"The PA role is hardly new in the NHS – it has been around for 20 years, helping doctors by doing tasks such as taking medical histories and carrying out examinations.

What has changed is the speed at which they are being recruited – over the last seven years the numbers have gone from a few hundred to 3,500 currently with a target of 12,000, including AAs, by 2036."

 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c2dly5ldrxjo

Coffee drinking habits may greatly impact makeup of gut biome, research suggests

 

"The researchers found one major difference in the two groups—the population numbers of a bacteria called Lawsonibacter asaccharolyticus. Those people who drank coffee regularly had levels as high as eight times those who did not—and the difference held steady for people all around the globe.

 

The research team acknowledges that they do not know what impact higher levels of L. asaccharolyticus may have on people, but suggest it is likely associated with health benefits that have been attributed to coffee drinking. They suggest there are substantial impacts of a single food or beverage on the human gut biome."

 

https://medicalxpress.com/news/2024-11-coffee-habits-greatly-impact-makeup.html

Deep belly fat could predict Alzheimer's disease decades ahead of symptoms

https://www.upi.com/Health_News/2024/12/02/deep-fat-alzheimers-disease-study/4491733096419/

 

NHS gets 12 years to roll out new weight-loss drug Mounjaro

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cx2y5zl99vro

 

Fish Have a Brain Microbiome. Could Humans Have One Too?

The discovery that other vertebrates have healthy, microbial brains is fueling the still controversial possibility that we might have them as well.

 

https://www.quantamagazine.org/fish-have-a-brain-microbiome-could-humans-have-one-too-20241202/

Man ran 700 miles to make ‘insanely impressive’ art on GPS fitness app

It took Duncan McCabe 10 months to make a 27-second digital art video.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/2024/12/02/strava-art-run-toronto-mccabe/

 

https://www.tiktok.com/@thesiakapkeli/video/7441465506957184263

Noninvasive imaging method can penetrate deeper into living tissue

 

Using high-powered lasers, this new method could help biologists study the body’s immune responses and develop new medicines.

https://news.mit.edu/2024/noninvasive-imaging-method-can-penetrate-deeper-living-tissue-1211

People who are good at reading have different brains

"Finally, it’s worth considering what might happen to us as a species if skills like reading become less prioritised. Our capacity to interpret the world around us and understand the minds of others would surely diminish. In other words, that cosy moment with a book in your armchair isn’t just personal – it’s a service to humanity."

 

https://theconversation.com/people-who-are-good-at-reading-have-different-brains-244786

Why Do Animals Adopt?

Taking responsibility for another’s young reveals the deep evolutionary roots of care.

 

Neuroplasticity in F16 fighter jet pilots

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC9974643/

The British Sleep Society position statement on Daylight Saving Time in the UK

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/jsr.14352

‘Unprecedented risk’ to life on Earth: Scientists call for halt on ‘mirror life’ microbe research

Experts warn that mirror bacteria, constructed from mirror images of molecules found in nature, could put humans, animals and plants at risk of lethal infections

 

"Although a viable mirror microbe would probably take at least a decade to build, a new risk assessment raised such serious concerns about the organisms that the 38-strong group urged scientists to stop work towards the goal and asked funders to make clear they will no longer support the research. "

 

“The threat we’re talking about is unprecedented,” said Prof Vaughn Cooper, an evolutionary biologist at the University of Pittsburgh. “Mirror bacteria would likely evade many human, animal and plant immune system responses and in each case would cause lethal infections that would spread without check.”

 

https://www.theguardian.com/science/2024/dec/12/unprecedented-risk-to-life-on-earth-scientists-call-for-halt-on-mirror-life-microbe-research

Bowel cancer rising among under-50s worldwide, research finds

Study suggests rate of disease among young adults is rising for first time and England has one of the fastest increases

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2024/dec/11/bowel-cancer-rising-under-50s-worldwide-research

Weight loss drugs may also treat addiction, Alzheimer’s, and heart disease

Pharmaceutical companies are already cashing in on their other health benefits.

https://arstechnica.com/health/2024/12/weight-loss-drugs-may-also-treat-addiction-alzheimers-and-heart-disease/

Do people reach 100 by surviving, delaying, or avoiding diseases? A life course comparison of centenarians and non-centenarians from the same birth cohorts

https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11357-024-01330-w

Why hasn’t the bird flu pandemic started?

Some scientists examining mutations found in H5N1 viruses fear major outbreak is imminent but others say pathogen remains unpredictable

"So why hasn’t H5N1 touched off a pandemic yet?

One simple answer is that the virus may just need more time to hit the right combination of mutations. The high mutation rate of influenza viruses should tip the odds in H5N1’s favor: “My rule of thumb is that one in 4000 [virus] particles will have a mutation at the amino acid that you are interested in,” Paulson says. Indeed, one polymerase mutation the virus likely needs, dubbed 627K because it leads to the amino acid lysine (K) at position 627 of the protein, has been found several times in strains infecting mammals but also in virus isolated from the first human case associated with the U.S. outbreak in dairy cows."

 

https://www.science.org/content/article/why-hasn-t-bird-flu-pandemic-started

How BioNTech’s “revolutionary” lung cancer vaccine actually works

The promising new treatment builds on research that went into developing COVID vaccines.

https://bigthink.com/health/lung-cancer-vaccine/

Dietary fructose enhances tumour growth indirectly via interorgan lipid transfer

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-024-08258-3

Sold-out farm shops, smuggled deliveries and safety warnings: US battle over raw milk grows

Unpasteurised milk, seen as both anti-government and anti-corporate, soars in popularity among conspiracy theorists and new agers

https://www.theguardian.com/food/2024/dec/14/raw-milk-us-battle-unpasteurised-safety

The Real Appeal of Raw Milk

Not even bird flu can stop some Americans’ thirst for unpasteurized dairy.

https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2024/12/bird-flu-cant-stop-the-thirst-for-raw-milk/680896/

Don't throw away your printed books: A meta-analysis on the effects of reading media on reading comprehension

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1747938X18300101

Brain stimulation helps partially paralyzed patients walk again

https://newatlas.com/medical-devices/paralyzed-walk-again-spinal-cord-injury-deep-brain-stimulation/

Health Officials Investigate Rare Form of Blindness Tied to Ozempic

 

Several recent studies have found a possible connection between semaglutide use and a rare condition that causes sudden vision loss.

 

https://gizmodo.com/health-officials-investigate-rare-form-of-blindness-tied-to-ozempic-2000539752