Patrick Aebischer, president of EPFL and Jacques Melly, president of the Valais cantonal council, sign an agreement of understanding 10 January to set up a branch of the polytechnic in Valais
LAUSANNE, SWITZERLAND – Canton Vaud’s federal polytechnic institute, EPFL and canton Valais signed an agreement of intention Tuesday 10 January in Sion to establish a branch of the school in canton Valais, most likely in Sion but working closely with a number of existing services throughout the canton.
A formal agreement and plans will be developed later in the year, but EPFL President Patrick Aebischer is quoted by Le Nouvelliste as saying the new campus should be up and running by 2015.
The new branch of EPFL will have have 11 research and training chairs, the canton and EPFL announced at a press conference Tuesday.
Valais will have a teaching campus that focuses on energy, health and chemistry, according to Le Nouvelliste, with seven chairs in energy and the rest in bio-technology and bio-engineering, while Le Temps reports that four chairs will be in energy and the others in biotechnology and medical engineering.
EPFL has not yet issued a press release confirming details but Valais, for its part, says the focus will be on energy, health (with a focus on rehabilitation) and nutrition and the new school should help attract international companies. Nutrition studies would centre around work to produce components for vitamins and medicines.
A masters degree in energy is being planned.
EPFL is based in Lausanne but has a small campus in Neuchatel for nanotechnology.
BERN, SWITZERLAND – The Swiss federal government has issued a salmonella warning for a Camembert cheese, cautioning consumers to check if it corresponds to the following:
Le Camembert Fermier « Ferme de Jouvence » (lot 11309VC; DLUO 14.01.2012): 275g with sell-by dates of 14.01.2012.
The cheese was immediately pulled off shelves once French authorities were aware of the problem; they immediately alerted Swiss health authorities of the salmonella risk, but some 200 of the cheeses had already been sold.
Salmonella provokes severe vomiting and high fevers, usually within 6 to 72 hours; if you suspect you have this, contact a doctor immediately.
GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – The Hug University Hospitals in Geneva and its lab workers have reached an agreement, two weeks after the hospital lashed out at the workers’ union for endangering lives during a work slowdown. The agreement calls for the laboratory workers to have two new work categories labeled as technicians, reflecting changes in their field, and to redefine the training and skills needed for their jobs.
The hospital has argued that it does not have the power over this area, for which only the canton is competent, but it has agreed to a joint work group that will focus on developing job descriptions for the cantonal system, with particular attention to continuing education, and to a joint commission that will be involved various areas, notably staff concerns over the new laboratories being built.
Landmarks get red lights as Aids Day
Global prevention, treatment and funding at a turning point
Women in Eritrea learn about Aids (photo ©2011 The Global Fund / Didier Ruef )
GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – Red lights are shining today on several world landmarks, including the Empire State Building and Stock Exchange in New York and the Sydney Opera House in Australia, to mark World Aids Day. The day has been noted officially since 1988, making it 23 years since we woke up to the reality that action on a massive scale was needed to stop the killer disease.
Funding was organized over the years, treatment and prevention research were stepped up, and patients began to find help. The World Health Organization (WHO) in Geneva says that HIV infections fell by 15 percent in the past decade and Aids-related deaths fell by 22 percent.
The improvements came about largely because of better access to treatment and drugs, but just as hope has been growing, the global economic crises of the past three years are threatening to bite into that progress, the WHO and the Geneva-based Global Fund note.
And a number of groups remain at risk: teenage girls, drug users, men who have sex with men and babies born to women with HIV.
On the bright side, there is clear progress, says the WHO:
BERN, SWITZERLAND – The deadline is looming if you’re considering changing your obligatory Swiss health insurance policy. You have until 30 November to make the change. The federal government has added new features to its insurance cost comparison site, which has an easy-to-use tool for comparing companies, as does Comparis, which has pages in English.
28% increase in deaths from chronic bronchitis in women
Improving their chances: more years ahead for young Swiss as age of death rises
NEUCHATEL, SWITZERLAND – The average age of death is rising in Switzerland: 74.4 for men and 82.1 years for women.
The Swiss Statistical Office’s new figures on mortality for 2009, the most recent calculations, show 15,000 fewer deaths in the under-80 population than in 1970, with 62,476 deaths in 2009. Over age 80 the number of deaths has increased by 2.2, while the population has increased threefold.
