A recent study published in The New England Journal of Medicine, reports that Campath, a Genzyme (GENZ) drug already approved for leukemia, could be one of the most effective treatments for multiple sclerosis, as it shows potential for reversing the disease.  Researchers found patients on Campath recovered lost motor functions somewhat and, seemed less disabled three years after trial participation.  The study results suggest that Campath allows damaged nerve tissue to repair.

In a first of its kind, health insurer Aetna Inc. teaming up with Microsoft Corp. is offering clients medical record storage, allowing them to access the Internet-based vault, even if they change jobs or replace their health plan for another.  According to Wall Street Journal, beginning next month, all Aetna clients will be able to transfer information from their Aetna ‘personal health record’, an online repository of data, such as, claims, diagnoses, test results and prescriptions, to HealthVault.  Patients will be allowed to choose what they want to transfer between Aetna and Microsoft.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported a rise in food allergies in American children with four out of every 100 kids affected. The allergies which affect about 3 million children, doubles their risk of asthma and triples their risk of skin or respiratory allergies.

Amy Barnum, MSPH, CDC health statistician said, "It is a significant trend -- food allergies do appear to be continuously increasing over the decade. And if you look at hospital discharges with any diagnosis related to food allergy, there has been a significant increase."

The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation said it would hand out 104 grants of $100,000 each to scientists and researchers in 22 countries. The theme was “bold, untested” ideas to improve global health and the 104 were selected from 4000 applications which were twice as many as initially planned.

Dr. Tachi Yamada, president of global health at the Gates Foundation was to announce the first round of its Grand Challenges Explorations grants at a global health meeting in Bangkok.

Yamada said, “The quality of the applications exceeded all of our expectations. It was so hard for reviewers to champion just one great idea that we selected almost twice as many projects for funding as we had initially planned.”

Ixtapa, a Mexican restaurant has been identified as the source of E. coli infection that affected 17 people in Snohomish County.

According to health officials 13 out of the total 17 victims had eaten at Ixtapa. The owners have voluntarily closed the restaurant after the reports. Snohomish Health District officials said that they were co operating with them to resolve the problem.

The place is being sanitized. The health officials are pinning down the exact cause of the infection.

Health District spokeswoman Suzanne Pate said, "It's like looking for a needle in the haystack.”