© 2002 Canadian Medical Association or its licensors Obesity is now pandemic, affecting millions of people worldwide. In rich countries, between 10% and 20% of people are obese, and the problem is not unknown even in poor countries. In the United States, the National Institutes of Health and the surgeon general have acknowledged the importance of the problem and are developing public health str...

To assess Q fever in France, we analyzed data for 1985-2009 from the French National Reference Center. A total of 179,794 serum samples were analyzed; 3,723 patients (one third female patients) had acute Q fever. Yearly distribution of acute Q fever showed a continuous increase. Periodic variations were observed in monthly distribution during January 2000-December 2009; cases peaked during Apri...

During 1985-2005, a total of 91 laboratory-confirmed outbreaks of foodborne botulism occurred in Canada; these outbreaks involved 205 cases and 11 deaths. Of the outbreaks, 75 (86.2%) were caused by Clostridium botulinum type E, followed by types A (7, 8.1%) and B (5, 5.7%). Approximately 85% of the outbreaks occurred in Alaska Native communities, particularly the Inuit of Nunavik in northern Q...

Advocates of rent control often argue that rent control aids the mixing of rich and poor, and perhaps of the races as well. Economic theory does not necessarily predict that rent control will reduce segregation. The best case for rent control as an aid to integration is that it creates pockets of low rent (and low quality) apartments in expensive cities. However, by creating an excess of demand...

165 The total number of births registered in 1920 in the Federated Malay States was 36,566, while deaths of children under a year of age was 6,920 giving an infant mortality rate of 194 per 1,000 live births. Convulsions, the cause assigned to 3,460 deaths for that year, was actually not a disease but a symptom. Most of the deaths were probably caused by gastro-intestinal troubles reportedly th...

The 84.3 million workers protected by workers' compensation laws in 1985 represented 87 percent of all wage and salary workers in that year. Both the amount of benefits paid to workers and the cost of the program to employers rose substantially from 1984 to 1985. Benefit payments totaled $22.5 billion-14.1 percent higher than in 1984 and the largest annual increase since 1978-79. About two-thir...

Results of a long-term (1985–1999) photometric study of the VY Scl novalike TT Ari and CCD spectroscopic observations of the star in the region of Hα are presented. Photoelectric UBV observations carried out at Rozhen and Belogradchik observatories confirmed ∼ 6 years cyclical variability of the accretion disc luminosity in high state found by frequency analysis of 70 years long light curve. Th...

Few who were actively engaged in malaria vaccine research 20 years ago (including myself) would have imagined that, in 2005, there would still be a prediction of a 10-20-year horizon before vaccines become part of malaria-control strategies. Why is it still proving so challenging to produce effective vaccines?