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Nowadays there are genetic investigations that identifies any risk of diseases. By doing this, it allows for people to select a better medication and to be able to get a better personalized care. Gathering this genetic information, it facilitates doctors to choose a better medicine and the correct dose with less side effects for the patient. In many countries around the world the study of genetics in their population successfully identified the risk of developing hypertension. Another example is an indication of surgeries that reduces the risks after finding that a patient may have any mutation in the genes that may develop into breast cancer.

Currently it exists many genetic tests for the diagnosis of many diseases and with the help of new technology, it accelerates great findings to be able to catch diseases early and  hope for treatment. 

Nowadays there are genetic investigations that identifies any risk of diseases. By doing this, it allows for people to select a better medication and to be able to get a better personalized care. Gathering this genetic information, it facilitates doctors to choose a better medicine and the correct dose with less side effects for the patient. In many countries around the world the study of genetics in their population successfully identified the risk of developing hypertension. 

The deaths for overdose in the next decade will be more than the victims of HVI. There is an actual crisis of addiction of medicines that derivate from opioids in the U.S. This will cause a half a million deaths in the next decade. According to historians, everything changed in January 1980 with the publication of a letter of 101 word in the prestigious “New England Journal of Medicine”, that affirms the addictive capacity of these derivatives in hospitalized patients was negligible. 

As a result, doctors began using narcotics more freely. Then a study suggested that narcotics could be used with few side effects in patients with chronic pain that weren’t in serious conditions. With less fear of its use, doctors were progressively prescribing narcotics to patients with all type of chronic pain. Then in 1996 the laboratory Purdue Pharma started selling Oxycontin. This marked a before and after the crisis of the aggressive marketing practiced of that pharmaceutical companies. 

The American society reacted too late to the narcotics addiction and only last month a law was approved by the senate to control the problem. The use of narcotics in a patient with severe pain is an absolute necessity, but the necessary padlocks must be put in place to prevent their uncontrolled use from ending up causing addiction in innocent people.

Addiction to narcotics, how did this lethal epidemic start in the U.S?

The deaths for overdose in the next decade will be more than the victims of HVI. There is an actual crisis of addiction of medicines that derivate from opioids in the U.S. This will cause a half a million deaths in the next decade. There should be something we can do to stop it and try to prevent it.

Amoeba is a single cell organism that likes to live in warm places, they were first discovered in Australia but this brain eating Amoeba is believed to have evolved in the U.S. Only this past month a man in Texas died because of a brain infection called Primary Amebic Meningoencephalitis. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), Amoeba is a microorganism that can be found in lakes, ponds, and pools. The infection occurs, when the contaminated water enters the body through the nasal cavity. It is by this route that the parasite reaches the brain and destroys the brain tissue. It is estimated that only a dozen people in the world have survived the infection. Usually, an anti-parasitic drug called Miltefosine is given to treat the patients and in 2013 this medication saved two lives. The only recommendation is to keep the water out of your nose, when swimming in fresh water by covering your nose with your hands. 

Amoeba is a single cell organism that likes to live in warm places, lately this organism has been causing the death of people around the world. This past month a man in the U.S died because of a brain infection called primary amebic meningoencephalitis. How can we avoid this parasite?

According to the CDC, Amoeba is a microorganism that lives in sweet water that can be found in lakes, ponds and pools. The infection occurs, when the contaminated water enters the body through the nasal cavity.

Yesterday there was a lot of buzzed in the internet of how five patients had gone through a stem cell transplants and showed no signs of HIV. Does this mean that the virus is not in their body anymore? Can there be a cure after all? According, to the scientific journal “Annals of Internal Medicine”, this is a great start of research that wants to determine associated factors with stem cells transplant that could help the elimination of HVI. This study was based on the peculiar case of Timothy Brown, known as the Berlin patient. He was diagnosed in 1995 with HIV, he had a stem cell transplant to treat his leukemia. His donor had a CCR5- delta 32 mutation, that makes the blood cells to be immune to HVI. And so, Brown became resistant to the virus and is considered to be the only person in the world that has been cured from HIV. In order to discover this type of transplant and other factors, the people that were in charge of conducting the study, asked six volunteers with HIV that also had gone through stem cells transplant to be part of the research. After the analysis, monitoring and antiretroviral treatment, it was observed that five of them had undetectable levels of HIV in the blood and tissues. Also, one of the participants antibodies that was present to protect the virus had disappeared completely after six years after the transplant. This could only mean one thing, HIV was not present in his blood. Despite the promising results, we cannot talk about a cure yet. However, this discovery represents a great advance in new strategies to fight against and eradicate this virus.

Yesterday there was a lot of buzzed in the internet of how five patients went through a stem cells treatment and they showed no signs of HIV. Does this mean that the virus is not in their body anymore? Can there be a cure after all? According, to the scientific journal “Annals of Internal Medicine”, this is a great start of research that wants to determine associated factors with stem cells transplant that could help the elimination of HVI. This study is based on the peculiar case of Timothy Brown, known as the Berlin patient. 

One of the new techniques that has revolutionized the genetics field is CRISPR-Cas by cutting DNA. This important discovery provides a way of editing the genome that was applied to DNA in many organisms such as bacteria, fruit flies and yeast. There is an immunity that CRISPR-Cas has by being in bacteria and archaea and are used to defend these organisms against invaders. Scientists have invented a system known as CRISPR-Cas 9 that requires two RNA molecules, crRNA and tracrRNA. At the end it will facilitate the use of gene editing and by recognizing the specific sequence of DNA that works better than restriction enzymes. 

CRISPR-Cas is a new procedure that has transform the field of science, especially genetics that is used for cutting DNA. They occur naturally in bacteria and archaea and protects these organisms against anything that would harm them. A common system used in genetics is CRISPR-Cas9 that facilitates the use of gene editing. This system makes advances in recognizing a sequence of DNA than restriction enzymes.