There maybe some light at the end of this insidious tunnel.

Alzheimer's Development as Cellular Cleaners Offer Hope for New Treatments.

Scientists may have uncovered a new mechanism for treating Alzheimer's disease, offering hope to millions of patients worldwide.

The discovery involves the activation of the brain's cellular clean-up crew, resulting in improvements in memory and cognitive function in mouse models......

.....Today, there is no known cure for Alzheimer's, although scientists believe that it is caused by the abnormal buildup of proteins in and around the brain cells. In the past, scientists observed that special immune cells in the brain called astrocytes became activated in response to these protein clumps. But the mechanisms by which the astrocytes are able to remove the protein clumps are not well understood.

Now, scientists from the Korea Institute of Science and Technology, along with the Institute for Basic Science and Boston University, have shown that the presence of these protein clumps activates cellular recycling pathways in these cells, turning them into protein clearing machines.

The transformation appears to be mediated by temporarily switching on specific genes involved in this recycling process. Therefore, the research team hypothesized that if we were able to artificially induce this transformation, we might be able to facilitate the removal of these protein clumps in the brains of Alzheimer's patients.

To explore this further, the team used a group of genetically engineered mice that have been designed to model Alzheimer's disease. They found that, by activating these recycling genes, the damaged neurons in the mice's brains began to recover, resulting in improved memory and cognitive functions.

Meanwhile, inhibiting these genes showed a significant worsening of Alzheimer's symptoms, including an increased build-up of these protein clumps and subsequent neuronal damage.

More work needs to be done to confirm these results in humans, but the study offers new insights into the protective mechanisms used by our brains to ward off neurodegenerative disorders, and proposes a potential new therapeutic target for future drug development....

Not a good read:


Unleashed by Boris Johnson review – memoirs of a clown
wrote:

All the fancy verbiage in the world cannot disguise the emptiness at the heart of this self-serving, solipsistic book...

... But Boris Johnson does not do reflective. He never has and he never will. And nor does his new memoir, with its unnerving title...

... if it is heart-searching and confessions you seek from the pen of Britain’s most iconoclastic prime minister, you can stop now...

... describing how Johnson felt in April 2020 when he had to be transferred from Downing Street to St Thomas’ hospital suffering from Covid: "It wasn’t just the physical distress; it was the guilt, the political embarrassment of it all..."

... There’s a lot worth parsing there. And plenty that is characteristic of Johnson’s writing more generally ... then there’s also the sheer dishonesty and the lies. In reality, Johnson was a chronically indecisive prime minister, emphatically not one who led from the front ... His solipsistic admission that he thought going into hospital was an embarrassing look for a leader shows where his instinctive priorities lay...

... Yet listen to the Covid inquiry, and the evidence of what things were really like at the heart of Johnson’s government in 2020 is jaw-dropping. “I’ve never seen a bunch of people less well equipped to run a country,” said the cabinet secretary...

Indeed: "He is not going to change."


In my most humble opinion:

Deadly buffoonery at the highest.


Stay safe folks?
Martin

---

See new freedom: Mageia Linux
Take a look for yourself: Linux Format
The Future is what We all make IT (GPLv3)

Will the venom of our most deadliest spider really help? Researchers intend to find out.

World-first Aussie research using funnel-web venom molecule to treat heart attacks.

World-first Australian research is using funnel-web spider venom to protect the heart during heart attacks.

The University of Queensland researchers have on Sunday been granted $17m of government money to run clinical trials.

Project leader Glenn King says the drug, which mimics the venom, has the potential to save thousands of lives each year and “drastically improve” the quality of life for heart attack survivors.

Seven-thousand Australians die of a heart attack each year, and in total 55,000 have an attack annually. Heart attacks are the leading cause of death globally.

The researchers discovered a peptide which protects the heart during a heart, and also improves the viability of a donor heart.

Funnel-webs have the Hi1a peptide as protection from predators, but in humans, the peptide stops heart and brain cells from dying. In this research the spider peptide is synthesised in a lab.

The drug has already been shown effective in treating stroke. On Sunday the Federal Health Minister announced the government was granting $17.8m over five years for development.........

More of the Unleashed of Boris Johnson:


‘I felt like Achilles in a hard hat’: an extract from Boris Johnson’s ‘alternative’ memoir
wrote:

Unleashed, the former PM’s account of his days in office, is published today. But other versions of the truth are also available …

When it was announced that Boris Johnson was to publish an honest account of his time in Downing Street, we all thought: how honest would it be?...

... No. He has characteristically omitted from his book...

