Last-Minute Reminder: Judy Norsigian, executive director of Our Bodies Ourselves, will be at Women & Children First bookstore in Chicago Sunday, April 6, at 4:30 p.m. to discuss OBOS’ new book, “Pregnancy and Birth.”

Get event details here. Oh, and I’ll be there, too!

Judy has two events in Chicago on Monday — both of which are free and open to the public. Then it’s on to Austin, Texas. Check the OBOS events calendar for more cities and dates on the OBOS book tour.

Single Mothers in China Forge a Difficult Path: The New York Times reports on the plight of single mothers in China, some of whom lie about their marital status or enter into marriages solely to obtain basic identifications for their children to attend school or to receive other social services. Howard French writes:

In a society where until quite recently premarital sex was often punished, the issue of single motherhood has been slow to enter the public arena. But now, a new awareness of the issue is raising questions about the status of women in China. And the debate is also stretching to other areas of citizens’ rights, including the most basic societal tenets like the hukou, or residency permit, a central tool of population control passed down from the Maoist era that restricts movement by linking people to the towns of their birth.

The Chinese government has long maintained that the Communist Party liberated women in 1949 along with the rest of the country. But in an era of rapid modernization, China has lacked anything like a broad current of thought about women’s rights.

“When we argue that a woman owns the uterus, and it’s her right to decide whether to deliver the baby or not, people won’t buy it,” said Yuan Xin, director of psychology at the Consulting Center of Nankai University. “If you are a woman, your personal choice is monitored and supervised by a lot of others, and they expect you to do what everyone else does.”

Bush AIDS Initiative Gets Bipartisan Renewal: “A bipartisan coalition in the House voted Wednesday to significantly expand a popular program aimed at combating HIV and AIDS around the world, renewing the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief by authorizing $50 billion — $20 billion more than the White House requested — over five years,” reports the L.A. Times. The story also notes the political compromises over PEPFAR:

Conservatives gave up a demand that abstinence be the centerpiece of efforts to fight AIDS; when the program began five years ago, the Republican majority then in control of Congress included language requiring that one-third of all funds spent on prevention go toward abstinence-related initiatives. The legislation approved Wednesday mandated “balanced funding” to support a so-called A-B-C strategy: abstain from sex until marriage; be faithful; and use condoms.

Liberals agreed to accept some restrictions on activities by family planning organizations. Under the bill, funding may go to family planning clinics to pay for HIV/AIDS testing and education but not abortions. Faith-based organizations will also continue to receive funding.

Read more on PEPFAR at RH Reality Check, including this post by Kelly Castagnaro on PEPFAR as political sport.

Health Database Was Set Up to Ignore “Abortion”: The New York Times today caught up with the controversy over the restrictions on the word “abortion” in the world’s largest database on reproductive health. Known as POPLINE, the database is managed by Johns Hopkins University and receives funds from the U.S. Agency for International Development.

Rachel has an excellent report on how it all went down — including tons of links to more coverage — and how it turned out. Kudos to medical librarians and all activists who protested the restrictions and got the word out quickly and effectively.

Global Health Summit: The 2nd Annual GlobeMed Global Health Summit took place this week at Northwestern University. It’s mission: to mobilize and unite university students “to think critically about global health issues, develop personal and professional skills for building a sustained commitment to social justice, and share ideas about the role of students in catalyzing a movement to improve global health.”

I learned about the summit listening to a Worldview radio interview on Thursday with Catherine Quinn, coordinator of field program operations at Concern America, an international development and refugee organization. Quinn discussed maternal health and public health training in Latin America.

Public Masturbation as Teachable Moment: Courtney Martin raises a good question: What do you call it when a man publicly masturbates in your presence? “When I brought up this experience to friends, just about every one of them had a similar story, but we all realized there’s no real name for this kind of violation,” writes Martin. More than 100 readers weigh in.

Birth Control Options: “Birth control options are growing for women 40 and older — a group that once viewed its choices as pretty much limited to tube-tying surgery and condoms,” reports the AP. The story covers a safer birth control pill, the IUD and a nonsurgical method of tube-tying.