Dementia diagnosed more easily and earlier, lung cancer leads cancer deaths
Cardiovascular disease, cancer and dementia are the three main causes of death overall, but dementia as a cause of death is on the rise, as the aging population increases, the figures show.
The number of deaths from dementia as an initial illness has doubled in 10 years and the mortality rate has risen from 20 to 28 deaths per 10,000, a rise explained in part by earlier and better diagnoses, according to the statistical office.
Cardiovascular disease accounted for 36 percent of all deaths, cancer 26 percent and dementia about 7 percent.
Lung cancer accounts for nearly one-fifth of all cancer deaths and it remains by far the most prevalent form of cancer in Switzerland.
Respiratory diseases including chronic bronchitis are the fourth cause of death, with a startling figure: the number of deaths among women from chronic bronchitis rose 28 percent in the past 10 years, while it dropped 12 percent for men.
When a younger population is looked at, the figures show cancer as the leading cause of premature death, followed by accidents, then cardiovascular disease.
GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – The Hug university hospitals in Geneva late Tuesday 15 November said it is bringing charges for endangering life against lab workers and the union that is backing them in their hospital strike, following an incident today in the maternity unit. Urgently needed lab results were supplied to medical staff with delays of three to five hours, says the hospital, a clear violation of the guarantee to ensure basic services during a strike.
The hospital is also filing criminal charges against the lab workers’ union (VPOD-SSP) for inciting to endanger the lives of others for its threat to block the immuno-hematology transfusion unit Thursday.
Tensions between the hospital and the union rose Tuesday when the union announced that it will treat only blood units that the Hug buys. This, says the hospital, is only about 115 of the 500-700 needed a week not just by the hospital but also private clinics, doctors’ offices and elsewhere. The entire canton’s blood supplies will thus be “held hostage” says the hospital’s direction.
The other blood units are dealt with by the hospital’s lab, whose workers are striking; the union says the blood products will be treated and stored until after the strike.
But the Hug notes that in the meantime, this will put at risk several units, in particular emergency services, maternity, surgery and the pediatric unit.
Too much of a good thing means we need to cut back, says the Federal Office of Public Health
BERN, SWITZERLAND – The Swiss are known for their conservative approach to money, but one area where they are too liberal, it appears, is in adding sodium, or table salt, to their food. A study released Monday by the Federal Office of Public Health (FOPH) shows that people consume nearly double the amount of salt they should, but it also points to ways to reduce this, starting with the food industry.
Too much salt causes health problems, with the risk of cardiovascular disease high on the list. The Chuv (university hospitals) in Lausanne was mandated to carry out the research, with questionnaires for 1,500 people followed up by tests for hypertension.
Men were found to consume more salt than women, 10.6 grams compared to 7.8g. The World Health Organization’s recommends an intake of 5g maximum.
More men had a problem with high blood pressure, 32.3 percent, than women, 19.1 percent, but the average of more than 25 percent shows a population too much at risk for cardiovascular disease, says the FOPH.
School lunches, work canteens will use less salt, more herbs and spices
Expect less, get more, could well be the motto of the future for the Swiss population, with the food industry and researchers now working with the health office to cut back on the use of salt without any loss of flavour or safety in order to help consumers boost their health.
The study is part of the FOPH’s “Salt Strategy 2008–2012“, which aims to reduce the nation’s salt consumption. Salt Strategy is one part of the Swiss Nutrition and Physical Activity Programme 2008–2012.
Eleven categories of products have been targeted for reduced salt, with the federal government laying out recommendations for industry cutting back. Read more…
Swiss forests (here, Bern) are an economic and environmental priority, but poor wood-burning stoves could counteract forestry efforts
BERN, SWITZERLAND – More than 15 percent of fine particles, those minuscule bits of dust that are harmful to health, come from wood-burning stoves, the Swiss federal government now says, twice the amount shown by earlier research.
Reducing the quantity is a public health priority, with the popularity of home fireplaces growing, but an changes to regulations need to be aligned with an economic and environmental priority, to better develop and exploit Swiss forests.
The amount of wood burned for fuel is on the rise in Switzerland, according to Swiss energy officials, and it is likely to continue to go up if fossil fuel prices rise.
Switzerland is closely watching the example of Germany, which recently tightened its laws for wood as an energy source. It lowered the acceptable limits for home fireplaces, including existing ones.
