HPV Vaccine Might Not Have Caused Girl's Death, Expert Says
A British teen died soon after being vaccinated with GlaxoSmithKline's HPV vaccine Cervarix, health officials are saying. For now, the 14-year-old girl's cause of death is unexplained. But Caron Grainger, the joint director of public health in the city of Coventry, says that it is unlikely the vaccine caused her death, Reuters reports. Grainger says parents should continue having their children vaccinated under the immunization program offered by the National Health Service. Grainger said that so far, 2,000 reported adverse vaccine reactions had been minor, Reuters reports. Earlier this month, a Food and Drug Administration advisory committee recommended that Cervarix be approved for use in the United States. The FDA often, but not always, follows the recommendations of its advisory panels.
[Video: Advice for Parents on Gardasil Vaccine for HPV].
Parents Keep Teen Drivers Safe When They Control the Car Keys
Car crashes are the leading cause of death among teens. But it turns out there's one simple way to keep kids safer: Don't give teens a car they consider their own, U.S. News contributor Nancy Shute writes.
According to a new survey, teenagers who were the main person driving a vehicle rather than sharing it with other family members were more than twice as likely to be involved in a recent crash. One in four drivers with primary access to a car had experienced an accident while driving in the past year, compared with 1 in 10 with shared access, Shute reports. Teens with their own car also were more likely to use a cellphone while driving and to speed. Seventy percent of teens polled reported having their own car. Researchers at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia who conducted the survey advise parents to consider delaying giving a child a car at least until the teenager has been driving for a year. The results are published in the journal Pediatrics.
A second study by CHOP researchers found that children of parents who have authoritative or authoritarian parenting styles were 50 percent less likely to have had a crash in the past year, compared with parents whose style is permissive or uninvolved. Read more.
[Read: 3 ways to keep kids from texting while driving and why firm parents keep teen drivers safe.]
Health Advice: Are 'Swine Flu Parties' Safe?
Is it safe for parents to throw a "swine flu party" with the intent of exposing their children to the virus? U.S. New s's expert on children's health Judith Palfrey put the question to Thomas Sandora, the director of infection control at Children's Hospital in Boston.
Sandora says swine flu parties are a dangerous gamble and a big mistake. The novel H1N1 influenza virus is predicted to be the predominant circulating strain of flu in the country this winter. It is true, he says, that infection with an influenza virus can produce immunity to that strain—that's the principle by which vaccination works. However, catching this novel H1N1 flu virus can be extremely dangerous. Children under 5 years old, people with underlying illnesses such as asthma, and pregnant women are all at risk of complications from influenza, Sandora says. Read more.
[Slide Show: 10 Do's and Don'ts to Protect Yourself From Swine Flu].
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