“Exile” Turns 15: This isn’t really health related — unless you think of feminist music as necessary for mental health — but Kate Harding has a great post at Broadsheet titled “The Album That Made Me a Feminist.” Take a guess what it is … OK, I’ll spill: Liz Phair’s “Exile in Guyville,” which Harding notes will be re-released on June 24, marking the album’s 15th anniversary.

The only thing I’d add to Harding’s post is that Phair’s third album, “Whitechocolatespaceegg,” is every bit as good. Really.

Score One for the Patient: A breast cancer patient whose medical coverage was canceled by her insurer was awarded more than $9 million from her for-profit insurer, Health Net Inc., reports the L.A. Times. “The award issued by an arbitration judge was the first of its kind and prompted Health Net to announce it was scrapping its cancellation practices that are under fire from state regulators, patients and the Los Angeles city attorney.”

BCA Blasts Approval of Avastin: In a surprise move, the FDA approved the use of Avastin as a treatment for breast cancer. “The big question was whether it was enough for a drug temporarily to stop cancer from worsening — as Avastin had done in a clinical trial — or was it necessary for a drug to enable patients to live longer, which Avastin had failed to do. Oncologists and patient advocates were divided, in part because of the drug’s sometimes severe side effects,” writes Andrew Pollack.

“In the end, the agency found a compromise of sorts. It gave Avastin ‘accelerated’ approval, which allows drugs for life-threatening diseases to reach the market on the basis of less than ideal data, subject to further study.”

Breast Cancer Action blasted the decision. “The FDA has lowered the bar on the approval of breast cancer therapies. At a time when many questions are being raised about how the FDA approves drugs for market, today’s decision is a victory for drug companies, but not for patients,” BCA Executive Director Barbara A. Brenner said a statement posted at Prescription Access Legislation.

Short Maternity Leaves, Long Deployments: The Washington Post reports on the difficulty women in the military face if they want to have children and keep their jobs. Ann Scott Tyson writes:

The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have placed severe strains on the Army, including longer deployments in which soldiers serve 15 months in the war zone, followed by 12 months at home. Under that system, a woman who wishes to have a child and remain with her unit must conceive soon after returning home so she can give birth, recover and prepare for her next overseas tour.

Female soldiers interviewed over the past year say the tight schedule cuts short precious time for mother and infant to bond and breast-feed, forcing women to choose between their loyalty to their comrades — as well as their careers — and nurturing their families.

Vaccinating Boys for Girls’ Sake?: The New York Times looks at efforts to convince parents to vaccinate boys to prevent the spread of human papillomavirus, or HPV, which can lead to cervical cancer. HPV also causes anal and penile cancers, but these are much more rare. (Read our previous coverage of the HPV vaccine Gardasil here.)

One woman tells the NYT, “You don’t want to say it’s just the girls’ problem … But my sons won’t contract cervical cancer. And genital warts are treatable. I’m very skeptical. What risks will I expose them to?”

Another woman comments, “If there was a vaccine I could take that would get rid of prostate cancer, why wouldn’t I? … If there was a vaccine that sons could get that would get rid of breast cancer, most parents wouldn’t hesitate. But cervical cancer is the ’sex cancer.’”

Do Cellphones Affect Male Fertility?: Some studies suggest as much, but the data is limited, writes Tara Parker-Pope, adding, “There are some global concerns about declining male fertility in industrialized countries, but issues like pollutants, exposure to chemicals and smoking are likely far more worrisome culprits than cellphones.”

The Studies Surrounding DHEA: The L.A. Times “Healthy Skeptic” column looks at the anti-aging claims of DHEA and finds it’s no fountain of youth.

More on Migraines (and Music): I’ve mentioned the group blog on migraines at The New York Times — be sure to check out Paula Kamen’s latest post on leaving the rabbit hole. Kamen, who suffers from chronic daily headaches, also appeared last week on WBUR’s “The Point”.

