Beijing (dpa) - Authorities in Shanghai closed all poultry markets Friday and began culling birds at a major wholesale market, after the death toll from the H7N9 strain of bird flu rose to six, reports said. All birds from the Huhuai wholesale farm product market in the city's Songjiang district were to be killed to prevent the spread of the disease, after the H7N9 virus was found in pigeons at the...

RICHMOND, Va. The Food and Drug Administration says smokers that are trying to quit can safely use nicotine gum, patches and lozenges for longer than previously recommended. Current labels suggest consumers stop smoking when they begin using the products and that they should stop using them after 12 weeks.

TORONTO - When Michelle Delbaere gave birth to her son Henry seven months ago, she had planned to exclusively breastfeed him because she'd been told that mother's milk is considered best for baby's health. Despite her intentions, she agreed to initially bottle-feed her newborn with formula because it was taking time for her milk to come in. "Once in the hospital. Actually, it was twice in the hospital,"...

April 01 - The illnesses that killed our parents and grandparents won't kill as many of us in the future. Deaths from strokes, heart attacks and cancer declined significantly between 2000 and 2010, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, while death from Alzheimer's increased significantly. Diseases of older age can take years to finally kill you. You can battle cancer a long time....

April 01 - It has been just over three years since President Barack Obama signed the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act into law, and in about 200 days major provisions of the act are slated go into effect. As Jerry Reed once sang in the movie "Smokey and the Bandit," we've got a long way to go and a short time to get there. But we are not taking about beer. We're talking health care insurance...

March 31 - Hundreds of former patients of oral surgeon Dr. W. Scott Harrington lined up in occasional rain outside the North Regional Health and Wellness Center on Saturday morning to get tested for HIV, hepatitis B and hepatitis C. Health officials said Thursday that Harrington, who has been practicing for 36 years, may have exposed as many as 7,000 patients since 2007, the earliest that patient records...

March 30 - Q: Is it true there are foods that are designed to be addictive? JOY D., ANNAPOLIS, MD. A: It's true, some food manufacturers engineer products to contain (from their point of view) the optimal balance of sugar and high fructose corn syrup. Then you feel maximum "crave" and keep eating, drinking and buying more of their products. It's what they call your bliss point. We kid you not; they...

March 29 - BOISE - Coeur d'Alene Rep. Luke Malek's bill to make attacking a health care worker a felony - a measure requested in part by Kootenai Medical Center, which says violent attacks there are increasing - was killed in the Senate Thursday after the lieutenant governor broke a rare tie vote. Malek said, "I'm disappointed that it was defeated this year, but confident that once we iron out the...

March 29 - CHARLESTON - An ex-Marine who lost a brother to prescribed painkillers, a doctor and a nursing leader appealed to a House committee Thursday to legalize marijuana for therapeutic uses. Eighteen people signed up for a special hearing by the Health and Human Resources Committee - a significant step in Delegate Mike Manypenny's, D-Taylor, three-year crusade to legalize cannabis to lessen pain....

March 29 - The choice to nurse a baby has serious implications, starting in the first precious hour. Babies fed breast milk will have a healthier immune system. And they will be less likely to have a childhood marked by obesity and illness. The benefits of breast milk are well-understood and indisputable. But what should happen to encourage nursing moms doesn't always happen, and the hospitals in Franklin...

March 29 - GREENSBORO - The student at Southern Elementary who was found to have MRSA was the second student in Guilford County Schools to get the staph infection this school year. The other case was in December, although school officials could not recall at which school. MRSA, officially known as methicillin-resistant staphylococcus aureus, is a staph infection that is resistant to certain anti­biotics,...

March 29 - Virginia Commonwealth University reported its first case of mumps Thursday as the outbreak at the University of Richmond continues to spread. UR has had 40 probable cases since Jan. 24 and expects to see additional cases through this semester, said university spokesman Brian Eckert. Of the cases, 20 have been confirmed by laboratory tests. VCU has one confirmed case - a student living off...

March 29 - Thousands of patients of a Tulsa dentist may have been exposed to HIV, hepatitis B and hepatitis C, health officials said Thursday. Dr. W. Scott Harrington, an oral surgeon who has been practicing in Tulsa for more than 30 years, voluntarily stopped practicing March 20 after two site visits found multiple violations, including assistants being allowed to unlawfully perform IV sedation, which...