Pilot projects have been started in some Swiss cantons in an effort to find better tools for measuring home fire emissions.
Burn dry wood in a correctly installed and properly functioning fireplace, for your health
A group meeting in Bern this week concluded that there is a huge difference, in terms of health and air pollution, between good home fireplaces and those that don’t meet today’s standards. Quality is directly linked to proper installation, the group says, as well as correct use and burning the right materials.
The question is of growing importance because the number of automatic wood-burning stoves has tripled and the number of manual home wood-burning stoves (poeles) has doubled in the past 15 years according to the Swiss Energy Office.
Swiss authorities, researchers, firms and cantonal officials, many of them with Cercl’Air, met 8-9 November to discuss the effectiveness of air filters on home fireplaces and to review Swiss regulations governing small wood-burning units.
Switzerland’s law requiring certification for home fireplaces went into effect in 2007, but the implementation has been phased in, through 2012.
Cercl’Air is a group that brings together corporate and governmental Swiss air quality managers.
Today’s filters function mainly with electrostatic separation, but this works only if the fireplace is correctly installed and functioning properly. Studies are showing that a large number of wood-burning systems of medium- and large-size are not correctly installed, and these will be targeted to reduce fine particles in the short term.
More problematic are smaller units, under 70 kW, whose emissions are currently measured visually in most cantons to ensure, for example, that only dry wood and not household waste is being burned. But this approach is inadequate with older fireplaces that are not up to current standards.
Meanwhile, the Energy Office provides tips for anyone using wood for fuel, including avoiding creating too much soot through:
- proper ventilation in the fireplace
- using only dry wood
- lighting the fire properly
- avoiding using too much wood.
Federal Energy Office brochure on using wood-burning fires correctly (Fr, PDF)
The WHO board call for reform points to "WHO's unique mandate as the directing and coordinating authority for work in international health"; here, part of a 2009 WHO report on the health problems linked to the high number of road accidents in Africa
GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – The World Health Organization, based in Geneva, late Friday 4 November, approved a number of resolutions to reform the health body at the most basic levels.
The crucial question of how to improve funding was set aside for two months until the next general meeting of the executive board. The WHO, in a statement issued Friday night, states that the board will then review “a proposed mechanism to increase predictability and flexibility of financing for the organization”.
Two key changes agreed to in the special board meeting on WHO reform that just drew to a close in Geneva will be to establish a contingency fund for emergency work and to clarify roles and responsibilities “between the three levels of the WHO – country offices, regional offices and headquarters – to create a tightly networked, leaner and streamlined organization”.
The WHO has repeatedly faced under-funding for a number of reasons including the high percentage, in its budget, of “voluntary donations” and in the past, criticism from the US government which withheld funding. That relationship has been on a better footing for several years, and in September 2011 the US and the WHO agreed to strengthen the relationship.
The board also agreed to set up a mechanism for independent evaluation and to:
- develop criteria for priority-setting of its work in global public health
- engage “an increasing number of public health actors, including foundations, civil society organizations, partnerships and the private sector. The Board felt strongly that in any opportunity for engagement, WHO’s independence and integrity must be protected from undue influence by those with vested interests.”
Decomposing sardines from Brittany were destroyed by Swiss customs
GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – Swiss customs officials in Geneva stepped up their checks of food items entering the country in May, and say they have uncovered serious problems in the transport of a number of food items.
Between June and September they seized a large number of shipments of supposedly fresh foods that were not kept at correct temperatures during transport, they say.
The non-exhaustive list:
1. 531 kg of meat and fish in sauces, headed for a shop, were stored at +18 °C rather than +5 °C to -8 °C. The goods were destroyed.
Read more…
Wearing your heart on your sleeve to take on a new meaning
LAUSANNE, SWITZERLAND – A tiny new device could soon provide real-time heart monitoring that might help prevent some of the 70-100,000 deaths annually from sudden onset heart attacks. The new tool has yet to be tested in real-life conditions, but cardiologists are enthusiastic about its potential, says EPFL, which developed the medical tool. It is one of several “wireless body sensor networks” (WBSN) tools being developed at the polytechnic university in Lausanne, as part of the huge Guardian Angels project, selected as one of six finalist mega-research projects by the European Union (winner to be announced in 2012).