Jeff Tweedy hasn’t weighed in yet, but I did see Wilco Tuesday and Wednesday (braving cold and limited views) during the band’s five-night run in Chicago. Yeah, OK, that had nothing to do with women’s health, but I had to boast somewhere.

Debating “Juno”: Will “Juno” win best picture? Stay tuned. In the meantime, young birth mothers discuss what they liked and didn’t like about the film’s portrayal of adoption.

Caffeine and Pregnancy: A new study (PDF) published in the American Journal of Obstetrics & Gynecology says too much caffeine during pregnancy may increase the risk of miscarriage. Researchers found that “pregnant women who consume 200 milligrams or more of caffeine a day — the amount in 10 ounces of coffee or 25 ounces of tea — may double their risk of miscarriage,” reports The New York Times.

Dr. De-Kun Li, a reproductive and perinatal epidemiologist at the Kaiser Permanente Division of Research in Oakland, Calif., and lead author of the study, said pregnant women should try to give up caffeine for at least the first three or four months. But some physicians had reservations about the study.

“Just interviewing women, over half of whom had already had their miscarriage, does not strike me as the best way to get at the real scientific question here,” said Dr. Carolyn Westhoff, a professor of obstetrics and gynecology, and of epidemiology, at Columbia University Medical Center. “But it is an excellent way to scare women.”

Kindness RX: Women’s eNews looks at a social-support campaign by and for pregnant African American women, who are nearly four times as likely to die from pregnancy-related causes as white women.The community-based campaign is called “100 Intentional Acts of Kindness Toward a Pregnant Woman.”

No More Drive-By Mastectomies: Celebrities, activists and lawmakers called on Congress this week to pass the Breast Cancer Patient Protection Act of 2007, which would require that insurers cover up to a 48-hour stay in a hospital after a woman has had a mastectomy if the doctor and patient deem it necessary. Lifetime’s website collected 20 million signatures in support of the legislation.

According to the Baltimore Sun, only 10 states require up to 48 hours of coverage after mastectomies, and 10 states have no specific time limit. The remaining 30 have no protections.

Interview with Lisa Jackson: Melissa Silverstein interviews fillmmaker Lisa Jackson, who went to the Congo to take the testimony of women and girls being raped and sexually assaulted for the last decade in her new film, “The Greatest Silence: Rape in the Congo.” The film made its premiere at Sundance and will appear on HBO in April.

Plus: Chances are you saw the Oscar nominations this week, but did you catch the nominees for the 19th Annual GLAAD Media Awards? Here’s the full list of nominees.

The Pill Protects Against Cancer: “British researchers found that women taking the pill for 15 years halved their chances of developing ovarian cancer, and that the risk remained low more than 30 years later, though protection weakened over time,” reports the Washington post. The findings were published Friday in The Lancet.

In response to the study, The Lancet’s editors called for oral contraceptives to be made more widely available to women over the counter.

Calcium Effects Boosted by Vitamin D: The combination of calcium and vitamin D is more effective than calcium alone in preventing bone loss in elderly women, according to a new study that will appear in the March issue of the Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism (JCEM).

Buying into Botox: In a story about “How Not to Look Old,” a new advice book by Charla Krupp, a former beauty director at Glamour and columnist for More magazine, New York Times writer Natasha Singer notes that the book “is the latest makeover title to treat the aging of one’s exterior as a disease whose symptoms are to be fought to the death or, at least, mightily camouflaged.” She continues:

But the book offers a serious rationale for such vigilant attempts at age control, arguing that trying to pass for younger is not so much a matter of sexual allure as of job security. [...] Many people would shun a book if it were titled “How Not to Look Jewish” or “How Not to Look Gay” because to cater to discrimination is to capitulate to it. But the success of “How Not to Look Old” indicates that popular culture is willing to buy into ageism as an acceptable form of prejudice, even against oneself.

“Teeth” Provides Feminist Bite: In a review of the new film “Teeth,” a satire based on the myth of vagina dentata, Wesley Morris writes: “[T]here’s something almost subversive about Lichtenstein’s affection for his heroine and the pleasure she ultimately takes in re-appropriating a misogynistic myth. By the end of the film she’s not some virginal damsel. She’s on the verge of becoming a vaginal vigilante.”

