Week of April 26, 2006

BBC News

Video: Gift of Life -- Strangers To Be Allowed to Donate Organs
Gill Higgins
Apr. 26, 2006
"Live organ donation from strangers will be allowed under new human tissue legislation. Currently, live donation can only take place between people who are genetically or emotionally connected."

Video: Hewitt Heckled by Furious Nurses
Andrew Burroughs
Apr. 26 2006
"Health Secretary Patricia Hewitt has been heckled for the second time in three days by health workers. Ms. Hewitt was jeered and slow hand-clapped by nurses at a conference in Bournemouth."

Image Gallery: Fighting Hunger in Haiti
"Haiti is one of the poorest countries in the Western hemisphere -- more than half its inhabitants survive on less than $1 per day. Every year, an estimated 38,000 children under the age of five die -- almost one out of three because of malnutrition. The situation is particularly serious in the remote village of Chauffard, high in the mountains above the capital, Port-au-Prince."

ABC News: World News Tonight

Video: How's Medicare Doing? Seniors Respond
Lisa Stark
Apr. 25, 2006
"Many seniors and their doctors are pleased with the prescription drug plan."

Video: U.S. Death Rate Drops
David Muir
Apr. 19, 2006
"A new report finds that Americans are living longer than ever."

The News Hour with Jim Lehrer

Polio: An American Story
Susan Dentzer
Apr. 24, 2006
"A conversation with David Oshinsky, this year's Pulitzer Prize winner in history, about the battle against polio."

Video: Substance Abuse Increases Among Women
Susan Dentzer
Apr. 21, 2006
"Women are falling victim to substance abuse in increasing numbers in recent years."

NBC News: Dateline

Video: Outbreak -- Could It Happen Here?
Ann Curry
Apr. 23, 2006
"Some of the world's top flu experts helped Dateline create a vision of how our lives could change if the avian flu jumps to humans, and triggers a pandemic." (Requires Internet Explorer)

CBS News: 60 Minutes

Video: Aging In The 21st Century
Steve Croft
Apr. 23, 2006
"Steve Kroft investigates the new multi-billion dollar field of anti-aging medicine, in which diet, exercise and even controversial drugs play a role in helping people feel and look younger." (Related story)

Week of April 19, 2006

The News Hour with Jim Lehrer

Video and Audio: Mumps Reappears in Midwest
Ray Suarez
Apr. 20, 2006
"The largest mumps outbreak in more than two decades has hit the Midwest with confirmed cases in at least eight states. Dr. Julie Gerberding, director of the Centers for Disease Control, offers an update on efforts to contain the virus."

World Health Organization

Video & Web Photo Series: 'Great Expectations'
Apr. 20, 2006
"In Great Expectations, six mothers living in different countries of the world are sharing their experiences of pregnancy, childbirth, and life with a young baby. The babies are now one year old. This is the final installment of Great Expectations. The series was launched over 12 months ago to highlight World Health Day 2005 -- the theme of which was maternal and child health."

CBS Evening News

Video: A Doctor and a Vet Collaborate Against Cancer
Richard Schlesinger
Apr. 18, 2006
"Every month or so, Dr. Ross Wilkins and Dr. Stephen Withrow meet for breakfast to discuss new treatments for bone cancer. It's a most unusual partnership, reports CBS News correspondent Richard Schlesinger. The two doctors are fighting the same kind of disease with the same kind of treatment -- but they work with very different kinds of patients. Dr. Wilkins is a bone cancer specialist -- and Dr. Withrow is a veterinary oncologist...The collaboration of the two doctors has paid off big for both people and pets. Wilkins has been able to raise the survival rate of his human patients from 70 to 92 percent. Withrow says his canine patients are living four times longer." (Related story)

NBC Nightly News

Video: Katrina Families Suffer Health Problems
Martin Savidge
April 18, 2006
"A new study finds displaced Hurricane Katrina families suffer chronic health problems -- especially the children. NBC's Martin Savidge reports." (Requires Internet Explorer)

BBC News

Video: Prime Minister To Press On with NHS Reform
James Hardy
Apr. 18, 2006
"The prime minister has called on health professionals to 'hold their nerve' as he pushes through NHS reforms. Tony Blair has pledged to cut waiting lists to a maximum of 18 weeks by 2008. James Hardy reports." (Related story)

The New York Times

Audio and Photo Slideshow: Drought in Africa
Ben Werschkul
Apr. 18, 2006
"Ben Werschkul reports on the drought that has ravished the Horn of Africa."

ABC News: World News Tonight

Video: Struggle Against Pricey Prescription Pills
Apr. 16, 2006
"Why it's getting harder every day to find ways to save on prescription drugs."

CBS News: 60 Minutes

Video: Too Many Men in China
Leslie Stahl
Apr. 16, 2006
"As China's President Hu Jintao makes his first official visit to the United States this week, his nation faces a demographic time bomb that could affect its stability. With more than a billion people, China has too many men. According to the latest census, an average of 120 boys are born for every 100 girls, the greatest imbalance in the world. As correspondent Lesley Stahl reports, the root of the problem is a traditional preference for sons." (Related story)

Here & Now, National Public Radio

Audio: Post Polio Syndrome
Apr. 12, 2006
"1979 marked the last U.S. case of polio, but also the first time polio survivors began to complain of new problems."

