US funding for HIV/AIDS in Africa has risen substantially in recent years, but the good this has done is more than outweighed by the sharp decline in support for family planning. That's the premise of an article in this week's Washington Post, which notes that poor family planning means more children are being born HIV positive.

Is that a fair way to look at the situation? It's certainly a provocative one. Many public health experts have advocated piggybacking HIV treatment and prevention efforts onto family planning. But instead US support for family planning has waned since 1994, and the Bush administration has pulled funds from organizations that counsel women about abortion. With such policies, it's no surprise that the United Nations has revised its estimates of the population of Kenya in 2050 from 44 to 83 million.

The benefits of family planning may seem self evident--one being reducing the rate of HIV transmission to children and reducing the burden on parents who may themselve be HIV positive. But perhaps it's not so obvious to those who make policy.

Posted by Charlotte Schubert at 09:14 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Breast pumping. Does the word make you queasy? I’m a nursing mom and I feel a bit weird about it.

That’s a problem. Too many women are denied the opportunity to breast pump at work –and at conferences –when they are away from their baby. This is not some scary hairy-legged feminine beast- roar. Given the numerous benefits of breast milk, it’s a real public health issue.

I’m happy to report, though, that the folks at the American Society for Cell Biology have a clue!! I brought my baby to the poster session (she loved it--the colors!). So I was drawn to a room that said “Baby changing room.” It was serviceable as a changing room, although the bathroom was better since it had a sink. But what the room was really good for was breast pumping. It had electrical outlets and discreet curtains all set up. Some moms were in there, making milk for their babies.

I applaud the organizers for keeping moms in mind. I must admit though I wish they had made it clear that the room was also good for pumping. If the organizers were going to bother using a euphemism, something like “Milk Lounge” might be appropriate.

The American Academy of Pediatrics advises women to breast feed for one year—the World Health Organization advises two. Nursing women away from their babies need to express milk to keep up their milk supply and to avoid pain.

But not everyone has gotten the message. Even in work environments that should be enlightened, I’ve seen women relegated to bathroom stalls, for some reason, when perfectly good utility closets were available. Another friend had four days of breast milk confiscated at the airport when flying back from a conference. She watched in horror as the agent spilled her milk into a garbage can.

How many moms out there have had such a room at conferences they have gone to? Would you like to see them more often? Has anyone stopped nursing because traveling or working was too hard to do without good facilities for pumping?

Posted by Charlotte Schubert at 07:02 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)

It’s been more than a week since the 47th annual meeting of the American Society for Cell Biology. I’m finally getting around to blogging about it, with my editing deadlines for the January issue out of the way.

I only made it to the last day of the meeting but I wish I had gone to more. Just that one day was rich icool images and ideas.

My favorite: The primary cilium. Nearly every cell in our body has a single specialized cilium. I had barely heard of it. In my defense, an older cell biologist, who has been around for a while, told me that he didn't know much about it either. The meeting convinced me that this structure has languished in obscurity for too long.

The late-breaking poster session alone had seven abstracts on the primary cilium. Those abstracts implicated the cilium in coordinating several types of cell signaling events in embryonic stem cells, cancer cells and fibroblasts, common cells that make connective tissue. Apparently the appendage can act as a little cellular sensor.

The primary cilium is not just for cell biologists. A study by Klaus Piontek, Gregory Germino and collegues in this month’s issue shows how defects in the cilium lead to kidney disease. See also the News and Views by Emily Kim and Gerd Walz.

Another recent study, in the Journal of Clinical Investigation, examines how the cilium contributes to setting up the left-right asymmetry of organs. Individuals with defective primary cilia are susceptible to heterotaxy--in which organs are distributed randomly on the left and right sides.

I left my day at the meeting with renewed enthusiasm for cell biology--the wellspring of biomedical advance.

If you'd like to read a real blog on the meeting, see one by Brendan Maher for Nature News:

Posted by Charlotte Schubert at 12:20 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

My heroes growing up were boys. In the books I read, boys got dirty, flew to the moon, sailed pirate ships and generally had a lot more fun.

So I was happy to see these books for children advertised at the Cell Biology meeting. It's a series about women scientists doing cool stuff: designing robots, camping with gorillas, and busting apart moon rocks.

The series,"Women's Adventures in Science" is a project of The National Academy of Sciences. I haven't read any of these books, but I'm intrigued. I hope some little girls are too.

Posted by Charlotte Schubert at 12:09 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

A report last week stated that, according to the US Health and Human Services Department, advocates of the idea that vaccines are linked to autism will join neurologists and other health professionals as members of the Interagency Autism Coordinating Committee, a new panel that will recommend areas for autism research.

If the vaccines-autism link has been repeatedly proven to be wrong, and even the Institute of Medicine, an independent organ that advises the US government on health issues, has urged scientists to look elsewhere for the causes of autism, what's the point of including supporters of such a link, other than to appease the advocacy groups?

