Health Highlights: June 25, 2009

Each year, between 20,000 and 40,000 Americans are in contact with a rabid animal. About 1,000 get just three or four shots and none have come down with rabies, which was a factor in the committee's decision, the AP said.

The committee advises the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which prepares official guidelines for doctors.

Until the 1970s, people had to have 14 shots in the abdomen after exposure to rabies, but improved vaccines led the government to ease that requirement.

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Insurance Improves Odds of Having a Doctor: Report

Young American adults who don't have health insurance are about half as likely as those with coverage to have a regular doctor (36 percent vs. 70 percent), says a federal government report released Wednesday.

About five million adults ages 19 to 23 didn't have health insurance for the entire year in 2006, and 30 percent said they didn't think coverage was worth the cost, according to the latest News and Numbers from the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality.

More than two-thirds of young adults without insurance for the entire year did not see a doctor. Men were more likely than women to be uninsured -- 30 percent vs. 18 percent.

The AHRQ also said that 46 percent (2.2 million) of uninsured young adults worked full time and 26 percent (1.3 million) worked part time. The majority -- about 81 percent -- of the five million young adults without coverage through all of 2006 were not full-time students.