific antigen. More studies are needed to confirm the effectiveness of the experimental T-cell therapy. If proven successful in more patients, Yee predicted this therapy could be used for the 25 percent of all late-stage melanoma patients who have the same immune-system type and tumor antigen.

Cripes! Even if a very specific set of circumstances are required, this could be the beginning of a dynamic new mode of treatment for cancers.

A man whose teething infant died after apparently sucking on his father’s cocaine-tainted fingers has been sentenced to life in prison.

Dennis Ray Driver, 26, was convicted Wednesday of felony murder for the overdose death of his 8-month-old son…

Driver had told investigators that he had chopped up cocaine and the baby later sucked on his fingers.

Driver had at least eight previous convictions, including six that were related to cocaine. The Houston Chronicle reported Wednesday in its online edition that when the baby died, Driver was free on bail on a cocaine possession charge.

That’s a really successful rehab program for drug offenders in Houston. Eh?

Hospital authorities in India have ordered an independent inquiry after a baby was declared dead, only to make an apparently miraculous return to life.

The baby girl – born in the city of Mumbai (Bombay) – was diagnosed as stillborn on Monday night. But she astonished her distraught family by gurgling as they took her off to the cemetery the next day.

Hospital authorities say they are now investigating possible negligence by staff who attended the birth.

Medical experts say the most likely explanation for what happened is that drugs given to the mother suppressed the baby’s heart beat – which would have grown stronger once the effects of the drugs wore off.

Might give a real kick to medical tourism, too. Eh?

Could injecting a gene into a patient with severe heart failure reverse their disabling and life-threatening condition? Physician-scientists are setting out to answer that question in a first-ever clinical trial of gene therapy to treat severe heart failure.

NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital/Columbia University Medical Center is the only center in the New York City area where the therapy is currently available.

Patients enrolled in the trial…will undergo a minimally invasive cardiac catheterization procedure that will introduce a specially engineered gene that stimulates production of an enzyme necessary for the heart to pump more efficiently.

This is the first human trial of this technique.

Bravo. No surprise seeing the “Pres” taking the lead in this test.

A powerful Hindu-nationalist political party in western India has called for Hindu suicide squads to counter Islamic terrorism, causing outrage and embarrassing the national opposition with which it is allied.

“Islamic terrorism is on the rise in India and in order to counter Islamic terrorism, we should match it with Hindu terrorism,” the unsigned editorial said in Marathi.

“Just like Islamic extremism, to safeguard the country and Hindus we must create Hindu suicide squads if Hindu society is to be saved…”

The editorial, titled “The dud bombs of Hindus! Why embarrass us?”, was prompted partly by two low-intensity bombs that were planted in theatres in northern suburbs of Mumbai earlier this month. One exploded and injured a handful of people, the other was defused by police…

The Saamana editorial called the bombs “ridiculous and stupid” because they succeeded only in hurting a few people who were Hindus, and had no impact against Islamic extremism.

Theocrats and anarchists share the same demented and counter-productive ideology. So-called direct action against a civilian population is an admission of political weakness and failure.

GLADSTONE, Oregon: A 16-year-old boy who, along with his parents, believed in faith healing has died as a result of an inflammation in his urinary system that is treatable.

The boy, identified by authorities as Neil Beagley, was suffering from an inflammation in a tube leading from his bladder – the urethra – that made him unable to urinate, according to Dr. Clifford Nelson, a deputy state medical examiner.

Beagley filled up with urine, and that eventually ruined his bladder and kidneys and resulted in heart failure, said Nelson, who called it “an absolutely horrible way to die.”

Police said relatives and church members told them the teenager refused treatment for the illness, as he was entitled to do under Oregon law. State law allows minors 14 and older to make such decisions.

Ain’t nothing like being One of the Chosen.

Thanks, K B

Maybe they should try a few of these?

Drivers caught speeding in this north Atlanta suburb soon will have to pay an extra $12 to cover $4-a-gallon gas costs for the police officers who stop them.

The Holly Springs City Council passed the fee hike, effective July 1, to offset fuel prices that have eaten up nearly 60% of the police department’s 2008 fuel budget, Police Chief Ken Ball says…

Ball says he was seeking ways to maintain patrols despite record high gas prices. “I was hearing that Delta (Air Lines), pizza deliverers, florists were adding fuel charges to their services, and I thought, why not police departments…?”

I really like the quote from the mayor: “This is a self-taxing system. If you don’t break the law, you don’t pay the tax.”

Thanks, Mister Justin