LONDON (Reuters) – Scientists have used human embryonic stem cells to create an embryo-like research model to help them study some of the earliest stages of human development. The model overcomes some of the ethical restrictions on using human embryos for rese... More »
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The U.S. Supreme Court on Friday took up an appeal by President Donald Trump’s administration seeking to enforce new federal rules allowing employers to obtain religious exemptions from an Obamacare requirement that health insurance that... More »
BEIJING (Reuters) – An unmarried Chinese woman filed a suit against a hospital on Monday for rejecting her request to undergo a medical procedure to freeze her eggs due to her marital status, in China’s first legal challenge of a woman fighting for her reprodu... More »
(Reuters Health) – Obese women who have weight-loss surgery between pregnancies may be less likely to experience complications like high blood pressure and preterm births in their second pregnancy, a recent study suggests. Researchers examined hospital records... More »
(Reuters Health) – When insurance covers in vitro fertilization, more women struggling with infertility, especially those with limited financial resources, will use the method to improve their chances of having a baby, a new study suggests. Researchers found t... More »
Women who develop preeclampsia, a form of dangerously high blood pressure during pregnancy, may face a wide variety of heart problems long after they give birth, a research review concludes. Preeclampsia has long been linked to an increased risk of events like... More »
Men may be more likely to experience fertility problems if their mothers endured stressful life events early in pregnancy, a recent study suggests. Compared to men with mothers who had stress-free early pregnancies, men whose mothers experienced one or more st... More »
(Reuters) – Missouri’s only abortion clinic will remain open for now after a state arbiter on Friday ordered a stay in response to Planned Parenthood’s challenge of the state health department’s refusal to renew the clinic’s license. Planned Parenthood, the wo... More »
ST. LOUIS (Reuters) – Missouri health officials on Friday refused to renew the license of the state’s only abortion clinic, but the facility will remain open for now as a judge left in place an injunction blocking its closure. At a brief state circuit court he... More »
LONDON (Reuters) – A rogue Chinese scientist who caused outrage last year when he said he had created the world’s first “gene-edited” babies in an attempt to protect them from HIV may also have put them at risk with a “foolish” choice of gene, experts said on ... More »
ANAHEIM, Calif. (Reuters) – Walt Disney Co Chief Executive Bob Iger told Reuters on Wednesday it would be “very difficult” for the media company to keep filming in Georgia if a new abortion law takes effect because many people will not want to work in the U.S.... More »
NEW YORK (Reuters) – Americans have become more supportive of abortion rights over the past year, even as a wave of Republican-controlled state governments have imposed new restrictions, according to a Reuters/Ipsos poll released on Sunday. The poll found that... More »
CHICAGO (Reuters) – Prior infection with dengue, a mosquito-borne disease that infects nearly 400 million people a year, could reduce the risk of contracting Zika nearly by half, U.S. and Brazilian researchers reported on Thursday. The finding, published in th... More »
LONDON, Jan 7 (Reuters) – A leading geneticist who ran the conference where a Chinese scientist said he had made the world’s first “gene-edited” babies condemned him on Monday for potentially jeopardizing lives and having no biology training. Robin Lovell-Badg... More »
(Reuters Health) – Early menopause is more likely among women who were exposed to famine in the womb, a recent study in China suggests. Researchers compared the timing of menopause for 751 women born during a famine in China from 1959 to 1961 and for 1,029 wom... More »
(Reuters Health) – – Isotretinoin, a drug for severe chronic acne, has long been linked to miscarriages, birth defects and other serious problems, but a research review suggests much of data on the drug’s safety, effectiveness and side effects may be unreliabl... More »