Pop Goes Abortion: Yep. Another story about recent films that have avoided abortion … but this Newsday story goes further, addressing television’s representation (and lack thereof) as well: “More frequently, shows duck the issue by having characters back out at the last second (”Beverly Hills 90210,” “Melrose Place,” “The O.C.,” “Felicity,” “Sex and the City”) or miscarry (”Party of Five,” “Beverly Hills, 90210″ and “Melrose Place” - twice.) And Erica Kane? In 2005 she learned her baby wasn’t aborted after all, but transferred to another woman’s uterus.”

OK, it’s been ages since I watched “All My Children,” but he’s joking, right??

Plus: Susan J. Douglas puts in context “The Jamie Lynn Effect.”

The year that was …

Top Ten: From Women’s eNews — “Significant efforts were made during 2007 to advance women’s rights and to reduce health disparities and violence. Some of those efforts, however, fell far short: the U.S. abortion rights movement suffered a major defeat by the Bush appointees to the Supreme Court.” Here are the top 10 news stories of 2007 as identified by WeN.

Take Five: Society for Women’s Health Research has picked the top five women’s health stories of 2007.

Key Health Disparities Legislation: Kaiser Family Foundation summarizes about a dozen federal legislative initiatives introduced in the 110th Congress to address racial and ethnic disparities in health and health care.

Global Public Health Priorities: According to a new report based on the Kaiser/Pew Global Health Survey, preventing and treating HIV/AIDS is the top-rated health priority in countries surveyed in sub-Saharan Africa and Asia; fighting hunger and malnutrition is the top priority among countries surveyed in Latin America and the Middle East; and access to health care is the top priority in Central/Eastern Europe.

And for the Seventh Year in a Row … Ideology trumped public health in the United States. In a Boston Globe op-ed, Susan Wood, the former assistant commissioner for women’s health at the Food and Drug Administration, sounds off on two of the “more visible defeats that healthcare has suffered during this administration”: The limbo status of the State Children’s Health Insurance Program and the skyrocketing cost of birth control on college campuses.

“At a deeper level,” adds Wood, “the low priority healthcare gets from President Bush is reflected in his failure to staff important health-related positions with qualified individuals willing to provide science-based advice.”

Plus: Rebecca Traister covers the year in sex.

Update 12/30: Emily Douglas of RH Reality Check interviews Dr. Vanessa Cullins, Planned Parenthood’s vice president for medical affairs, about PP’s guide to the year in women’s health (if anyone has the link to the guide itself, please leave it in the comments; it doesn’t seem to be on either organization’s website.).

Giving is Good: Yes, but how good? The L.A. Times looks at the research, some of which seems to indicate that gift-giving improves health and longevity.

Where to Give: A donation to Our Bodies Ourselves will not only make you feel better, but it’s guaranteed to improve the health of women around the globe.

Plus: See Katha Pollitt’s annual holiday donation list.

Dear Santa …: Flea’s story about answering a letter to Santa from an 8-year-old girl is my favorite holiday blog post. Mrs. Claus rocks.

Color Lines: Rosalyn Ball at The F-Word covers gender stereotypes via the toy aisles. And Feminist Law Professors identifies the most unnecessary use of pink. Ever.

A Holiday Bonfire Made Out of Tulle: “Disney likes to think of the Princesses as role models, but what a sorry bunch of wusses they are,” writes Barbara Ehrenreich at The Nation.

“Typically, they spend much of their time in captivity or a coma, waking up only when a Prince comes along and kisses them. The most striking exception is Mulan, who dresses as a boy to fight in the army, but — like the other Princess of color, Pocahontas — she lacks full Princess status and does not warrant a line of tiaras and gowns. Otherwise the Princesses have no ambitions and no marketable skills, although both Snow White and Cinderella are good at housecleaning.”

File Under News You Can Use: If you’re feeling under the weather and it seems like no cold medicine will do, you may start to wonder if there are any medical benefits to having, say, a hot brandy. Fortunately, there’s an answer to that question.