Week of April 12, 2006

PBS

Video: Rx for Survival -- The Heroes
Apr. 12, 2006
"Using highlights from the acclaimed six-hour Rx for Survival series, this new special focuses on the individual heroes whose tireless perseverance saves millions of lives across the globe. From young polio warriors in India to armies of grandmothers in Nepal, Rx for Survival -- The Heroes takes viewers inside the stirring campaigns that have brought renewed faith to poor communities from Africa to South America." (Related New York Times TV review)

CNN

Video: Germs for Good Health
Elizabeth Cohen
Apr. 11, 200
"Some doctors say early exposure to germs may actually be good for kids' health."

Video: Battle Against Teen Obesity
Dr. Sanjay Gupta
Apr. 7, 2006
"Some teens are turning to a controversial surgery to help battle obesity."

CBS News: The Early Show

Video: Painkiller Killing Kids
Tracy Smith
Apr. 10, 2006
"A painkiller rarely mentioned in drug warnings for kids is now the No. 1 drug that kills young people in several states. Tracy Smith's report on methadone reveals how kids are abusing it and dying."

ABC News

Video: HRT and Breast Cancer
Dr. Tim Johnson
Apr. 11, 2006
"Studies show that use of estrogen does not increase the risk for breast cancer."

Business Week

Slideshow: Taking the Pulse of Medical Training
Reena Jana
Apr. 10, 2006
"Although it looks a lot like a video game, Pulse!! is a serious training tool for nurses and physicians. It's a $7.5 million project that immerses students in the hectic environment of a hospital's intensive care unit and places them in a first-person role as a health-care professional." (Related story)

The New York Times

Video: A Disease's Hidden Agony
Donald G. McNeil Jr.
Apr. 9, 2006
"Times reporter Donald G. McNeil Jr. discusses the eradication efforts for lymphatic filariasis." (Related story)

The Boston Globe

Audio Slideshow: A Personal Lifeline to Somalia
Chris Janiec
Apr. 9, 2006
"Nuuh Hassan strolled into Butterfly Coffee in Roxbury Crossing after a recent week on the job as a sheet-metal worker. Passing tables full of customers, he headed to the back of the cafe where a glassed-in counter houses a money transfer service. There, in a matter of minutes, he sent a lifeline to his family in Somalia -- $150. Six thousand miles to the east, in a coastal town south of the Somali capital, Nuuh's father, Hersi Hassan, received the cash in dollars at a rundown money transfer shop. 'It means survival,' said Hersi Hassan, standing in the sandy courtyard of his home in Merca. He said it means that he, Nuuh's stepmother, and his nine siblings could eat that month."
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National Public Radio

Audio: Romney's Mission -- Massachusetts Health Care
Richard Knox
Apr. 8, 2006
"This week, Massachusetts enacted legislation to provide health insurance for virtually every citizen within the next three years. Gov. Mitt Romney says he'll sign it into law. The measure would be the first in the nation to require people to buy health insurance if they don't get it at work."

Audio: When Physicians Get Cancer
Joanne Silberner
Apr. 6, 2006
"Dealing with a potentially fatal cancer is difficult for anyone, but doctors with cancer face a special challenge. They're accustomed to giving medical care, not receiving it. And they know better than most what their future might look like."

Week of April 5, 2006

ABC News: World News Tonight

Video: One Year Later, Peter Jennings Still Educates Public on Smoking
Apr. 5, 2006
"Peter Jennings's announcement a year ago that he had lung cancer helped change people's attitudes about smoking, according to public health advocates...Thomas J. Glynn of the American Cancer Society called the public declaration a 'watershed event in public health.'" (Related story)

BBC News

Video: Folic Acid 'Should Be Added to Bread'
Ben Ando
Apr. 5, 2006
"Folic acid should be added to flour and bread to reduce the number of birth defects, the food watchdog has said. Folates are already added to food in the United States and Canada." (Related story)

Video: Bird Flu in the U.K.
Tom Heap
Apr. 5, 2006
"Pets, farmers, and government officials are set to take part in an exercise to simulate an outbreak of bird flu. Exercise Hawthorn is designed to analyse how people would react if bird flu was found in the U.K." (Related story)

National Public Radio

Audio: Massachusetts May Require Health Insurance for All
Richard Knox
Apr. 5, 2006
"The Massachusetts legislature has enacted a bill designed to provide health insurance for nearly all its citizens. If Gov. Mitt Romney signs the bill, the state would become the first in the nation to require all individuals to have health coverage or pay a penalty."

Audio: Seeking Avian Flu in Alaska
Elizabeth Arnold
Apr. 5, 2006
"The U.S. government has set an ambitious goal of testing 100,000 birds for [nfluenza A, or H5N1], mainly in Alaska, where wildlife biologists, researchers and public-health officials are hurriedly preparing for the first flocks to land."

CNN

Video: Secrets of Self-Mutilation
Adaora Udoji
Apr. 4, 2006
"CNN's Adaora Udoji reports on a program that helps people whose depression leads to self-mutilation."

Video: Teen Drug Use Declining
Gary Nurenberg
Apr. 3, 2006
"CNN's Gary Nurenberg reports recent numbers show teen drug use is actually on the decline."

NBC Nightly News

Video: Vitamin D May Lower Cancer Risk
Robert Bazell
Apr. 4, 2006
"New studies suggest women who get lots of vitamin D are less likely to develop breast cancer, NBC's Robert Bazell reports." (Requires Internet Explorer)

Video: Kids and Car Seats a Weighty Issue
Janet Shamlian
Apr. 3, 2006
"A study in the Journal of Pediatrics found thousands of kids are too big for their car seats." (Requires Internet Explorer)

The News Hour with Jim Lehrer

Video: The World Food Program
Jeffrey Brown
Mar. 29, 2006
"The head of the World Food Program talks about how donations are solicited and distributed."