... with an even more honest appraisal of those Big Dog Days. In a companion, so-called “parody” volume to his own brilliant memoir, I present his life as a series of useful life lessons: If It Ain’t Fixed, Break It; A Lie Isn’t A Lie If It’s A Joke, etc.

But I have also corrected the public perception of events which culminated in his being forced out by what he courageously called a “media-driven hoo-hah”. The Guardian has selected some uncontroversial extracts from that ultra-honest timeline, below …

Ouch!

How do we let such politicians in to play such (deadly) 'games' with our lives?...


Only in the UK?
Martin

---

See new freedom: Mageia Linux
Take a look for yourself: Linux Format
The Future is what We all make IT (GPLv3)

There's hope for a better vaccine.

Australia’s first mRNA Covid vaccine candidate could solve ‘immune imprinting’ problem.

Researchers developing Australia’s first mRNA Covid vaccine say they may have solved the “immune imprinting” issue that has contributed to the declining effectiveness of boosters as the virus mutates.

Immune imprinting, also known as original antigenic sin, occurs when the body’s original immune response to a virus — either from vaccination or infection — becomes less effective against new variants of the same virus.

The Australian-based vaccine candidate, being developed by the Monash Institute of Pharmaceutical Sciences (MIPS) in collaboration with the Doherty Institute, aims to tackle the problem by encoding the proteins on the surface of the receptor-binding domain — the tip of the virus ‘spike’.

In a preclinical study, published in Molecular Therapy Methods and Clinical Development, the researchers tested their mRNA ‘membrane-anchored receptor-binding domain’ (mRNA RBD-TM) vaccine against ancestral Covid vaccines by comparing third-dose immune responses to Omicron variants in mice.......

Avery, a singer with a substantial social media following, said in a recent video that Ozempic gave her a bone-thinning disease after taking the weight loss drug for one year.

averyofficial
Breaking down the history of my ED in depth so people can better understand how things like this happen I’m spreading awareness because these medications have now become WAY too available - they are sold at plastic surgery offices, med spas, and online websites where you can just lie about your weight to get it. Because of this, many people with body dismorphia are getting this medication to drop weight way quicker than is natural - and it comes with consequences!!! Please do your research, and ask yourself if it is really worth the long term side effects. It was not worth it for me. #greenscreen #ozempic #edawareness #osteoporosis #eatingdisorder

Ya can't get clearer than this:


COVID shots protect kids from long COVID—and don’t cause sudden death


... But...

How long has that taken to undo the deadly games of the Conspiracy theorists?...

Will MAGA ever even notice reality until after they're already diseased and dead?


Stay safe folks!
Martin

---

See new freedom: Mageia Linux
Take a look for yourself: Linux Format
The Future is what We all make IT (GPLv3)

I did not have my three children vaccinated against COVID because to date there is not a single regularly approved COVID vaccine here that has proven in clinical tests that its positive effects outweigh the negative ones. This criterion has been required for every other vaccine in the past, and it cannot be any different with COVID. During the pandemic, governments acted with emergency approvals and liability exemptions for the pharma industry. There was probably no other way back then.

How Near-Death Experiences Arise in the Brain

Researchers put forward a comprehensive model outlining the conditions that may give rise to the vivid mental phenomena that some people experience as they near death

Everyone dies, but what actually transpires during that process is a deep mystery that scientists are only beginning to seriously investigate. Increasingly, near-death experiences, or NDEs, are part of that growing field.

It's time to breakout the Buzz Off.

Japanese encephalitis and other mosquito-borne viruses likely to rise after record-breaking Queensland rain.

Queenslanders are being warned of an expected surge in mosquito-borne viruses after flooding rain, as the state records its second death this year from Japanese encephalitis.

With towns like Thargomindah, in Queensland's south-west, still inundated following record rainfall in parts of the state, authorities say it could be weeks before waters completely recede.

Infectious disease physician Paul Griffin said mosquito populations were likely to surge.

"We've had some extraordinary rainfall events in recent times right across the state, so that is likely to translate into an increase in mosquito numbers and therefore, an increase in mosquito-borne infections," Dr Griffin said.

"We typically see an increase of Ross River and Barmah Forest virus around this time of year, and we've also had significant cases of dengue and an expansion of Japanese encephalitis as far down as south-east Queensland."......

The same will also apply to those here in northern, north west and western NSW.

CDC struggling to fight raging measles outbreak after deep funding, staff cuts
wrote:

In first 4 months of the year, US measles cases are over double last year's count...

