"Companies with a financial interest in a weed-killer sometimes found in drinking water paid for thousands of studies federal regulators are using to assess the herbicide’s health risks, records  of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency show. Many of these industry-funded studies, which largely support atrazine’s safety, have never been published or subjected to an independent scientific peer review."

"One in four U.S. parents believes some vaccines cause autism in healthy children, but even many of those worried about vaccine risks think their children should be vaccinated. Most parents continue to follow the advice of their children's doctors, according to a study based on a survey of 1,552 parents. Extensive research has found no connection between autism and vaccines."

"Nearly 50,000 US medical patients die every year of blood poisoning or pneumonia they picked up in hospital, a study has shown."

"The Occupational Safety and Health Administration will announce the largest fine in its history on Friday, $87 million in penalties against the oil giant BP for failing to correct safety problems identified after a 2005 explosion that killed 15 workers at its Texas City, Tex. refinery, federal officials said Thursday."

"Dozens of red flags suggest that a wide range of pollutants are playing a role in millions of birth defects that strike worldwide every year. But little is being done to understand or control exposures."

"The United States needs to lead a global effort to protect people from new outbreaks of deadly infectious diseases that originate in animals, such as swine flu, AIDS and SARS, health experts said on Tuesday."

"Drug-resistant staph bacteria have been found on public beaches in Washington state, and beaches in other states may harbor the superbug too."

"Swimming in chlorinated pools may increase the risk of a child getting asthma and respiratory allergies like hay fever, according to a Belgian study."

The CDC rarely gets requests to investigate cancer clusters, and it is rarer still that the agency finds a cancer cluster exists, much less what caused it.

Many kids and adults aren't getting enough Vitamin D. The solution may be as simple as spending more time in the sun.

A dramatic rise of birth defects in India's Punjab breadbasket seems to be caused by uranium pollution, which in turn seems to be caused by ash from coal-burning electric power plants.

"Parasitic infections and other diseases usually associated with the developing world are cropping up with alarming frequency among U.S. poor, especially in states along the U.S.-Mexico border, the rural South and in Appalachia, according to researchers."

The tobacco industry sees its future in recruitment of new smokers, some very young, in the Third World.

"The goal of a new CDC Website, the National Environmental Public Health Tracking Network, is to become a one-stop shop for anyone who wants to investigate environmental causes of illness, from asthma to well water."

"There’s a kind of blue and green scum that can bloom in lakes and ponds across the nation. This scum is called cyanobacteria. For years, scientists have known that this stuff can produce dangerous toxins. Amy Quinton reports now researchers are studying whether there’s a link between cyanobacteria and Lou Gehrig’s disease."