The project is also looking at similar monitoring systems for other health problems, such as the immediate impact of diet on obese patients.
The device consumes very little electricity and is made up of high-precision body sensors applied to the skin, a ZigBee radio module and a chip that’s optimized for analyzing and processing biological signals.It monitors the heart and detects anomalies, immediately alerting the patient’s cell phone in the case of a problem. Medical personnel are immediately alerted by e-mail and message.
“This system collects very reliable and precise data, it’s equipped with a very effective noise filtering system, and it has batteries that can last for 3-4 weeks at a time,” notes EPFL professor David Atienza, head of EPFL’s Embedded Systems Lab. “Above all it provides an automatic analysis and immediate transmission of data in compressed format to the doctor, preventing him or her from having to work through hours of recorded data.”
Underfunding is a growing concern, though, says WHO
TB patient in Ethiopia being carried by her sons (photo, WHO)
GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – Sustained efforts by a number of large countries are responsible for much of the dramatic improvement in the global picture for tuberculosis, the World Health Organization said late Tuesday 11 October.
China has halved the prevalence of the disease and seen the number of people dying from TB fall by 80 percent in the past decade. Brazil, Kenya and Tanzania have pumped resources into fighting the disease with very good results.
Worldwide, says the UN health organization in its WHO 2011 global tuberculosis control report, published 11 October, that:
- the number of people who fell ill with TB dropped to 8.8 million in 2010, after peaking at 9 million in 2005
- TB deaths fell to 1.4 million in 2010, after reaching 1.8 million in 2003
- the TB death rate dropped 40 percent between 1990 and 2010, and all regions, except Africa, are on track to achieve a 50 percent decline in mortality by 2015
- in 2009, 87 percent of patients treated were cured, with 46 million people successfully treated and seven million lives saved since 1995. However, a third of estimated TB cases worldwide are not notified and therefore it is unknown whether they have been diagnosed and properly treated.
Funding gap hitting multidrug resistant cases
The WHO says in a statement that rapid progress is being made in detecting multidrug resistant (MDR) TB, thanks to new tests that are being widely adopted. But detection is outpacing treatment for the MDR cases:
New research shows mothers, not just baby bottles, transmit BPA, source of mammary gland changes
LAUSANNE, SWITZERLAND – Researchers at the EPFL have shown through experiments with mice that indirect exposure by pregnant women and nursing mothers to Bisphenol A, also known as BPA, most likely predisposes infants to breast cancer by modifying their mammary glands.
BPA is an organic compound present in some plastics and it is the subject of growing concern in the medical world, especially concerning young children. The focus until now has been primarily on the role of plastic baby bottles that emit “a significant quantity of the molecule” when heated, according to the EPFL.
BPA has been the subject of numerous scientific studies, with conflicting research results. The World Health Organization and Food and Agriculture Organization in September 2011 published the results of their ad hoc review of the situation. The report described the widespread exposure to BPA:
“Bisphenol A (BPA) is an industrial chemical that is widely used in the production of polycarbonate (PC) plastics (used in food contact materials, such as baby bottles and food containers) and epoxy resins (used as protective linings for canned foods and beverages and as a coating on metal lids for glass jars and bottles). These uses result in consumer exposure to BPA via the diet.”
It concluded that for now it’s impossible to assess the impact of exposure, but noted that “BPA exposure during the perinatal period
has been reported to alter both prostate and mammary gland development in ways that may render these organs more susceptible to the development of neoplasia or preneoplastic conditions with subsequent exposures to strong tumour initiating or promoting regimens. In the absence of additional studies addressing identified deficiencies, there is currently insufficient evidence on which to judge the carcinogenic potential of BPA.”
The EPFL results would appear to challenge this conclusion.
The Lausanne-based polytechnic institute says that BPA is so pervasive that it is not possible to do a controlled study.
GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – Money invested in mental health comes to a global average of only $3 per capita, according to the World Health Organization, and in some developing countries it is as low as $.25, with most funds spent on long-term hospitalization. Only two percent of all health resources are invested in mental health services and prevention is badly underfunded, the Geneva-based group says in its Mental Health Atlas 2011, published Friday 7 October.
The report “finds that the bulk of those resources are often spent on services that serve relatively few people”, with 70 percent of scarce funding going to mental institutions.
A key problem is that “in lower income countries, however, shortages of resources and skills often result in patients only being treated with medicines. The lack of psychosocial care reduces the effectiveness of the treatment.”