The number of teenagers and young adults dying from cancer in the U.K. has halved since the 1970s, according to a report from Cancer Research UK. Deaths fell from about 580 per year to 300 in this age group, while the largest drop was in those with leukaemia. Cancer is still the main cause of death from any disease in teenagers and young adults with only transport accidents accounting for more deaths...

March 26 - The lobby of Heartland Health's Cancer Center doesn't look much like a yoga studio, but Andrea Ambrose and her students make it work. Ms. Ambrose separates off a corner with rolling room dividers and brings a small stereo to play soothing music. She brings extra mats and blankets to lay down. The space, in a way, represents what the Restorative Yoga class is all about. Just as the dividers...

March 26 - One woman left Johns Hopkins' intensive-care unit believing her husband and nurse had been plotting to kill her. Another ICU patient had flashbacks of hospital walls covered in blood. A third had visions of big spiders riding bicycles in her room. Suddenly, a favorite hobby, gardening, felt creepy. Doctors used to think patients returned to normal after the delusions and hallucinations of...

March 26 - Despite a growing consensus that cardiovascular disease is a "food-borne" illness, many physicians are ill-prepared to advise patients on what they should eat to best protect them from heart attack or stroke. One provocative new study found that a Mediterranean-style diet was so effective at warding off heart attacks, stroke and death that scientists stopped it early. They wanted to let...

TORONTO - Mandatory flu shots for health-care workers should be put on hold until there is a more effective influenza vaccine, a prominent infectious diseases specialist says. In a commentary published in this week's issue of the Canadian Medical Association Journal, Dr. Michael Gardam argues that making the vaccine mandatory could lead to legal challenges that may not be winnable, given the modest...

TORONTO - People who think the new coronavirus couldn't take off and cause a SARS-like crisis may have forgotten a phenomenon that was a game-changer during SARS ????? patients called superspreaders. At present, this new coronavirus doesn't seem to spread easily from person to person, a fact which some people use to argue it will not become the next SARS. Some limited human transmission has occurred,...

March 22 - Central Ohio hospitals say emergency-department visits have risen 18 percent in four years. The area's four largest hospital systems - Mount Carmel Health System, Nationwide Children's Hospital, Ohio State University's Wexner Medical Center and OhioHealth - reported 771,829 such visits in fiscal- or calendar-year 2012, up from 651,387 in 2008. The rising visits appear to span the spectrum...

March 22 - The groundhog has spoken, and the vernal equinox has passed, but if you need another sign of spring, here's one: For the first time in 13 weeks, the flu has fallen from widespread levels in Virginia. The commonwealth was one of the last holdout states in a country where most flu levels dropped in late February, according to statistics posted Thursday by the Virginia Department of Health....

March 22 - Doctors from across the globe are getting specialty medical training via a studio tucked inside Akron Children's Hospital. Thousands of physicians worldwide have participated in web-based continuing medical education conferences offered by GlobalCastMD. Dr. Todd Ponsky, a pediatric surgeon who joined the staff of Children's last year, is co-founder of GlobalCastMD, which offers low-cost,...

March 22 - While riskier alcohol consumption is increasing, the population of students under the influence is not, said panelists in a forum on the culture of binge drinking in college hosted by Washington State University student news media Thursday. Cougs Under the Influence focused on alcohol consumption and attempted to highlight the danger of mixing substances - particularly caffeine from energy...

March 22 - "We're the safety net for society," says a doctor in Peter Nicks' compelling documentary "The Waiting Room," nicely summing up the movie's urgency. It's a portrait of 24 hours in the emergency room of Oakland's public Highland Hospital, in which we meet some of the many people who passed through that day: a man with painful bone spurs in his back; a frightened little girl with a bad case...

March 22 - Four flu-related deaths were confirmed in Minnesota last week, bringing the season's death toll to 180, the Minnesota Department of Health said Thursday. Statewide, the number of flu cases continued to taper off, with four schools and one nursing home reporting outbreaks. Seven people were reported hospitalized with flu complications. Since October, 2,956 people have been hospitalized in...