Health Highlights: July 10, 2009

• Cookie Dough E. Coli Doesn't Match Outbreak Strain: FDA
• Pentagon Looks to Crack Down on Tobacco Use
• Heart Patient Death Rates Vary Widely in U.S.: Study
• Michael Jackson's Use of White Glove Linked to Lupus: Report

Here are some of the latest health and medical news developments, compiled by editors of HealthDay:

Cookie Dough E. Coli Doesn't Match Outbreak Strain: FDA

The strain of E. coli that sickened at least 69 people in 30 states doesn't match the strain found in a sample of raw cookie dough from the Nestlé USA plant in Danville, Va., says the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, the Associated Press reported.

Nestlé last month recalled all Toll House refrigerated cookie dough products made at the plant after the FDA told the company it suspected people had become sick after eating raw cookie dough contaminated with E. coli.

The finding that the strain found in the cookie dough and the strain that caused the 30-state outbreak are different could mean the dough was contaminated with multiple strains, the AP reported.

The company is working with the FDA on the ongoing investigation.

More than 1,000 tests have been done at the Danville plant, according to Nestlé, including thorough inspections of production lines, equipment and ingredients tests, and reviews of quality and safety procedures, the AP reported.

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Pentagon Looks to Crack Down on Tobacco Use

Tobacco use among U.S. troops should be forbidden and the sale of tobacco on military property banned, Pentagon health experts say.

They want Defense Secretary Robert Gates to adopt proposals from a federal Institute of Medicine study that calls for a phased-in ban over a number of years, perhaps as long as two decades, USA Today reported.

Tobacco use among U.S. troops is rising, leading to higher costs for the federal government, said the study, released late last month.

Tobacco-related costs for the Pentagon total $846 million a year in medical care and lost productivity, and the Department of Veterans Affairs spends up to $6 billion treating tobacco-related illnesses, according to the study, USA Today reported.

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Heart Patient Death Rates Vary Widely in U.S.: Study

Hospitals in Arkansas, Oklahoma and California have the highest death rates for patients with heart attack or heart failure, while hospitals in northeastern states such as New Jersey and Massachusetts have the lowest rates, says a Yale University School of Medicine study.

Among hospitals across the United States, 25 percent of patients hospitalized for heart failure and 20 percent of heart attack survivors were readmitted within 30 days, which indicates "uniformly poor performance," said the researchers, Bloomberg news reported.

The study authors analyzed Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services data on almost 600,000 hospital admissions for heart attack and more than one million admissions for heart failure between July 2005 and June 2008.

They found that a median of 16.6 percent of heart attack patients died within 30 days of being admitted to a hospital. Rates ranged from 10.9 percent in the best-performing hospitals to 24.9 percent in the worst.

The findings indicate "that patients' outcomes are dependent, at least in part, on the hospital that provides their care," study leader Dr. Harlan Krumholz said in an e-mailed statement to Bloomberg. "If we could better understand how the best hospitals achieve their results and help the hospitals that are not doing as well improve, we could save many more lives."

The study appears in the journal Circulation: Cardiovascular Quality and Outcomes.

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Michael Jackson's Use of White Glove Linked to Lupus: Report

Pop star Michael Jackson's famous white glove and his occasional use of a surgical mask and umbrella to avoid sun exposure may have been connected to the chronic autoimmune disorder lupus.

The singer's physician, Dr. Arnie Klein, on Wednesday told "Good Morning America" that he'd diagnosed Jackson with lupus, a disease in which the immune system attacks the body, causing inflammation, pain and damage to certain tissues, ABC News reported.

What's known about Jackson's other medical conditions may also point to lupus, Dr. Robert Lahita, an autoimmune disease expert and a professor of medicine at Mount Sinai Medical School, told "Good Morning America."

"He had a form of skin lupus, called discoid lupus, which affects about 40 percent of the patients with lupus," Lahita said. Discoid lupus can lead to depigmentation of the skin, among other problems.

"Michael Jackson acknowledged having vitiligo, having splotches of the skin," Lahita said, ABC News reported. Vitiligo is common with autoimmune disease. Patients with vitiligo are normally advised to avoid sun expsoure, which may explain Jackson's use of an umbrella on sunny days.

The white glove and surgical masks may have been used to camouflage the white skin patches caused by vitligo, he said.