Half of the world’s population lives in areas where there is only one psychiatrist per 200,000 people.
MILAN, ITALY – Sunday 9 October was a car-free day in Milan, designed to get the pollution level, one of Europe’s highest, down to legally acceptable levels. Seventy firefighters and extra police officers ensured that from 08:00 to 18:00 virtually no cars were driven in the city. The city’s safety commissioner said they were also checking cars with stickers for the handicapped, which could be driven, to catch cheaters, according to Corriere della sera newspaper.
The fine is euros 155 for driving on a car-free Sunday.
The ban followed 10 days of restrictions on certain categories of vehicles that were labelled polluters. The system kicks in when the pollution level rises above 50 micrograms of particulates per m3 of air over 12 days
Source: WHO, September 2011
Detractors, including some environmental groups, say the day off does little to bring down levels. Corriere della sera cites one critic who notes that the level has dropped to within legal limits after only on six of the 15 car-free Sundays in recent years, and that the city should invest more in anti-pollution measures for its public transport system.
Milan’s citizens were encouraged to take advantage of free entry Sunday to the city’s swimming pools and discounted entries for several museums, using the additional buses and subway trains that were put on for the day.
The northern Italian city has one of the highest car ownership ratios in the world and ranks as one of Europe’s most polluted cities for both the extent to which pollution rises above the European Union PM10 (particulates) limit of 50 micrograms per m3, and the duration. An Ecopass system to reduce car traffic went into effect in 2008, at which point 98,000 cars reportedly entered the city every day. The number of cars affected by Sunday’s ban three years later was 120,000, according to city officials.
The most recent comparative figures, from the World Health Organization (WHO) in Geneva in late September, show Milan, Torino and Naples sharing the top spot, with 2008 annual PM10 figures of 44 or 45 on average. The WHO published its new clean air guidelines and database covering more than 1,000 cities in 91 countries, noting:
“PM10 particles, which are particles of 10 micrometers or less, which can penetrate into the lungs and may enter the bloodstream, can cause heart disease, lung cancer, asthma, and acute lower respiratory infections. The WHO air quality guidelines for PM10 is 20 micrograms per cubic metre (µg/m3) as an annual average, but the data released today shows that average PM10 in some cities has reached up to 300 µg/m3.”
Bern, Geneva and Zurich showed annual averages of 21 to 24, while Rome was 35 and Paris 38, according to WHO figures.
GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – The Hug university hospitals in Geneva were handed a surprise strike Thursday 6 October by the workers who transport patients and material, and the union for which they work and hospital officials immediately met. The hospital says in a statement issued during the morning that its first preoccupation is the patients, and that they must not be taken hostage by the situation.
The workers’ demands prompted the hospital’s management to suggest three solutions:
- given that the hospital itself does not have responsibility for salaries, which are set by cantonal authorities, it recommends that as a temporary measure both types of transport workers be placed on the same salary scale
- that the hospital can recommend an increase in the number of staff, but for the 2012 budget
- that a reorganization of the service should be put under review.
Infectious diseases prevention projects honoured as international references
The Hug had earlier announced, Thursday evening, brighter news: its penitentiary hospital staff were awarded Wednesday, in Italy, the World Health Organization’s Health in Prisons Project prize. The award was given to the HUG jointly with the Champs-Dollon prison in Geneva, for two projects. Both are considered projects of reference in Switzerland and abroad, notes the HUG: one for measles prevention and the other a syringue-distribution project designed to reduce infectious diseases.
More apples, fewer sweet drinks if US children are to avoid obesity, study shows
VEVEY, SWITZERLAND – Children in the US are developing poor eating habits that are likely to lead to obesity at a younger age, as early as 12 months, a study by Nestlé shows. Some 10 percent of children between ages 2 and 5 are now categorized as obese and another 11 percent are overweight, but parents questioned for the survey mostly thought their children’s weight was about right.
The Nestlé Feeding Infants and Toddlers Study began in 2002 and was expanded to include infants in 2008. It has included more than 3,200 children, making äit the largest, most comprehensive study of the diets and eating habits of infants, toddlers and pre-schoolers in the United States,” the Swiss-based company says.
