To be completely honest, I was terrified when I first opened this app up. I did not need to discover yet another scary thing about my state. Thankfully, it looks like Florida is fairly free from outbreaks of infectious diseases.

From playing around with the app though, I’m given the impression that neither Florida nor any other place will appear infection free for long because of the outbreak report function. Let’s face it, given the fact that there’s an option to report Sexually Transmitted Infections and that the report is quick and easy to submit is practically inviting people to report their former significant others’ homes as outbreak sites. [HealthMap via Boston]

The National Health Service in the London Borough of Hounslow, in an effort to coax young people into getting tested, is offering free self-service STD kits, with an added bonus: text message diagnosis!.

After sending off your little envelope of chlamydia ‘n’ hope to a lab, you can opt to receive your potentially traumatic results via SMS, phone or letter (though Twitter, with its convenient-for-notifying-exes “@” system, might have been a better choice).

Despite how trivialising this sounds, it could actually be an attractive option for some. Phone calls involve direct interaction with another person about an extremely embarrassing subject, and a physical letter can take quite a while—again, not exactly appropriate for the, uhh, urgent nature of the situation. Here, technology might actually make the whole process a little less intimidating for young folk (philanderers and strumpets, every last one of them!), but it’s not a totally shame-free—the NHS has assured that there are still actual humans sending out the texts. [Register]

The science behind the technique isn’t exactly new – it’s been used to screen for Cystic Fibrosis for years in the UK, but this is the first time its been used to prevent cancer. It involves screening for affected genes while the baby is still in the 8-cell embryonic stage, when it’s about 3 days old. Without the treatment, any female descendants of the family in question would have a 50-80% chance of developing breast cancer in their 20s.

Scientists have been careful not to claim this is a cure for breast cancer – there are other causes for the disease other than this one altered gene – but what this really does is open the door for designer babies. After all, if you can remove a bad gene from a child at the embryonic stages, you should be able to add different genes (like giving your child blond hair and blue eyes, for example) as well. And from there it’s only a matter of time before we’re subjected to an entire race of Children of the Corn, isn’t it?

[BBC]

Blood analysis usually requires either large and expensive equipment or a trained technician to manually examine the material. Both are out of reach for many remote areas, especially in parts of Africa where HIV and malaria are rampant. UCLA researcher Dr. Aydogan Ozcan developed software that allows blood samples to be analysed with the use of inexpensive, off-the-shelf camera sensors and a filtered light source. The key is the software’s ability to analyse thousands of blood cells at once, providing an accurate result within minutes.

The photo above shows a Sony-Ericsson phone modded for this type of use. That bulge on the back is the filtered light source. It’s great to see cool mods done for great social welfare rather than our gadgety amusement every once in awhile. [Wired]

However, like any medical invention, there’s testing and trials to be done, and this lightsaber cancer-fighter is no exception. Still, hearing the inventor describe this thing you can’t help but get excited.

“We can use lasers to punch tiny holes exactly where we want them,” said Dr. Frank Gunn-Moore. “We can produce a rod of light – sometimes described as a sword – that can even go around objects. It really does sound like science fiction.”

The good doctor doesn’t plan on stopping with cancer, either. Other diseases, such as Alzheimer’s, are potential targets too. Good form. [Herald Sun, thanks Yash!]

Schlieren photography involves shining collimated light past a knife edge onto a target, and variations in the refractive index of moving air create “shadows” of a sort in the image captured on film, and it’s most often used to solve aeronautical air-flow problems, or weapons in action. Like this shot fired from an AK47:

But Doctors Gary Settles from Penn State University and Julian Tang from Singapore tweaked the technique and created an image of the turbulent air stirred up by a cough, which is apparently a very unexplored phenomenon. They plan to use the technique to explore how coughs spread diseases like SARS and the flu.

And while that kind of clever science could end up having big health pay-offs, this image should just do one single thing for you and I: next time you feel a cough coming on, put your hand over your mouth won’t you? [IHT via Uberreview]

1. Athlete’s Foot
2. Polio
3. Feline Senior Dementia
4. the Bends
5. Priapism
6. the Vapours
7. Seasonal Affective Disorder
8. the Bubonic Plague

So things really aren’t so bad. [CTV]

This disease diagnosis works by detecting biomarkers — substances in the body that indicate specific diseases. For example, the protein PSA (prostate specific antigen) frequently appears at elevated levels in men who have prostate cancer; the currently administered PSA blood test is the most effective way to screen for the disease. With the Leeds team’s new device, however, prostate cancer screening would become much easier.

When completed, it should make diagnosing diseases a much quicker and cheaper process, which will lead to earlier detection and better treatments. All good things! I look forward to testing myself for various diseases every day and becoming obsessed with checking and ensuring that I’m as healthy as humanly possible. [University of Leeds via io9]

Most recently, HealthMap detected the salmonella outbreak in the U.S., which has sickened over 1,000 people, long before the Centre for Disease Control announced that it was happening. By alerting officials and doctors to the most likely diseases in their area, the web tool could help make health care much more efficient and precise. [Discovery]