LONDON, Dec 4 (Reuters) – A woman in Brazil who received a womb transplanted from a deceased donor has given birth to a baby girl in the first successful case of its kind, doctors reported. The case, published in The Lancet medical journal, involved connecting... More »
LONDON (Reuters) – An international team of scientists has moved closer to creating artificial embryos after using mouse stem cells to make structures capable of taking a crucial step in the development of life. Experts said the results suggested human embryos... More »
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Brett Kavanaugh, the consummate Washington insider picked by President Donald Trump on Monday for a lifetime seat on the U.S. Supreme Court, has viewed business regulations with skepticism in his 12 years as a judge and taken conservativ... More »
LONDON (Reuters) – Scientists have created hybrid embryos from the sperm of near-extinct northern white rhinoceroses in the laboratory, hoping they can ultimately help save the species. The northern white rhino is the world’s most endangered mammal, and its on... More »
(Reuters Health) – Women with undiagnosed celiac disease may be more likely to have miscarriages or stillbirths than women who never get this diagnosis, a Danish study suggests. Once celiac disease is identified and treated with a gluten-free diet, however, wo... More »
(Reuters Health) – Making it easier and more affordable for women to access care, and supporting research that includes how treatments work in both sexes, can improve the health of all Americans, not just women, U.S. doctors argue. “Women and their families ar... More »
(Reuters Health) – Under the Affordable Care Act (ACA) provision allowing adult children to stay on their parents’ health insurance policy until age 26, young women with gynecological cancers were diagnosed and treated sooner, researchers say. Before the law, ... More »
(Reuters Health) – Women who breathe polluted air during pregnancy may be more likely to have children who develop high blood pressure, a U.S. study suggests. Researchers focused on what’s known as fine particulate matter, or PM 2.5, a mixture of solid particl... More »
(Reuters Health) – Hair products used primarily by black women and children contain a host of hazardous chemicals, a new study shows. The findings could explain at least in part why African-American women go through puberty earlier and suffer from higher rates... More »
(Reuters) – Iowa Governor Kim Reynolds signed into law on Friday a bill outlawing abortion after a fetal heartbeat is detected, which often occurs at six weeks and before a woman even realizes she is pregnant, and Reynolds acknowledged the likelihood of a cour... More »
(Reuters Health) – Mothers who are overweight or obese during pregnancy are more likely to have daughters go through early puberty than pregnant women who are a normal weight, a U.S. study suggests. Researchers examined medical records for nearly 15,300 mother... More »
(Reuters Health) – A UK study suggests that diets rich in certain foods may be a factor in the timing of menopause. Researchers who studied more than 14,000 women found that those whose diets included lots of fish and legumes entered menopause years later, on ... More »
(Reuters Health) – Women exposed to high levels of air pollution may have less success getting pregnant with fertility treatments or staying pregnant, compared to women breathing cleaner air, a South Korean study suggests. Researchers analyzed pregnancy rates ... More »
(Reuters) – Kentucky state officials have agreed to hold off enforcing a new law that bans a common abortion procedure from the 11th week of pregnancy until a federal judge rules on a request by a civil liberties group challenging it, according to court papers... More »
(Reuters Health) – Babies’ brains may develop differently when their mothers take antidepressants during pregnancy, a small U.S. study suggests. Researchers examined brain scans of 16 newborns whose mothers took medications known as selective serotonin reuptak... More »
(Reuters Health) – Pregnant women who exercise outside on warm days or spend a little time in a hot bath or sauna may not necessarily raise their body temperature enough to cause problems, a research review suggests. While most women without health problems ca... More »
