Investigation: Widely Used, Unregulated Nano-Particles Linked to Cancer, Other Major Diseases

A frightening report has come out on some of the nano-particles now present in close to 10,000 consumer products - everything from creams and cosmetics to icing, medicines, toothpaste and nutritional supplements. Mice that consumed the tiny particles suffered high levels of DNA damage and genetic instability associated with cancer, heart disease, neurological disease and aging, according to a study cited in a three-part AOL News investigation of nano-particles.

Nearly a million kilograms of nano-particles are produced and used each year in the U.S. alone, the story says - with virtually no government oversight. Labeling and safety compliance are generally left to manufacturers, while some government officials say they don't want to interfere in the industry's progress. The global market for the particles was $254 billion in 2005 and is expected to grow 10-fold by 2014. The 2011 U.S. federal budget has earmarked $1.8 billion in spending on nanotechnology.

TAGS: health

Investigations: Classified Footage Shows U.S. Attack on Journalists, Children in Iraq

WikiLeaks has broadcast dramatic and shocking classified footage of a U.S. Apache helicopter attacking and killing two Reuters journalists and civilians who come to help. Two girls were seriously injured and then denied access to U.S. military medical help. Reuters has spent two years trying to obtain the footage through a Freedom of Information request. Visit this special WikiLeaks page to see and hear the footage and read details of the incident.

TAGS: Iraq, military

Interesting: Why Med Journal Banned Tobacco-Funded Studies

Some medical journals are banning studies funded by tobacco companies. Here's an interesting Q&A with Ginny Barbour, the chief editor of PLoS Medicine, on why her journal doesn't accept the studies. "There is a huge problem with all corporate funding of clinical trials: it's like asking the coach of the football team to referee the game," Barbour says.

Also linked in the story is this very interesting PLoS study on the influence one tobacco company was able to wield on major European Union policies, based on hundreds of internal company documents.

TAGS: health