"For reasons still unknown, bedbugs  really seem to like the state of Ohio. The problem is so dire in Cincinnati that some people with infested apartments have resorted to sleeping on the streets."

"A new superbug from India could spread around the world -- in part because of medical tourism -- and scientists say there are almost no drugs to treat it."

"The virus commonly called swine flu has 'run its course,' World Health Organization Director-General said today. But while the pandemic danger is over the swine flu, or H1N1, has not gone away, it has just become more like seasonal influenzas."

"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."