Author Archives: Science Media Centre
expert reaction to announcement about AstraZeneca’s UK operations
AstraZeneca announced a major restructuring with a substantial impact on its operations in the UK, including both job losses and investment for building new headquarters in Cambridge. read more
expert reaction to EU vote not to suspend use of neonicotinoids
Countries in the EU abstained from voting on a proposed two-year ban of neonicotinoids, a class of pesticides that some blame for falling bee populations, causing the ban to fail. read more
HRT and breast cancer
A study in the Journal of Family Planning and Reproductive Health Care found there was no clear evidence in the data it examined of a causal link between the decline in the use of hormone replacement therapy (HRT) and a reported fall in the numbers of new cases of breast cancer. read more
expert reaction to HRT and breast cancer
A study in the Journal of Family Planning and Reproductive Health Care found there was no clear evidence in the data it examined of a causal link between the decline in the use of hormone replacement therapy (HRT) and a reported fall in the numbers of new cases of breast cancer. read more
violent offending and the military
There has been a lot of media coverage and public debate about violence committed by veterans of the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan. A paper in the Lancet is the first large-scale study of its kind. It links data from 13,856 randomly selected serving and ex-serving UK military personnel with national criminal records to assess the impact of deployment, combat exposure, and post-deployment mental health problems on subsequent offending behaviour. read more
expert reaction to nightshift work and risk of ovarian cancer
Research published in Occupational and Environmental Medicine showed a potential link between working night shifts and risk of developing ovarian cancer, with the risk lower for night types (“owls”) than for morning types (“larks”). read more
expert reaction to new results about Higgs-like particle discovered at CERN
The ATLAS and CMS collaborations at CERN’s Large Hadron Collider (LHC) presented preliminary results that indicate the particle discovered last year behaves like a Higgs boson, the particle linked to the mechanism that gives mass to elementary particles. read more
expert reaction to Guillain-Barré syndrome and H1N1 vaccine
A meta-analysis of safety data gathered in the US during the 2009 H1N1 swine flu vaccination programme, and published in the Lancet, found the vaccination was associated with a small risk of Guillain-Barré syndrome, a disorder of the nervous system which can result in paralysis. read more
expert reaction to new report from the Chief Medical Officer on infectious disease and antimicrobial resistance
A report from the Chief Medical Officer, Prof Dame Sally Davies, warned of the dangers of antibiotic resistance, calling for a global initiative to tackle the problem. read more
expert reaction to EPIC study into health effects of eating processed meat
A study of half a million men and women in BMC Medicine suggested an association between processed meat and cardiovascular disease and cancer, after having controlled for various factors associated with ill health. read more
deer culling
There are more deer in the UK than at any time since the ice age. In the absence of natural predators deer populations are continuing to expand, threatening biodiversity and causing road traffic accidents and crop damage. read more
insomnia and heart failure
A study in the European Heart Journal followed 54,279 people for an average of over 11 years, and found that those who suffered from from insomnia had an increased risk of developing heart failure. read more
expert reaction to insomnia and heart failure
A study in the European Heart Journal followed 54,279 people for an average of over 11 years, and found that those who suffered from from insomnia had an increased risk of developing heart failure. read more
expert reaction to baby successfully treated for HIV
Virologist Dr Deborah Persaud presented evidence that a baby girl in the US appeared to have been cured of HIV, after very early treatment with standard drug therapy, at the Conference on Retroviruses and Opportunistic Infections in Atlanta. read more
expert reaction to the WHO Fukushima health risk report
The World Health Organisation (WHO) released a report on health risks associated with the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant (NPP) disaster in Japan, concluding that for the general population the predicted risks are low but estimated risk for specific cancers in certain subsets of the population in Fukushima Prefecture has increased. read more
expert reaction to new study into brain-brain information sharing in rats
Results showing a brain-to-brain interface that allows the direct transfer of information between the brains of two rats were published in Scientific Reports. read more
expert reaction to new research into the relationship between sugar and diabetes
The results of a large epidemiological study published in PLOS ONE, which examined data on sugar availability and diabetes rates from 175 countries over the past decade, suggested sugar could be linked to diabetes independently of obesity read more
new research into the relationship between sugar and diabetes
The results of a large epidemiological study published in PLOS ONE, which examined data on sugar availability and diabetes rates from 175 countries over the past decade, suggested sugar could be linked to diabetes independently of obesity. read more
expert reaction to link between narcolepsy in children and swine flu vaccine
A study published in the BMJ found an increased risk of narcolepsy in children and adolescents who received the Pandemrix influenza vaccine during the 2009 pandemic in England. read more
expert encounter: should boxing be banned?
The advances of modern neuroscience mean we know more than ever about chronic brain damage in boxers since it was first described nearly a century ago. But has this knowledge really changed anything and is long-term brain injury from contact sport a ticking time bomb? read more