FILE PHOTO: Doctor Katarzyna Koziol injects sperm directly into an egg during in-vitro fertilization (IVF) procedure called Intracytoplasmic Sperm Injection (ICSI) at Novum clinic in Warsaw, Poland October 26, 2010. REUTERS/Kacper Pempel /File Photo LONDON, (R... More »
An undated picture shows a magnification of a lab-grown fully matured human egg ready for fertilization. Doctor David Albertini/University of Edinburgh/Handout via REUTERS LONDON, (Reuters) – Scientists have succeeded for the first time in growing human eggs i... More »
FILE PHOTO: Signs are placed around a neighborhood as county vector control hand-spray a for adult Aedes mosquitoes after a travel-related case of Zika was confirmed in this the area of San Diego, California, U.S. September 12, 2016. REUTERS/Mike Blake CHICAGO... More »
(Reuters Health) – Women with sleep disorders other than sleep apnea may be more than three times as likely to experience infertility as their counterparts who don’t have trouble sleeping, a recent study suggests. When insomnia was to blame for women’s sleepin... More »
President Donald Trump's administration on Friday undermined requirements under the Obamacare law that employers provide insurance to cover women's birth control, keeping a campaign pledge that pleased his conservative Christian supporters. More »
By Deena BeasleyU.S. scientists have succeeded in altering the genes of a human embryo to correct a disease-causing mutation, making it possible to p More »
A woman holds her stomach at the last stages of her pregnancy in Bordeaux April 28, 2010. REUTERS/Regis Duvignau By Lisa Rapaport(Reuters Health) – Prescription prenatal vitamins may have lower doses of key ingredients like vitamin A, vitamin D, and calcium th... More »
By Cheryl Platzman Weinstock(Reuters Health) – Children born to mothers who experienced fever, especially multiple fevers, during the second trimeste More »
By Lisa Rapaport(Reuters Health) – Women who drink even a little bit of alcohol during pregnancy may be more likely than other mothers to have babies More »
FILE PHOTO — A woman holds a sign in the rain as abortion rights protestors arrive to prepare for a counter protest against March for Life anti-abortion demonstrators on the 39th anniversary of the Roe vs Wade decision, in front of the U.S. Supreme Court build... More »
By Carolyn Crist(Reuters Health) – Despite concerns that children born through Assisted Reproductive Technologies (ART) may develop differently from More »
A member of a pest control team shows a container of mosquito larvae that they collected during their inspection at Zika clusters in Singapore September 5, 2016. REUTERS/Edgar Su/File Photo Singapore on Friday confirmed two cases of locally transmitted infecti... More »
By Gene Emery(Reuters Health) – One risk of taking lithium for bipolar disorder during the first trimester of pregnancy is turning out to be lower th More »
Texas Governor Greg Abbott speaks at a news conference in Austin, Texas, U.S., June 6, 2017. REUTERS/Jon Herskovitz The Texas governor has signed into law new abortion restrictions that include requiring abortion providers to dispose of aborted fetal tissue th... More »
Aedes aegypti mosquitoes are seen at the Laboratory of Entomology and Ecology of the Dengue Branch of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in San Juan, Puerto Rico, March 6, 2016. REUTERS/Alvin Baez/File Photo Puerto Rico on Monday declared that... More »
FILE PHOTO: Aedes aegypti mosquitoes are seen inside Oxitec laboratory in Campinas, Brazil, on February 2, 2016. REUTERS/Paulo Whitaker/File Photo India has reported cases of the Zika virus, the World Health Organization said, adding that efforts should be mad... More »
FILE PHOTO: Aedes aegypti mosquitoes are seen inside Oxitec laboratory in Campinas, Brazil, on February 2, 2016. REUTERS/Paulo Whitaker/File Photo Studies using gene sequencing equipment to trace the path of Zika through the Americas show the virus arrived a y... More »
By Carolyn CristAdolescents who have attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder are much more likely than peers without ADHD to become teenaged parents More »
An artists impression shows a lamb inside a fluid-filled womb-like bag known as an extra-uterine support device developed by the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia.MANDATORY CREDIT Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia handout via REUTERS Scientists in the Unit... More »
