Parents and the public received grim reminders of the risks of medical care as prominent institutions on opposite coasts battled hospital-related infections among some of the most vulnerable patients around: babies and children. In the Pacific Northwest, a mold outbreak has taken a terrible toll — with one patient dead, five others infected, 1,000 surgeries postponed and 3,000 people told to watch for infection symptoms — at Seattle Children’s Hospital, which the Washington Post reported,…

Consumers may want to think long and hard about whether the federal Food and Drug Administration protects the interests of the vulnerable public or profit-raking Big Pharma and medical device makers. As a scrutiny of data by Science magazine  shows: “From monitoring clinical trials and approving medicines and vaccines, to ensuring the safety of blood transfusions, medical devices, groceries, and more, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is one of the nation’s most…

Even as the nation grapples with an opioid- and drug-overdose crisis, alcohol, one of the oldest intoxicants known to mankind, causes significant harms, including to as many as a fifth of American grownups who have suffered harm due to drinking by others and not themselves. A newly published study, based on data from a survey of 8,750 men and women, finds that as many as 53 million American adults experience any of a…

Headlines can command attention while not always fully informing, as might be the case with these eye-catching story titles, one fresh, the others a few years back: If you’re a doctor, hospital, or insurer, these headlines and news articles might provoke a chill, and the thought — there go those doggone medical malpractice lawyers again, extracting unfair sums for patients in there-but-for-the-grace cases. But the details tell a different story. The Baltimore Sun, in detailing…

Cities are daring to tread where federal regulators have not: They’re cracking down on vaping and its potential harm, particularly to the young, by banning e-cigarettes and tobacco products. San Francisco supervisors’ e-cigarette ban, recently enacted, packs a symbolic punch because Juul, a “tech startup” whose product has become the market-dominating maker of vaping devices, is headquartered in the city. Officials not only banned e-cigarette sales, they also decreed that their makers cannot…