Specifically, the study shows that children are getting one-third of their calories from between-meal snacks. A simple improvement, says the company, would be for parents to consider the snacks as mini-meals and offer nutritious foods, such as simple fruits, vegetables, low-fat yogurts and whole-grain foods.
Almost half of toddlers and pre-schoolers consumed beverages that were sweetened, on any given day.
The findings of the study were presented at the annual meeting of The Obesity Society in Orlando, Florida in the US.
Details of the study up to 2008, presented in April, Gerber
ZURICH, SWITZERLAND – Migros is recalling its Prosciutto cotto Gran Riserva, sold in several cantons including Basel, Vaud and Zurich, after the Zurich cantonal lab found evidence of Listeria.
The bacteria can be particularly harmful to pregnant women and anyone with immune system problems. Headaches, fever and nausea experienced after eating the ham should be reported promptly to a doctor.
Consumers should not eat the product and will be reimbursed when they return it to any Migros store.
LAUSANNE, SWITZERLAND – US pharmaceutical company Pfizer won the Swiss Federal Tribunal’s backing Thursday 4 August for health insurers to cover the cost of Champix, a drug used by some smokers to ease their tobacco addiction. The court agreed that in some cases the addiction is an illness and the cost of the drug should be reimbursed.
Football and skiing cause greatest number of sports injuries, Swiss safety statistics show
Source: BPU 2011 (click on image to view larger)
ZURICH, SWITZERLAND – The greatest number of injuries to children around the home in Switzerland are due to falling from heights, while by age 26 falling on stairs becomes more of a problem.
By age 45 we become wiser about avoiding falls in general, until age 65 when we suddenly fall more often at level ground and once again from heights. But we remain far more careful about stairs in our old age.
The details of how and when we are likely to injure ourselves in accidents are part of the lastest Swiss safety statistics, published Wednesday 3 August by BPU, the Swiss Safety Council.
Accidents cost the country CHF55 million in 2008
The new figures, culled from 2008 statistics, underscore the often-ignored fact that accidents are a major and costly public health problem. Accidents caused more than 61,000 deaths in 2008, the most recent year for statistics and the one covered by the report.
Disease, by comparison, caused some 57,000 deaths.
The figures hold true for every age group: accidents at all ages take more lives than disease.
The total economic burden of all accidents in 2008 was CHF54.8 million, with home and leisure accidents accounting for more than half, CHF30 million. Road accidents cost more than the sports or home/leisure accidents when tangible costs alone are considered, but the longer-term cost of home and leisure accidents is more than double the figure for either road or sports accidents.
The statistics also show that for the three categories of road, sports and home/leisure accidents, the greatest number of people who are disabled or severely injured have had accidents at home, some 29,000. The figures for people disabled or severely injured by road accidents and sports are about the same: some 12,000 people in 2008 for each group.
The highest number of deaths, 1,538, was due to home accidents, followed by road accidents, 329, and sports accidents, 129.
Road accidents, however, carry the greatest risk of disability, severe injury or death, based on the rates in 2008. BPU registered 91,000 road accidents, 310,000 sports accidents and 600,000 home and leisure accidents.
Soccer has the highest per-hour-of-sport incidence of injuries
BERN, SWITZERLAND – The Swiss Red Cross’s blood donor programme, Transfusion CRS Suisse, launched an emergency public appeal Monday 18 July for more donors during the next four weeks.
Supplies are dangerously low, the group says, and hospitals may be required to postpone surgeries if adequate supplies are not available.
Summer is a low donor period, but the last time supplies fell this low was during the World Cup in 2010, accompanied by a hot spell, which cut the number of donors.
This year the problem is linked to unexpectedly high needs from a number of hospitals.
Transfusion CRS Suisse, an independent group with a federal mandate to maintain hospital and emergency supplies coverage, plans to distribute 1,000 posters in train stations and on trains in the next four weeks, as part of the appeal.
Details about the requirements and how to give blood are available on the group’s web site, www.transfusion.ch and by telephone from a free number, in French: 0800 000 757.
BERN, SWITZERLAND – The Swiss Department of the Interior Thursday moved to ban, effective immediately, several Egyptian agricultural products to protect consumers from the possibility of E. Coli (EHEC) contamination. The ban is effective until 31 October and covers a number of types of sprouts, beans and seeds sold to consumers as well as sprouts and seeds for planting and for animals foods.