FILE PHOTO: A pair of Aedes albopictus mosquitoes are seen during a mating ritual while the female feeds on a blood meal in a 2003 image from the Centers for Disease Control (CDC). REUTERS/Centers for Disease Control/James Gathany/Handout via Reuters Researche... More »
By Gene Emery(Reuters Health) – New evidence from a Danish nationwide study suggests that Sanofi Pasteur’s quadrivalent human papillomavirus vaccine More »
By Carolyn Crist(Reuters Health) – Women with access to free long-term birth control after an abortion are more likely to use it and avoid future pre More »
Scientists in Britain have for the first time created a structure that resembles a mouse embryo using a 3D scaffold and two types of stem cells – research which deepens understanding of the earliest stages of mammalian development. More »
The legs of women are pictured as they walk along a street in Paris, France, October 14, 2015. REUTERS/Jacky Naegelen By Lisa Rapaport(Reuters Health) – – Couples who are obese may take longer to achieve pregnancy than partners who aren’t as overweight, a rece... More »
Aedes aegypti mosquitoes are seen at the Laboratory of Entomology and Ecology of the Dengue Branch of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in San Juan, Puerto Rico, March 6, 2016. REUTERS/Alvin Baez/File Photo Officials in Washington, D.C.’s pub... More »
By Andrew M. Seaman(Reuters Health) – Women aren’t the only ones who may feel depressed when welcoming a newborn: a new study from New Zealand says More »
Planned Parenthood supporters hold signs at a protest in downtown Denver February 11, 2017. REUTERS/Rick Wilking Anti-abortion protesters rallied at scores of Planned Parenthood clinics on Saturday to urge Congress and President Donald Trump to strip the healt... More »
An aedes aegypti mosquito is pictured on a leaf in San Jose, Costa Rica February 1, 2016. REUTERS/Juan Carlos Ulate/File Photo Mexico has confirmed the first case of microcephaly linked to the Zika virus, the health ministry said on Friday. More »
U.S. Vice President Mike Pence waves at the annual March for Life rally in Washington, DC, U.S. January 27, 2017. REUTERS/Yuri Gripas U.S. Vice President Mike Pence fired up tens of thousands of anti-abortion activists who gathered on Friday for the 44th March... More »
A woman holds her stomach at the last stages of her pregnancy in Bordeaux April 28, 2010. REUTERS/Regis Duvignau By Lisa Rapaport(Reuters Health) – Pregnancy may trigger changes in the structure and size of regions in a woman’s brain that are involved in respo... More »
A woman looks at a Center for Disease Control (CDC) health advisory sign about the dangers of the Zika virus as she lines up for a security screening at Miami International Airport in Miami, Florida, U.S., May 23, 2016. REUTERS/Carlo Allegri Texas health offic... More »
A woman stands near a poster explaining about the Zika virus at the Ministry of Health office in Jakarta, Indonesia September 2, 2016. REUTERS/Iqro Rinaldi/File Photo The World Health Organization on Friday declared that Zika no longer constitutes an internati... More »
Worker fumigates along a street in Yangon, Myanmar November 18, 2016. REUTERS/Soe Zeya Tun Myanmar is largely unprepared for an outbreak of Zika, experts say, with the health ministry slashing anti-virus measures due to lack of funds, overworked doctors skippi... More »
A city worker fumigates the area to control the spread of mosquitoes as a Buddhist monk looks on at a temple in Bangkok, Thailand, September 14, 2016. REUTERS/Chaiwat Subprasom Confirmation that the Zika virus had caused microcephaly in Thailand is not likely ... More »
An airplane carrying a banner asking people to use insect repellent to avoid the Zika virus, flies over Miami, Florida, U.S., September 13, 2016. REUTERS/Carlo Allegri The unprecedented aerial spraying of products that kill both adult mosquitoes as well as the... More »
By Lisa Rapaport(Reuters Health) – Even preemies who receive breathing treatments to improve lung function early in life may have respiratory challen More »
Aedes aegypti mosquitoes are seen at the Laboratory of Entomology and Ecology of the Dengue Branch of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in San Juan, Puerto Rico, March 6, 2016. REUTERS/Alvin Baez/File Photo State officials in Florida on Frida... More »