I hope I'm wrong, but being inclusive for the sake of political correctness doesn't strike me as the right way to tackle a problem as serious as autism.

Posted by Juan Carlos Lopez at 03:26 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)

My colleague Clare Thomas pointed me to this fascinating report in SciDev.net.

A Nigerian doctor is suing the Nigerian Academy of Science after challenging his claims that he has produced an effective HIV vaccine from the blood of infected patients. What struck us the most was the fact that Jerimiah Abalaka, the doctor in question, cites an article he published in the journal Vaccine as evidence of his claims' legitimacy.

Why did Vaccine publish this paper? At the time of its publication, Ray Spier, editor of the journal, wrote an editorial saying that Abalaka's study was not published a peer-reviewed research paper, but as a report. He then goes to great lengths to try to justify his decision to publish the paper and concludes by stating that "desperate situations call for desperate measures".

This statement seems absurd to me. If the paper wasn’t peer reviewed, what is the true value of the data? I wish I could tell you how many charlatans send us papers every month, reporting cures for all kinds of diseases (including HIV, of course), and how quickly we reject them without further ado. How supremely irresponsible of Vaccine to publish something of such potential importance without peer review! Has science been served by the decision? The only thing that has come out of it is undue support for a man who is now in a stronger position to put the lives of thousands of people at risk.

Posted by Juan Carlos Lopez at 11:31 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Speaking of blood, my friend Andy Marshall, the editor of Nature Biotechnology, told me the other day that he's been mentioned at the British Parliament, no less.

Unfortunately, the British Commons did not bring him up to praise his contributions to the advancement of science. Instead, this past week they released an Early Day Motion (# 425) to regret "the continuing attempts to silence or misrepresent scientists whose research indicates possible human health problems from GM (genetically modified) crops".

The Motion specifically focuses on the case of Dr Irina Ermakova who, allegedly, "was misled by the editor of Nature Biotechnology into submitting an article to the journal to be published under her name, with the article in fact published under the editor's name with criticisms by four well-known GM supporters not seen by Dr Ermakova prior to publication".

I've spoken to Andy, and this is not exactly what happened. The article is more of a News Feature/Interview, which is why it's authored by Andy. Furthermore, Dr. Ermakova has been given a chance to rebut the comments from the other scientists. Her reply will be published on Friday as part of the December issue of Nature Biotechnology.

I don't want to steal their thunder and would therefore encourage you to read the whole article and the rebuttal once it's available. The only thing I'll mention here is another segment of the Motion, which specifically caught my attention. The Motion "calls on the Government Chief Scientist to protect the integrity and objectivity of science by reasserting the right of scientists to have their views published by journals without underhand interference by journal editors, and for the Chief Scientist to encourage journal editors to withdraw papers they have published which subsequently turn out to be grossly misleading or even fraudulent".

Pretty strong words to use in a case like this one. In any case, I've promised Andy that, if he's sent to prison, I'll make sure to get him cigarettes, the newspaper and, every month, a copy of Nature Biotechnology.

Posted by Juan Carlos Lopez at 11:11 AM | Permalink | Comments (10)

Good news for those of you who are tired of visiting this blog to find only posts of mine, which often read as if they came out of a gossip magazine.

First, Charlotte Schubert is back in business, as you may already know from her latest entry.

Second, I'm delighted to welcome Roxanne Khamsi, our new News Editor, whose contributions to this site I'm sure will be very interesting and timely. I'm looking forward to reading them.

Posted by Juan Carlos Lopez at 11:04 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

After six months of maternity leave I’m back
and ready to blog. Please hold the applause...

Like everyone says, having a kid changes your perspective. One thing that happens is that everything to do with babies—all that stuff that once bored you to tears —is now fascinating.

So I provide fair warning: you can expect future blog material on issues such as finding bisphenol A-free baby products (laborious), the medical structure set up around childbirth (peculiar), and parental leave policies for scientists (abysmal).

But I’d like to start off by proving that I’m not going to inflict you only with baby-centric jabber. I'm back on my soapbox about tobacco.

People here at the journal think I’m pretty shrill when it comes to
cigarettes. But the events of the last month or so should make anyone
concerned about public health emit at least a groan.

President Bush, in one of the first vetoes of his presidency, nixed a bill this fall to expand healthcare to low-income children by increasing the cigarette tax. The veto came on the heels of a CDC report that smoking rates have stopped leveling off in the US and are rising again among teenagers.

One reason for the veto, said Bush, is that the bill would increase taxes on “working people.”

And that is exactly why the bill should be passed: A report from the Institute of Medicine this year concluded that one of the most effective ways to reduce smoking—especially among the poor and teenagers—is to increase taxes on cigarettes. Raising tobacco taxes to fund children’s health seems like a win-win situation: a way to both reduce smoking and to promote public health.

Apparently, the bill is being renegotiated now and may be resurrected again closer to election season. Let’s hope some politicians put the tobacco issue at the center of the debate.

Posted by Charlotte Schubert at 11:23 AM | Permalink | Comments (7)