The move follows the 6 July announcement by the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) that the German and French E. Coli outbreaks had been traced imported Egyptian fenugreek seeds. Switzerland issued an alert against consuming fenagreek, as a precaution, 6 July, but EFSA informed the Swiss after that grains were found in animal foods that Switzerland imports.
Fenugreek is an ages-old remedy to increase the flow of breast milk when nursing.
Bern says that epidemiological tests have now shown the E. Coli appeared due to handling problems during production, but the precise source of the problem is still being sought by European health authorities. A tiny amount of a product carrying the bacteria can cause severe health problems.
BERN, SWITZERLAND – Several players met in Bern at the end of last week to hammer out details of how the country can provide citizens with an electronic or “cyber health” system that will include smart health care cards. The goal is to create a nationwide electronic system that provides hospitals and doctors with medical information but that protects the patients’ privacy. Insurance industry, medical profession and high tech company representatives as well as Swiss Post, which has been trialling a card, agreed on a number of steps.
There were strong reservations about including medical data on the card itself, but an experts review of existing cards that was mandated by Bern, such as the Swiss Post and pharmasuisse ones, concluded that all existing cards work very well. Technical differences came to light, however, and the group agreed that card manufacturers will need to create “middleware”, an interface that functions independently of the cards or software, to provide uniformity and allow them to be used more widely.
The group agreed that setting up a pilot project to trial cards in some cantons is a top priority, but there was also widespread agreement that a legal basis for handling data must be created. The Federal Health Office will be responsible for overseeing the development of the legal system needed to ensure that the next generation of cards has the necessary compatibility.
BERN, SWITZERLAND – Switzerland will not make organized assisted suicide a federal crime: the Federal Council Wednesday 29 June instead chose to boost efforts to discourage suicide and to improve palliative care options.
The cabinet noted that “the government is still intent on fostering suicide prevention and palliative care in order to reduce the number of suicides. The entire package of measures should contribute to strengthening the right of self-determination.”
Switzerland permits assisted suicide but only under certain circumstances, and the government, after consulting cantons and interested parties on the impact of making it illegal, concluded that banning it would have a number of drawbacks.
Bern was quick to underscore, however, that “to render assisted suicide admissible, the current legal provisions already require the person seeking suicide to have the mental capacity to consent and to be sufficiently well informed.
Moreover, the term ‘selfish motives’ referred to in the above-mentioned legislation already renders criminal prosecution possible in cases of assisted suicide abuse.”
The council argues that current legal tools are “flexible and practice-oriented” and constitute “a sensible balance between the State’s responsibility to protect the individual and to respect personal freedom.” Legislating a ban could in fact “legitimize” organized assisted suicide businesses, thus encouraging people to use their services. Clinics are currently tolerated as long as employees stay within the limits of the law.
The medical profession in Switzerland was one of the groups consulted.
GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – The first-ever international conference that brings together experts from five continents to a meeting on infection control and resistance to antibiotics meets in Geneva 29 June – 4 July. The meeting is a key session for experts in the wake of recent major infections with new elements, the e. Coli breakout in Germany and an NDM1 outbreak in India.
The meeting hosts 1,300 participants from 80 countries, with 600 abstracts presented.
The conference has two main goals, say the organizers: to carry the principles of infectious disease prevention beyond hospitals and ensure they are observed more generally in all areas of patient care, and to mobilize a far greater number of people in the fight against infections that are resistant to antibiotics. Patients, professionals and authorities all need to be more aware of the problem of resistance, according to World Health Organization experts.
Highlights will include a presentation on “Escherichia coli made in Germany” and the history of the NDM-1 bacteria in India, by authors and the editor of Britain’s Lancet medical journal and Friday as a day to celebrate the 10 commandments of hand hygiene in commemoration of the 150 years since Ignác Philipp Semmelweis published his thesis suggesting that students dissecting cadavers were carrying germs away on their hands.
Rock-a-bye zzzzzzzz (hammock, the perfect place to nap)
GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – Every culture does it and has done it for centuries, but why rocking puts us to sleep has remained something of a mystery.
Now a research team based at the University of Geneva has provided the explanation, arguing that a swinging motion “exerts a synchronizing action in the brain that reinforces endogenous sleep rhythms.”
Twelve healthy male volunteers, ages 22–38, were asked to nap on a bed that could either remain stationary or rock gently.
