Budget update brings deficit blowout and hits to health and aged care

Dec 15, 2015 08:14 am UTC| Health

Health, welfare compliance and aged care have been targeted for savings in a budget update that forecasts deficits bigger than forecast in May and pushes out further the return to surplus. In some 180 savings measures...

Indonesia's 'war on drugs' may bring health crisis

Dec 15, 2015 07:21 am UTC| Health

Indonesias war on drugs is jeopardising years of hard work by civil society and public health sector to provide harm-reduction interventions. These have successfully reduced rates of HIV prevalence and other blood-borne...

Health Check: will intermittent fasting diets help you lose weight?

Dec 14, 2015 17:57 pm UTC| Health

Intermittent fasting diets involve periods of fasting cycled with periods of feeding. Fasting involves a zero or reduced calorie intake from foods and drinks. Feeding can involve food and drink consumption under strict...

Don't believe the hype – your complementary medicines are unlikely to deliver

Dec 14, 2015 17:45 pm UTC| Health

We recently submitted a complaint about the promotion of Ease-a-Cold products, which claim to be clinically proven to shorten your cold. The complaint highlights a number of long-standing problems with the regulation of...

What a man eats can affect his sperm – and future generations

Dec 14, 2015 16:30 pm UTC| Health

A previously discredited evolutionary theory, called Lamarckism, is being revived thanks to a new understanding of heredity called epigenetic inheritance. In 1809, the French evolutionist Jean-Baptiste Lamarck put...

Drinking on the gay scene: why we need to take it more seriously

Dec 11, 2015 15:26 pm UTC| Health

Gay bars and clubs have been at the heart of LGBT culture in the modern era. But where chemsex has received much of the attention in recent months, voices within the LGBT community have also raised concerns about levels of...

Thalidomide: the drug with a dark side but an enigmatic future

Dec 11, 2015 04:05 am UTC| Health

The drug thalidomide has a notorious past. It was used between 1957-62 as a sedative and to treat morning sickness in early pregnancy but a serious side effect resulted in over 10,000 children born with severe birth...