Below Zero

The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention...

A virus that causes birth defects

The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) urged gynecologists to inform pregnant women to take steps to guard against cytomegalovirus, which causes serious birth defects in thousands of babies each year. Contact with the saliva or urine of preschool-age children is a leading cause of this viral infection among pregnant women. Congenital cytomegalovirus infection is caused when an infected mother passes the virus to her foetus through the placenta. Such infection can result in hearing or vision loss, mental disability or other problems. The CDC recommends that pregnant women wash hands often with soap and water, especially after contact with saliva or diapers from young children, to not kiss children under age 6 on the mouth or cheek to avoid saliva, and to not share food, drinks or utensils with young children. There is no vaccine for it. Many children become infected with CMV — a member of the herpes virus family — in early childhood. The virus then can be passed to others, including pregnant women, who come into contact with the infected child’s saliva or urine.

ZERO TO 20

Teen risk factors for schizophrenia identified

Five key factors can help predict whether at-risk young people will go on to develop schizophrenia, reports a study in Archives of General Psychiatry. The findings show that it is feasible to identify a person’s risk of schizophrenia as accurately as risk of heart disease or diabetes, said researchers from the University of California, Los Angeles. The team followed 291 teenagers considered to be at high risk. Thirty-five per cent of the participants developed schizophrenia during the study. Five characteristics identified at the study’s outset outlined the risk: a genetic risk for schizophrenia combined with recent decline in function; higher levels of unusual thought content; more suspicion/paranoia; more social impairment; and past or current substance abuse.

20 TO 50

Birth control pill lowers ovarian cancer risk: study

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Birth control pills can protect women against ovarian cancer for 30 years or longer after they stop taking them and have so far prevented 100,000 ovarian cancer deaths worldwide, found researchers from University of Oxford. The longer women stay on the pill, the lower their risk of developing the disease, which is more common after age 50, the researchers wrote in Lancet. For example, women who take the pill for 15 years cut their risk in half, they said. Worldwide the pill has already prevented 200,000 women from developing cancer of the ovary.

50 AND ABOVE

Exercise sharply cuts older men’s death rate

Older men classified as “highly fit” died at half the rate of those who were not fit, reports a new study in Circulation. The study of more than 15,000 US military veterans is one of the largest yet to show that exercise extends lives regardless of race or income. The men were encouraged to exercise until they were tired, unless they showed signs of heart problems. They were monitored for an average of 7.5 years. Men who were “very highly fit” had a 70 per cent lower risk of death during the study as those in the “low fit” category. All that is needed is between two and three hours of brisk walking a week spread over four to six days, the researchers said.