All participants were “good sleepers, non-habitual nappers with no excessive daytime sleepiness and had low anxiety levels. Sleep quality and quantity were assessed by questionnaires and actimetry recordings.” The men took two 45-minute afternoon naps (14:30-15:45),
“one with the bed stationary, and one with the bed put in motion (condition order randomized). The motion parameters were set to stimulate vestibular and proprioceptive sensory systems, without causing nausea or any entrainment of cardiac rhythm. In both conditions the naps were spent in complete darkness in a controlled room temperature (21 ± 1°C) and the level of auditory stimulation was around 37 dB. During both sessions, polysomnography data were recorded continuously. Sleep stages and sleep spindles were visually identified by two experienced scorers, blind to the experimental conditions.”
The authors write in their summary in the journal Current Biology that “We show that lying on a slowly rocking bed (0.25 Hz) facilitates the transition from waking to sleep, and increases the duration of stage N2 sleep (ed. note: the deepest point of sleep during a nap). Rocking also induces a sustained boosting of slow oscillations and spindle activity. It is proposed that sensory stimulation associated with a swinging motion exerts a synchronizing action in the brain that reinforces endogenous sleep rhythms. These results thus provide scientific support to the traditional belief that rocking can soothe our sleep.”
The team was led by Laurence Bayer, Irina Constantinescu, Michel Muehlethaler and Sophie Schwarz, from the neuroscience department at the Hug university hospitals in Geneva and the Swiss Center for Afffective Sciences, joined by Stephen Perrig and Julie Vienne from the Swiss Laboratory at Hug and the CIG in Lausanne, with Pierre-Paul Vidal from the Unviersity Paris Descartes.
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Paint the world red, Blood Donor day slogan (photo: Oliver O'Hanlon/WHO)
GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – The jet d’eau, Geneva’s famous water fountain, ran red 14 June to mark World Blood Donor day, but beyond the colourful display and other events, The World Health Organization (WHO) in Geneva marked the day by releasing new global data which shows that 70 percent of volunteer, unpaid blood donors are men. The average age is higher in wealthier countries, 44, compared to developing countries, average age 25. The last figure is explained partly by these countries’ younger populations, says the WHO.
Progress is being made in getting more people to donate blood, with the number of countries getting all their blood supplies from voluntary, unpaid donors seeing a 50 percent increase from 2002 to 2008. India was the country with the most impressive progress in 2010: the number of donors rose from 3.6 million to 4.6m.
Cucumbers: when will we learn to love them again?
GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – “It’s the bean sprouts”, the source of the E. coli outbreak in Germany, Reinhard Burger, Germany’s head of infectious diseases programme, said Friday morning 10 June. The actual sprouts that are behind what the WHO labels the “the unusual enteroaggregative verocytotoxin-producing Escherichia coli (EAggEC VTEC) O104:H4 bacterium” have not yet been pinpointed.
Germany’s Federal Institute for Risk Assessment and Food Safety and the Robert Koch-Institute will publish a joint press release Friday.
The number of new infections has been falling in recent days, but E.coli itself has killed 6 people in Germany and the HUS complication has killed 26, with an additional death in Sweden, according to WHO worldwide figures for the outbreak. In total, 2,909 people have been infected.
The European Union said Tuesday it would set aside €210 million for farmers touched by the outbreak, but a European farmers organization, Colos, says the losses are reaching €400m a week. Spanish farmers, the largest fruit and vegetable producers in Europe, calculate they have lost €200m in business since the start of the outbreak at the end of April, and German farmers say they have lost €60m, according to news agency AFP/TSR (Fr).
GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – The agriculture minister for Lower Saxony in Germany announced Monday 6 June that earlier suspicions may not be correct, that an organic farm in the region is the source of a dangerous outbreak of E. coli.
Initial tests led researchers to suspect the farm’s produce, but authorities Monday said that 23 of the 40 samples taken have come up negative for the E. coli strain that has so far killed 22 people and put more than 2,000 in hospital suffering from the infection or HUS, a complication. The other samples must still be analyzed, reports Der Spiegel. Two women who work at the farm have come down with diarrhea and one has been diagnosed with a form of E. coli, but Spiegel doesn’t specify if it is the strain that has caused the outbreak.
The farmer uses no fertilizers and has no animals, but Reuters quotes a London microbiology professor as saying this eliminate the possibility of the bacteria thriving.
