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Today President Obama declared H1N1 swine flu a national public health emergency. I was a little alarmed when I saw the headlines announcing this development today. There haven't been any significant changes in the status of the virus or the pandemic, so why is it a national emergency now? It turns out this declaration is really to help health care officials deal with the pandemic more easily rather than a result of any changes in the situation. In declaring a national emergency, President Obama gave the chief of the US Health and Human Services, Kathleen Sebelius, power to bypass federal laws in regards to how health care sites operate. Emergency rooms may be able to operate clinics away from hospitals (such as in schools and parking lots) to help prevent the spread of the virus to people who need to seek treatment for other problems. It also changes how hospitals can handle financial matters - requiring less paperwork so they can see patients more quickly and allowing federal reimbu

Obama: national emergency for swine flu; help for hospitals to speed treatment for infected

President Obama Saturday declared the H1N1 flu a national emergency, clearing the way for legal waivers to allow hospitals and doctors offices to better handle a surge of new patients.

Parents should take extra care in selecting toys for young children and supervising their play during the holidays, according to a leading eye surgeon. According to Dr. Mark Borchert, director, The Vision Center at Childrens Hospital Los Angeles, certain toys, such as BB guns, pose a particular danger for young children. 'While a BB gun pellet may not break the skin of a young child, it can puncture his eye very easily.

Patients who die in the hospital in the United States are almost five times as likely to have spent part of their last hospital stay in the ICU than patients in England. What's more, over the age of 85, ICU usage among terminal patients is eight times higher in the U.S. than in England, according to new research from Columbia University that compared the two countries' use of intensive care services during final hospitalizations.

A new study in China has found that people with higher levels of pesticide exposure are more likely to have suicidal thoughts. The study was carried out by Dr Robert Stewart from the Institute of Psychiatry at King's College London together with scientists from Tongde Hospital Zhejiang Province. The agricultural pesticides commonly used in China are organophosphates which are in wide use in many lower income countries but have been banned in many Western nations.