Aedes aegypti mosquitoes are seen at the Laboratory of Entomology and Ecology of the Dengue Branch of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in San Juan, Puerto Rico, March 6, 2016. REUTERS/Alvin Baez/File Photo It began with what felt like a punc... More »
A worker sprays insecticide for mosquitos at a village in Bangkok, Thailand, January 13, 2016. REUTERS/Athit Perawongmetha Health and city officials in Thailand downplayed risks from rising infections from the mosquito-borne Zika virus, which is linked to seri... More »
A pregnant couple walk together at a potential zika cluster in Singapore September 1, 2016. REUTERS/Edgar Su Eight pregnant women have been infected by the Zika virus among the 329 cases in Singapore, the government said on Sunday. More »
A worker fumigates the area to control the spread of mosquitoes in Bangkok, Thailand, February 12, 2016. REUTERS/Jorge Silva – RTX26L9I Twenty-one new cases of locally-transmitted Zika virus have been confirmed in central Bangkok, including a pregnant woman wh... More »
A resident shields his nose as pest control officer carry out fogging in the Aljunied Crescent cluster in Singapore, September 3, 2016 in this photo taken by Antara Foto. Antara Foto/MN Kanwa/via REUTERS Singapore authorities on Sunday confirmed 27 more cases ... More »
By Yasin KakandeKAMPALA (Thomson Reuters Foundation) – Ida, 29, was six months pregnant when she suddenly felt abdominal pains and went to a governme More »
Malaysia is bracing for more Zika cases, officials said on Sunday, after detecting the first locally infected patient, which could further stretch a health system struggling with dengue, another mosquito-borne virus that can be fatal. More »
A 61-year-old man diagnosed with the first case of a locally transmitted Zika infection in Malaysia has died from heart disease complications, and not from the mosquito-borne virus, the health ministry said on Saturday. More »
RIO DE JANEIRO Brazil’s Health Minister Ricardo Barros said on Friday there is no scientific basis for postponing the Olympics because of the Zika virus, explaining that lower temperatures and fewer mosquitoes reduced the chance of infection in August when the... More »
GENEVA/NEW YORK With debate growing over the safety of holding the Olympics in Brazil amid the ongoing Zika virus outbreak, the World Health Organization’s Emergency Committee on Zika will meet in the coming weeks to evaluate the risks tied to going on with th... More »
(Reuters Health) – Babies exposed to marijuana in the womb are likely to be born smaller than those not exposed, and more likely to need intensive care after birth, according to a new analysis of existing evidence. Mothers who smoke marijuana while pregnant ar... More »
WASHINGTON The Supreme Court on Wednesday headed toward a possible 4-4 split over a legal challenge by Christian nonprofit employers who object to providing female workers insurance covering birth control as required by President Barack Obama’s healthcare law.... More »
Global health officials are racing to better understand the Zika virus behind a major outbreak that began in Brazil last year and has since spread to many countries in the Americas. The following are some questions and answers about the virus and current outbr... More »
RIO DE JANEIRO The worst health scare in recent history is not keeping Brazilians from their annual Carnival revelry, with millions of partiers swarming streets and some making fun of the mosquito that spreads Zika and other viruses. Street processions, block ... More »
Companies and scientists are racing to create a Zika vaccine as concern grows over the mosquito-borne virus that has been linked to severe birth defects and is spreading quickly through the Americas. Zika is now present in 23 countries and territories in the A... More »
(Reuters Health) – When mothers eat three sizeable servings of fish each week during pregnancy it may benefit children’s brains for years to come, according to a large study in Spain. Researchers followed nearly 2,000 mother-child pairs from the first trimeste... More »
(Reuters Health) – Intimate partner violence or abuse can take the form of birth control sabotage, pregnancy pressure or coercion, which can have devastating consequences including unintended pregnancy, abortion and psychological trauma, according to a new rev... More »