Racial Disparities Noted in Diseases
Black people in the United States are far more likely than white people to die from strokes, diabetes and other diseases, according to a federal study that shows widening racial disparities in health care.
The report published yesterday by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention confirms a decade-long trend seen throughout the nation.
Researchers have been warning that high-fat diets, smoking and poor access to high-quality health care are leading to gaping racial disparities in the rates for heart disease, stroke and cancer.
In its latest report, the CDC said the number of potential years of life lost in 2002 because of strokes, diabetes and perinatal diseases was three times higher for black people younger than 75 than for white people of the same age.
That gap increases to about 11 times for AIDS. African Americans also have substantially higher rates of some cancers, including stomach and colorectal cancer.
Epilepsy Drugs Extend Lifespan of Worms
Some epilepsy drugs increase the lifespan of worms by as much as 50 percent, a finding that could help advance the study of human aging, according to a study in the journal Science.
The lifespan of microscopic roundworms that typically live about three weeks increased by 47 percent after they were given moderate doses of the anticonvulsant trimethadione.
A second antiseizure drug, ethosuximide, sold by Pfizer Inc. as Zarontin, boosted the length of the worms' lives by about 17 percent. The drugs affected the worms in ways similar to how they interact with humans, providing a potentially important clue to the secrets of human aging, researchers said.
"This reinforces the idea that the nervous system plays a role in aging," said Kimberly J. Evason, a researcher at the Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, who tested the worms. "One interesting possible follow-up would be to see how the drugs interact with other animals."
Study Predicts Rise In Hypertension
A third of the world's adults -- more than 1.5 billion people -- will suffer from high blood pressure by 2025, scientists said.
In 2000, about a billion people had high blood pressure or hypertension, the most important preventable risk factor for heart disease and stroke. But in the next 20 years, the number is expected to soar by about 60 percent, and three-quarters of the cases will be in developing countries.
"By 2025, we project that the number of adults with hypertension will be 1.56 billion," said Jiang He of Tulane University School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine in New Orleans.
Cardiovascular disease is already one of the top killers in most countries and accounts for 30 percent of all deaths worldwide.
In the first study to estimate the total burden of hypertension in the world, the Tulane scientists compiled published research on regional and national figures from 1980 to 2002 to estimate the current and future worldwide prevalence.
In 2000, 333 million adults in developed countries and 639 million in poor nations had hypertension. Prevalence in developing nations -- predicted to rise by 80 percent -- will account for most of the increase. Latin America and the Caribbean have a particularly high prevalence of hypertension, according to the research published in the Lancet medical journal.
-- From News Services
