Here are few brief news related to healthcare & pharmaceutical scenes for your update.

• Perspectives in Healthcare Quality – the Singapore’s Position
In the recent 2nd International Conference of the Asia Pacific Society for Healthcare Quality 2008, Minister for Health Mr. Khaw Boon Wan addressed the delegates and articulated how he perceived quality and affordable healthcare for the public. In his lively speech, he also cited and commended about hospital pharmacists’ role and initiatives in improving the quality and patient safety (point no. 13).
The full text of his opening speech can be downloaded and read HERE.
 

• Two million employees to be covered by new Work Injury Compensation Act from 1 April 2008
The Work Injury Compensation Act (WICA) will replace the Workmen’s Compensation Act (WCA) from 1 April 2008.
WICA extends the no-fault work injury compensation system to employees in general. This is a 70% increase from the coverage of the WCA and will benefit more than 2 million employees. The key areas under the new WICA include:
Extending coverage to all employees (except uniformed personnel and domestic workers employed by households)
Compulsory insurance not included for the new group so employers have flexibility to decide on how to manage their responsibilities to pay compensation for work-related injuries under WICA
Increase in compensation limits to keep pace with wage increases and changing circumstances
Changes to improve efficiency and effectiveness of the WIC system e.g. new and enhanced enforcement powers to deter non-payment of compensation by employers and fraudulent claims by employees

• Vaccine to Keep Drug Addiction Away?

Fancy an ultimate cure for drug addiction, scientists have developed a vaccine which prevents the body from getting high. The hope is that it can stop people from falling back into a spiral of addiction if they have a relapse. The most promising results so far have been with cocaine, but researchers hope it could also one day be used to cure addiction to methamphetamine, heroin and even cigarettes.

According to Prof. Thomas Kosten, a professor of psychiatry and neuroscience at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, the vaccine works by slowly decreasing the amount of cocaine that reaches the brain by enlisting the body's immune system to recognize the drug as foreign and attack it in the blood stream. It does so by injecting an altered version of the drug into the body which has been attached to a protein that the body will recognize as a threat, thereby eliminating it from the body faster.

The vaccine has one more large scale human study scheduled before it is ready for the federal FDA approval process. A similar nicotine vaccine is also in the early stages of testing by several groups of European researchers. Kosten hopes to have the vaccine on the market in two to three years. Someday, treatment of potential addiction can even be done very early!

Adapted from AFP

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