Experts question early release of incomplete trial data.

A draconian new law aims to toughen France's relaxed approach to conflicts of interest for scientists who advise the government on pharmaceuticals.

A year after cholera broke out in the aftermath of the January 2010 Haiti earthquake, the epidemic has disappeared from the headlines, but it continues to wreak a deadly toll. Mortality rates remain high in some areas, but donor funding for front-line response teams is drying up, even as a newly approved vaccine offers a glimmer of hope.

When heads of state and health ministers gather in New York next week for the first United Nations (UN) high-level summit on non-communicable disease (NCD), they will be presented with some jaw-dropping statistics. According to UN reports released before the meeting, NCDs such as cardiovascular disease and cancer killed 36 million people in 2008, accounting for 63% of all deaths.

Key weapons in the fight against malaria, pyrethroid insecticides, are losing their edge. Over the past decade, billions of dollars have been spent on distributing long-lasting pyrethroid-treated bed nets and on indoor spraying. Focused in Africa, where most malaria deaths occur, these efforts have greatly reduced the disease's toll. But they have also created intense selection pressure for mosquitoes to develop resistance.

A world population analysis reveals the locations that could put the most people in danger should a nuclear accident occur.

http://www.nature.com/news/2011/110427/full/472400a.html

In a week that has seen little good news about the stricken Fukushima Daiichi nuclear reactors, the latest data on radioisotope fallout from the plant is so far offering a glimmer of hope.

http://www.nature.com/news/2011/110330/full/471555a.html

Luc Montagnier is applying unorthodox ideas to the treatment of autism. With support from the Autism Research Institute (ARI), based in San Diego, California, the Nobel laureate is about to launch a small clinical trial of prolonged antibiotic treatment in children with autism disorders.

First affordable and effective weapon against killer meningococcal meningitis A rolled out in Africa.

Geological storage of long-lived radioactive material is moving closer to reality in Europe, says Declan Butler.

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