... the explosive measles outbreak mushrooming out of West Texas will require "significant financial resources" to control and that the agency is already struggling to keep up...

... "I find it absolutely devastating that we're having this update today," ACIP chair Keipp Talbot said at the outset of Sugerman's update. "There's no reason why we have healthy children dying of measles in the US..."

Keep off the Trump bleach and the Trump endorsed horse drugs stuff!!!


Stay healthy folks?...
Martin

---

See new freedom: Mageia Linux
Take a look for yourself: Linux Format
The Future is what We all make IT (GPLv3)

Trump's Secretary of Health must stop telling people that EVERY vaccination is harmful.
The measles vaccination campaigns of the past have almost eradicated this disease everywhere. Looking at the statistics, no one would question the helpfulness of measles vaccination. That's simply stupid.

In Germany it's mandatory for kids to attend kindergartens and school; original documents are rigorously checked by the health authority and again by school staff. Here, too, an increasing number of ignorant parents don't hesitate to challenge authorities; demand compulsory education for their kids without measles vaccination. Where? In the wealthiest Wilhelminian-era neighborhoods of Berlin (well-educated, left-wing Green Party voters). Crazy people everywhere.

"Defunded"?...


Screwworms are coming—and they’re just as horrifying as they sound
wrote:

... Anyone who falls victim to screwworms is figuratively—well, you know...

... And yet Trump "defunds" the National Institute of Health..?!


You're screwed??? (So far, only in America...)

Stay safe folks?...
Martin

---

See new freedom: Mageia Linux
Take a look for yourself: Linux Format
The Future is what We all make IT (GPLv3)

... And yet Trump "defunds" the National Institute of Health..?!

And the Dept of Education. Sick and dumb. That makes America Grate.

... And yet Trump "defunds" the National Institute of Health..?!

And the Dept of Education. Sick and dumb. That makes America Grate.

His argument is, the department over the years expanded its budget as well as its number of administrative employees multifold.

These numbers increased inversely proportional to the in average decreasing educational standard over the decades of this federal education department's existence. Therefore, he wants to return this authority to the federal states. As with everything Trump does, he will wreak havoc here too, from which, in a best case scenario, something better can emerge after a couple of years. The states are responsible now to improve education in schools.

The states are responsible now to improve education in schools.

Most states are bankrupt and with no way to raise tax revenue.

Broken Heart Syndrome Remains A Killer, Especially For Men

“Broken heart syndrome” sounds like a romantic, fairy-tale notion — the idea that suffering a devastating loss that can cause one’s heart to wither.

But this syndrome, formally known as Takotsubo cardiomyopathy, continues to be associated with a high rate of death and illness, researchers reported May 14 in the Journal of the American Heart Association.

Just under 7% of people with broken heart syndrome died between 2016 and 2020, researchers found.

That’s nearly three times higher than the death rate of more than 2% among people without Takotsubo cardiomyopathy, according to the study.

Broken heart syndrome is especially hard on men, even though the study found that 83% of people who develop the disorder are women.

Men had more than double the rate of deaths from broken heart syndrome, at 11% compared to just over 5% in women, researchers found.

On my maternal side of the family, my great-great-grandparents died within six days of each other, which was said to be a broken heart.

So true. I see it too often at work. One gone, then the other. (if you have forgotten I work in death care)

1 step closer to a cure.

‘Overwhelmed’: Major breakthrough from Aussie researchers in HIV study.

Australian researchers have found a way to force the HIV virus out of hiding within cells, opening the way to eradicate the virus from the body.

The human immunodeficiency virus is able to hide within white blood cells, presenting a serious roadblock for scientists pursuing a cure.

Research from Melbourne’s Peter Doherty Institute for Infection and Immunity, published in late-May, says work towards a cure is one step closer.

The next hurdle is analysing whether revealing the virus allows the body’s immune system to fight off the virus or if additional treatments need to be combined.

“In terms of specifically the field of HIV cure, we have never seen anything close to as good as what we are seeing in terms of how well we are able to reveal this virus,” co-author Paula Cevaal told the Guardian.

“We were overwhelmed by how night-and-day difference it was – from not working before, and then all of a sudden it was working. And all of us were just sitting gasping like, ‘Wow’.”

The HIV that hides in white blood cells can reactivate.

The Peter Doherty Institute researchers used custom-made fat bubbles to deliver mRNA into cells where HIV is hiding. The mRNA tells the cells to reveal the virus.

Messenger RNA is a molecule that contains instructions for cells to make a protein. The technology rose to prominence during the Covid-19 pandemic.....