ATLANTA (AP) ― Only about half of the teenage girls in the U.S. have rolled up their sleeves for a controversial vaccine against cervical cancer - a rate well below those for two other vaccinations aimed at adolescents. The vaccine hit the market in 2006. By last year, just 49 percent of girls had gotten at least the first of the recommended three shots for human papilloma virus, or HPV, a sexua...

About one out of every four herpes zoster (shingles) patients are women 50 or older. According to the Mayo clinic’s definition, herpes zoster is a viral infection that causes a painful rash. Although shingles can occur anywhere on the body, it most often appears as a band of blisters that wraps from the middle of the back to one side of the chest to the breastbone. According to the Health Insur...

Heredity has been blamed as one of the main causes of hair loss but a recent study found that, for about half of those going bald, genes have nothing to do with it. The Korean Hair Research Society traced the family records of 1,220 people suffering from hair loss and found that only 41.8 percent of their fathers had the same problem. About 47.1 percent seemed to have been affected by their fath...

The Gardasil vaccine, given to women to help prevent infection of four types of the human papillomavirus, the main cause of cervical cancer, got the green light from the Food and Drug Administration of the European Union for men as well. The decision came after the Committee for Medicinal Products for Human Use of the European Medicine Agency voted to recommend that the vaccine be made available...

Chuseok, the Korean Thanksgiving Day which falls on Aug. 15 in the lunar calendar every year and Sept. 12 in this year’s solar calendar, is one of the two most important holidays in Korea. During the three-day Chuseok holiday, family members scattered across the country gather to talk and eat together, visit ancestral tombs and hold memorial services. Doctors suggest that people take precaution...

Health authorities said Wednesday that disinfectants used to clean humidifiers might have caused a fatal lung disease which killed four people, including two pregnant women. The Korea Centers for Disease Control and Prevention advised people to refrain from using humidifier disinfectants in a bid to protect them from the deadly pneumonic diseases. Humidifiers are widely used during the dry seas...

In the three decades since HIV and AIDS were first identified, patients, activists and medical researchers have been struggling against not only the disease itself but also the social stigma it brings. Thanks to their strenuous efforts, AIDS is now perceived as a chronic illness rather than a death sentence. Medical experts paint a sanguine picture about their research, saying that as long as pa...

PARIS, Aug 26, 2011 (AFP) - One in every two American adults will be obese by 2030, adding hugely to the country's health costs, according to studies published on Friday that highlight the growing burden of the world's obesitypandemic. On present trends, 50-51 percent of American men and 45-52 percent of American women will by 2030 have a body mass index (BMI) of 30 or more, adding as many as ...

Sanofi Pasteur on Tuesday launched “IDflu 15 microgram (intradermal),” the world’s first intradermal-influenza vaccine product, targeting people over 60 years old. IDflu is a pre-filled syringe product with Vaxigrip, an influenza vaccine product in a 1.5 mm micro-injection system that is only one tenth the length of existing injection needles. It injects directly into the skin, where high densit...