60 SECONDS

Bluetongue vaccine catch

As bluetongue spreads across northern

Europe’s farms, carried by midges,

agriculture ministers are calling for

vaccination against the deadly animal

disease. However, the plant where

vaccine is manufactured in the UK by

Merial, at Pirbright, Surrey, has

suspended all work with live viruses

following an escape of foot and mouth

disease virus from the site in August.

Blue whale blues

Three blue whales have died off the

coast of southern California in less than

two weeks. Post-mortems showed that

ships had hit two of them, killing one

instantly. Samples from the third are

still being analysed, but the algal

poison domoic acid is suspected.

Meditation dulls distress

People with rheumatoid arthritis who

practised meditation for six months

experienced a 35 per cent reduction in

psychological distress compared with

those who did not meditate, a study at

the University of Maryland School of

Medicine has found (Arthritis Care & Research, DOI: 10.1002/art.23010).

Meditation did not stop the disease

progressing, as gauged by reports of

swollen joints.

Montreal ozone boost

HCFCs, refrigerant chemicals that

damage the upper atmosphere’s ozone

layer and accelerate global warming,

are to be phased out 10 years earlier

than planned, thanks to an agreement

signed on 22 September. It updates the

20-year-old Montreal protocol to

protect the ozone layer. Industrialised

countries agreed to phase out

HCFCs by 2020, and developing

countries by 2030.

Black hole detector

NASA has restarted NuSTAR, the Nuclear

Spectroscopic Telescope Array project,

cancelled in 2006. Now due to launch in

2011, NuSTAR will detect high-energy

X-rays, providing 500 times the sensitivity

of previous instruments looking for

black holes in the local universe.

director, says the immediate

effect of a ban on spending would

be small but symbolic: “If it stays

for multiple years, it’s going to

turn into a moon programme.”

Hundreds of people have used the

society’s website to tell Congress

they support a crewed Mars flight.

It is not clear who inserted the

banning provision into the House

budget, but Dave Obey, the

Wisconsin Democrat who chairs

the House Appropriations

Committee, supported a ban that

was outvoted in the Republican-

controlled House last year. The

Moon-Mars programme was

proposed by President Bush in

2004. Democrats now control

both the House and Senate.

DRUG companies will in future

find it harder to bury the results

of trials that show their products

in a poor light. The US Food and

Drug Administration (FDA)

Amendments Act, passed by

Congress last week, will require

clinical trials to be registered

and their results placed in a

public database.

The new law contains a raft of

measures to improve drug safety,

including better monitoring for

adverse effects after drugs hit the

market. The trials registry is vital,

says Merrill Goozner of the Center

for Science in the Public Interest

in Washington DC, because

problems such as the heart attack

risk posed by the diabetes drug

Avandia may only come to light

when independent researchers

reanalyse the results of multiple

clinical trials (see page 10).

The FDA will also have to give

the reasons for its decisions on

new drug applications, noting

dissenting scientific opinions. “For

us, this is huge,” says Francesca

Grifo of the Union of Concerned

Scientists in Washington DC,

which last year revealed that

many FDA staff felt their work was

subject to political interference .

But the act fails to impose new

restrictions on drug advertising

and continues to allow the FDA’s

budget to be part-paid by industry.

A POTENTIAL anti-cancer

treatment that attracted massive

public interest earlier this year

is to be tested on 50 people with

brain tumours.

The drug, dichloroacetate

(DCA), disables the energy-

producing mechanism in

cancerous cells, although

concerns remain over toxicity and

side effects such as nerve damage.

Promising results from animal

studies at the University of

Alberta in Edmonton, Canada

(New Scientist, 20 January, p 13)

led to attempts by desperate

cancer patients to buy DCA – a

common lab chemical – online.

The US Food and Drug

Administration later halted sales

of the unapproved drug .

The Canadian researchers,

meanwhile, sought permission

from Health Canada to carry out

an authorised trial – and now

they have it. “We’ve obtained

human ethics approval as well,

and we plan to start immediately,”

says lead researcher Evangelos

Michelakis. The team has so far

raised $800,000 in public

donations to fund the trial.

“We have approval and plan to start trials of dichloroacetate in people immediately”

Thousands of American athletes,

bodybuilders and amateur sports

enthusiasts were sitting in nervous, if

pumped, anticipation this week, as US

federal investigators announced they

had cracked a huge global racket

supplying black-market anabolic

steroids, human growth hormone and

insulin growth factor.

The evidence they seized includes

emails and invoices which could

implicate customers, some of whom

may be leading athletes.

Nationwide raids on 24 September

by officials from the US Drug Enforcement

Administration led to 124 arrests at 56

steroid labs. Agents seized 242 kilograms

of raw steroid powder, mainly of Chinese

origin, and 11.4 million doses of steroids.

With collaborators in nine other

countries, Operation Raw Deal

uncovered a clandestine web of

international drug dealers selling

through the internet. Much of the

merchandise was produced in garages,

bathtubs and sinks. The DEA announced:

“Today we reveal the truth behind the

underground steroid market: dangerous

drugs cooked up all too often in filthy

conditions with no regard to safety.”

The global sting focused on

underground labs in the US, Canada

and Mexico, and numerous US-based

websites. Investigators located many

illicit sellers by visiting bodybuilding

discussion websites, where enthusiasts

can learn how to make steroids from

raw materials at home. Besides steroids,

the seizures included the stimulants

ephedrine and pseudoephedrine.

STING SMASHES STEROID RACKET

M. L

. SIN

IBAL

DI/C

ORBI

S

–Tense moments–

No hiding place

Cancer trial is go

www.newscientist.com 29 September 2007 | NewScientist | 5

070929_N_Upfronts.indd 5070929_N_Upfronts.indd 5 25/9/07 4:56:15 pm25/9/07 4:56:15 pm