And, for those who want to ring in the new year organically, there’s news on that, too. Now, about that chocolate …

Moving from the perpetually pre-pregnant woman to the teenage pregnancy that caused shockwaves … News that Jamie Lynn Spears, the 16-year-old star of Nickelodeon’s popular “Zoey 101,” is pregnant sent the media into a tailspin this week over The Big Question: “What will parents tell their children?”

Without waiting for Nickelodeon to air a “sex special” next year hosted by Linda Ellerbee — “TV queen of talking to moppets about any subject that makes advertisers cringe!” notes Lisa de Moreas — parents might want to start by discussing the importance of sex education, and what can happen when contraception isn’t used or unexpectedly fails.

The Massachusetts teenagers quoted in this New York Times story on reaction to Spears’ pregnancy get what Spears’s own mom didn’t want to accept: teenagers have sex, even teenagers who make curfew.

Referencing the same NYT article, Tracy Clark Flory makes an excellent point about how Jamie Lynn Spears, who until now had been held up as the antidote to her older sister’s tabloid life, is being shamed.

“There are some dangerous assumptions being made here, namely that having sex at age 16 makes one unclean, a fallen angel, and that contraception never fails,” writes Flory. “So much of the ‘TV’s perfect girl is pregnant’ coverage focuses on the dilemma facing parents: How do they best discuss the news with their kids? It’s an important question, to be sure. I just hope the dichotomous angel vs. slut, smart vs. stupid context in this Times article isn’t representative of how parents are answering that call.”

A Culture Saturated in Sexism: “If you believe many of this year’s movies, tabloids and blogs, one of the most terrifying sights is an adult female body that is (gasp) slightly imperfect,” writes Johanna Schneller in a great column on sexism in popular culture.

The piece quotes many of our favorite bloggers and cultural critics — including OBOS Executive Director Judy Norsigian, who weighs in on the impact that unrealistic beauty expectations and public criticism of women’s bodies have on women’s health:

“Humans have a natural desire to feel attractive,” she said, “but our culture is pushing an extremely narrow norm of what constitutes beauty, and that results in critical risks: complications from elective surgery, from silicone ruptures to MRSA [the virulent methicillin-resistant staph infection that plagues hospitals]. Health risks from fad diets. New mothers being encouraged to lose their baby weight so soon that they can’t produce breast milk. These dangers are downplayed left and right by the beauty industry. Their marketing misleads the public in massive ways.”

N.J. Postpartum Depression Law Not Meeting Expectations: “Since Gov. Jon Corzine signed the landmark postpartum depression law 20 months ago, the state has spent $9 million on the program: half on TV and radio ads and brochures encouraging women to ask for help, and half on training more than 6,000 medical professionals in how to identify the illness,” writes Susan K. Livio in the New Jersey Star-Ledger. “But health experts and women using the hotline say the law has fallen short: Women are seeking help, but when they do, state and medical professionals often are not prepared to assist them.”

The story covers the shocking range of responses women have received after calling the hotline — one women was referred to a therapist who turned out to be a drug counselor; another had the police and rescue squad arrive unannounced at her home an hour after she told a hotline staffer she was six months pregnant and “depressed out of my mind.”

The Sunny Side of Legal Rights for Eggs: Writing at Women’s eNews, Gloria Feldt summarizes the state ballot initiatives to give legal rights to fertilized eggs, from Colorado, where a proposed initiative extends the state’s constitutional protections to “any human being from the moment of fertilization,” to similar initiatives underway in Georgia, Oregon, Michigan, Mississippi and Montana.

But far setting off alarm bells, Feldt writes that she is “sounding the gong of opportunity.”

Fetal personhood initiatives could be the best thing since Roe v. Wade legalized abortion in 1973. Maybe even since Griswold v. Connecticut made birth control legal in 1965. That’s if, and only if, the pro-choice movement confronts the challenge head on and goes boldly toward a new moral rhetoric and legal agenda rooted in human rights.

