CDC Warns Untreatable Gonorrhea is On the Way

U.S. News & World Report

A new strain of gonorrhea is resistant to one of the last known effective treatments

Gonorrhea, one of the most common sexually transmitted diseases in the United States, is increasingly showing resistance to one of the last known effective antibiotic treatments, leading researchers from the Centers for Disease Control to "sound the alarm" about potentially untreatable forms of the disease.

"During the past three years, the wily gonococcus has become less susceptible to our last line of antimicrobial defense, threatening our ability to cure gonorrhea," Gail Bolan, director of the CDC's sexually transmitted disease prevention program, wrote in The New England Journal of Medicine last week...[Full Article]

CDC Official Accused of Child Molestation, Bestiality Returns to Work

Fox News

• 
  
  

An official with the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention who was charged with two counts of child molestation and bestiality involving a 6-year-old has returned to work with the agency.

Dr. Kimberly Lindsey, a deputy director with the CDC's Laboratory Science, Policy and Practice Program Office, had been scheduled for a preliminary hearing Thursday, but the hearing was pushed back to a later date, one of Lindsey's attorneys told the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

Lindsey, 44, was arrested in October along with her boyfriend Thomas Westerman. Lindsey was being held in the DeKalb County Jail on a $25,000 bond, while Westerman was released on a $16,000 bond.

[Full Article]

CDC executive arrested for child molestation, bestiality

Atlanta Journal-Constitution

A Centers for Disease Control and Prevention official was arrested Sunday and charged with two counts of child molestation and bestiality for sexual acts involving a 6-year-old boy.

DeKalb County Jail Kimberly Quinlan Lindsey, 44, faces charges of child molestation and bestiality.

DeKalb County Jail Thomas Westerman, 42, faces child molestation charges.

According to a DeKalb County criminal warrant obtained Sunday, Kimberly Quinlan Lindsey's boyfriend, Thomas Westerman, was also arrested on two counts of child molestation. Westerman works for the CDC as a night watchman, his LinkedIn profile states. The pair, who live together in Decatur, surrendered to authorities Sunday afternoon, said DeKalb police spokeswoman Pamela Kunz.

Lindsey, 44, serves as the deputy director for the Laboratory Science Policy and Practice Program Office at the CDC, according to her biography on the agency's website. The Emory University graduate, who's been with the CDC since 1999, was formerly a senior health scientist responsible for overseeing a $1.5 billion fiscal allocation process for terrorism preparedness.

A medical professional alerted police about the child molestation allegation on Aug. 24, Kunz said. The warrant cites two incidents -- the first in Jan. 2010 and the latest on Aug. 22.

"During the investigation evidence was recovered that led to the bestiality charge," Kunz said...[Full Article]

CDC Warns Public to Prepare for 'Zombie Apocalypse'

Fox News

Are you prepared for the impending zombie invasion?

That's the question posed by the Centers for Diseases Control and Prevention in a Monday blog posting gruesomely titled, "Preparedness 101: Zombie Apocalypse." And while it's no joke, CDC officials say it's all about emergency preparation.

"There are all kinds of emergencies out there that we can prepare for," the posting reads. "Take a zombie apocalypse for example. That's right, I said z-o-m-b-i-e a-p-o-c-a-l-y-p-s-e. You may laugh now, but when it happens you'll be happy you read this, and hey, maybe you'll even learn a thing or two about how to prepare for a real emergency."

The post, written by Assistant Surgeon General Ali Khan, instructs readers how to prepare for "flesh-eating zombies" much like how they appeared in Hollywood hits like "Night of the Living Dead" and video games like Resident Evil. Perhaps surprisingly, the same steps you'd take in preparation for an onslaught of ravenous monsters are similar to those suggested in advance of a hurricane or pandemic.

"First of all, you should have an emergency kit in your house," the posting continues. "This includes things like water, food, and other supplies to get you through the first couple of days before you can locate a zombie-free refugee camp (or in the event of a natural disaster, it will buy you some time until you are able to make your way to an evacuation shelter or utility lines are restored)."...[Full Article]

Click here to read more on the "Zombie Apocalypse" at CDC.gov.

[Webmaster - What kind of "predictive programming" is this? Our government has lost all credibility (not that I'm surprised...)]

Peddling Flu Vaccines Despite Criticism

Despite a series of vaccine-related scandals and the recent admission from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that its flu-death estimates were wildly inflated, U.S. and global health authorities are teaming up with big business, the mainstream media, and various organizations to urge more Americans to get an influenza shot. But not all experts — or even most of the public — are necessarily on board with the effort. David Wood, a vaccine boss with the World Health Organization, claimed at a press conference Monday that the massive swine-flu immunization campaign helped limit the damage caused by the alleged H1N1 “pandemic.” He also noted that the recent vaccine effort “gives us considerable hope for the future” that the technology used in inoculations is effective.

But despite the self-congratulatory remarks, the WHO and its swine-flu campaign have come under heavy fire. “The handling by the WHO of the H1N1 pandemic led to a waste of large sums of public money and unjustified scares and fears about health risks faced by the European public,” charged the Council of Europe in a report, saying there was “overwhelming evidence that the seriousness of the pandemic was vastly overrated by WHO.” The world health body actually changed the definition of a pandemic during the crisis, allowing it to raise the alert and take emergency measures.

The European-level investigation discovered improper sway by pharmaceutical companies and vaccine manufacturers on the WHO’s decision-making process, eventually calling for new safe-guards against “undue influence by vested interests.” It also chastised the media and warned against future “sensationalism and scare mongering in the public health domain.”...

[Full Article]

Cancer Costs Double In Less Than 20 Years

Over a period of nearly two decades, the medical costs of cancer care almost doubled in constant dollars, but remained proportional to other medical costs, researchers said.

Over the same time -- from 1987 to 2005 -- cancer costs shifted away from inpatient care, according to Florence Tangka of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and colleagues.

Meanwhile, the share of cancer costs picked up by private insurers and Medicaid increased while private, out-of-pocket expenditures declined slightly, they reported online in the journal Cancer.

Much of the increase in cancer care costs has been driven by a growing caseload -- fueled in turn by an aging population, rather than a rise in per-case costs -- Tangka and colleagues said...

[Full Article]

CDC: Almost Half U.S. Population Suffers From Serious Illness

Stop someone in any street in America and chances are you'll find a chronic health problem.

The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) has new data about the state of our health, and it's not good.

They say 45 percent of the adult population has either high blood pressure, high cholesterol or diabetes.
What's the cause of all the illness?

Signs point to eating too much and exercising too little.

"Each one of these conditions is a risk factor for cardiovascular disease which is one of the leading causes of death in the U.S.," says Dr. Rosemarie Hirsh of the National Center for Health Statistics.

But there is some good news. The CDC says these conditions are treatable, through lifestyle changes and medications.

Grants to Support Vaccinations for Denver Students

A new program that brings together Denver Public Schools (DPS), Denver Health, the University of Colorado Denver and Kaiser Permanente Colorado will receive two grants totaling more than $1.6 million from the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) for a pilot program intended to increase childhood immunization rates...