The Health News USA December 21 2017
- A Tennessee woman gave birth to a baby who had been frozen as an embryo for more than twenty four years — the longest known frozen human embryo to come to birth. The National Embryo Donation Center (NEDC) announced Tuesday that Emma Wren was born on November 25 to Tina Gibson, who is 26. A press release stated that Gibson carried an embryo that was conceived about eighteen months after she herself was born. Baby Emma was cryopreserved in 1992 and placed in Tina’s uterus through “frozen embryo transfer” earlier this year.
- At least 56 cases of mumps have been reported in Florida in 2017, a significant rise over prior years but well below outbreaks in other states, which have reported hundreds of infections this year. In Florida, mumps cases have occurred across all ages, with the most infections reported in Broward, Collier, Duval, Hillsborough and Palm Beach counties, according to a Florida Department of Health advisory to physicians dated December 11.
- U.S. health officials on Tuesday approved the nation’s first gene therapy for an inherited disease, a treatment that improves the sight of patients with a rare form of blindness. It marks another major advance for the emerging field of genetic medicine. The approval for Spark Therapeutics offers a life-changing intervention for a small group of patients with a vision-destroying genetic mutation and hope for many more people with other inherited diseases. The injection, called Luxturna, is the first gene therapy approved by the FDA in which a corrective gene is given directly to patients.
News on Health Professional Radio. Today is the 21st of December 2017. Read by Tabetha Moreto.
A Tennessee woman gave birth to a baby who had been frozen as an embryo for more than twenty four years — the longest known frozen human embryo to come to birth. The National Embryo Donation Center or NEDC announced Tuesday that Emma Wren was born on November twenty five to Tina Gibson, who is twenty six. A press release stated that Gibson carried an embryo that was conceived about eighteen months after she herself was born. Baby Emma was cryopreserved in nineteen ninety two and placed in Tina’s uterus through “frozen embryo transfer” earlier this year.
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Doctor Jeffrey Kennan, NEDC’s director, said he hoped Emma’s story inspires others to donate their embryos to families in need. According to NEDC, nearly seven hundred pregnancies have been possible thanks to the center’s adoption program, which has received donated embryos from all over the U.S. NEDC Lab Director Carol Sommerfelt said “It is deeply moving and highly rewarding to see that embryos frozen twenty four point five years ago using the old, early cryopreservation techniques of slow freezing on day one of development at the pronuclear stage can result in 100 percent survival of the embryos with a one hundred percent continued proper development to the Day-three embryo stage.” Emma weighed six pounds, eight ounces and was about twenty inches long at birth.
http://www.miamiherald.com/news/health-care/article190625819.html
At least fifty six cases of mumps have been reported in Florida in two thousand seventeen, a significant rise over prior years but well below outbreaks in other states, which have reported hundreds of infections this year. In Florida, mumps cases have occurred across all ages, with the most infections reported in Broward, Collier, Duval, Hillsborough and Palm Beach counties, according to a Florida Department of Health advisory to physicians dated December eleven.
The two thousand seventeen count includes confirmed and probable cases, said Brad Dalton, a health department spokesman. Dalton said the health department publishes a monthly surveillance report for mumps and other diseases, though the most current report is for November and counts fifty four cases.
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Florida’s surveillance report notes that mumps cases have been high since April, with a monthly peak of twenty cases reported in August. That trend follows a national pattern for mumps, which has skyrocketed in two thousand sixteen and two thousand seventeen compared to prior years, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Outbreaks have been reported among people in close settings, such as people playing on the same sports team or living in a dormitory with someone who has mumps.
Federal health officials estimate that about five thousand people have had mumps this year, with the highest numbers reported in Arkansas, Missouri, New York, Texas and Washington state. In two thousand sixteen, more than six thousand cases of mumps were reported.
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The CDC says that high vaccination rates for mumps help limit outbreaks, but even those who are vaccinated can still get the virus. The agency recommends children get two doses of MMR vaccine, which provides eighty eight percent protection against mumps.
http://abcnews.go.com/Health/wireStory/gene-therapy-rare-form-blindness-wins-us-approval-51884772
U.S. health officials on Tuesday approved the nation’s first gene therapy for an inherited disease, a treatment that improves the sight of patients with a rare form of blindness. It marks another major advance for the emerging field of genetic medicine. The approval for Spark Therapeutics offers a life-changing intervention for a small group of patients with a vision-destroying genetic mutation and hope for many more people with other inherited diseases. The drug maker said it will not disclose the price until next month, delaying debate about the affordability of a treatment that analysts predict will be priced around one million dollars. The injection, called Luxturna, is the first gene therapy approved by the Food and Drug Administration in which a corrective gene is given directly to patients. The gene mutation interferes with the production of an enzyme needed for normal vision.
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Patients with the condition generally start losing their sight before eighteen, almost always progressing to total blindness. The defective gene that causes the disease can be passed down for generations undetected before suddenly appearing when a child inherits a copy from both parents. Only a few thousand people in the U.S. are thought to have the condition. Luxturna is delivered via two injections — one for each eye — that replace the defective gene that prevents the retina, tissue at the back of the eye, from converting light into electronic signals sent to the brain.
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The Philadelphia-based Spark Therapeutics said it will announce its price in early January, but suggested its own analysis put the value of the therapy in the one-million-dollar range.
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