Breast Cancer Detection Depends on Doctor: A study published in last week’s Journal of the National Cancer Institute found that doctors reading mammograms miss an average of two in every 10 cases of breast cancer. From the Chicago Tribune:

The researchers found that sensitivity — the ability to detect cancer when it is present — ranged from 27 percent to 100 percent, with a median of 79 percent. The false-positive rate — women who got a tentative diagnosis of cancer when they did not have it — ranged from zero to 16 percent, with a median of 4.3 percent. (A definitive diagnosis of cancer depends on a biopsy.)

The radiologists who were most accurate — that is, had the highest sensitivity without too many false alarms — tended to be those based at academic medical centers, followed by those who spent at least 20 percent of their time on breast imaging.

Plus: Gene Study Helps Explain Link to Breast Cancer

Respiratory Risk with Elective C-Sections: “Compared with newborns delivered vaginally or by emergency caesarean sections, those delivered by elective caesarean section around term have an increased risk of overall and serious respiratory morbidity. The relative risk increased with decreasing gestational age,” concludes a study (PDF) from Denmark. The study by researchers at Aarhus University Hospital was published last week at BMJ.com and is summarized in this press release.

Physical Activity, Not Body Fat, Matters Most: A new study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association found that seniors who are physically active on a regular basis live longer than unfit adults, regardless of their body fat, according to researchers at the University of South Carolina’s Arnold School of Public Health. The study was published in the Dec. 5 issue of JAMA.

Personal Health Records: The Chicago Tribune looks at reasons for putting together your own personal record system. And what better time than the holidays, when everyone’s gathered together, to discuss your family medical history?

FDA Panel Rejects Breast Cancer Drug: “A Food and Drug Administration panel dealt a sharp blow to biotech giant Genentech Inc. on Wednesday by refusing to recommend approval for the company’s high-profile drug Avastin as a treatment for breast cancer,” reports the L.A. Times. “The cancer drugs are controversial: They extend patients’ lives in some cases only by several months, and they can cost as much as $100,000 per patient per year. In recent years, federal regulators have been willing to approve drugs even if the benefits were only marginal. But that may be changing.”

Health Care Debate Needs to Include Women: “As Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and the Democratic leadership in the Legislature negotiate a health care proposal that they hope everyone can agree upon, it’s important to consider a California constituency that hasn’t received enough attention during this debate: women,” writes Carlina Hansen, executive director of the Women’s Community Clinic in San Francisco, in an op-ed published in the Sacramento Bee.

The op-ed was co-signed by other representatives of the Women’s Working Group on Universal Health Care, a California-based organization that focuses on educating and involving women and women’s organizations in state and local health reform efforts. Check them out.

The Doctor Will Email You Now: “Unlike the banking, restaurant and travel industries, the medical profession has been slow to embrace the Internet’s potential customer service benefits,” reports the Chicago Tribune. “But despite concerns about patient privacy, costs and time constraints, a growing number of physicians are encouraging patients to go online to do things such as check lab results and immunization records, request refills and appointments, and e-mail their physicians with non-urgent medical questions.”

What Says Love Like Diamonds in the Delivery Room? In another example of All The News That’s Fit for Wealthy Heterosexual White Women, the New York Times turns attention to “push presents,” given to the mother following childbirth. Art commemorating the baby’s birth — I get that. I also understand, as one commenter points out, the desire to celebrate the birth with something that can be passed down for generations. But the materialism depicted in this story is disturbing. What’s nine months of pregnancy and labor worth? How about at least six months of paid maternity leave — now that’s priceless.

Plus: New word association game — read the word “push,” visit Pushed Birth.

Environmental Toxin Can Collect in Breast Milk: “Scientists have discovered the mechanism by which a chemical known as perchlorate can collect in breast milk and cause cognitive and motor deficits in newborns,” reports HealthDay News. “Used since the 1940s to manufacture explosives and rocket fuel, the contaminant is still widely present in the water and food supply, experts say.”

The study by scientists at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine of Yeshiva University appeared in the Dec. 3-7 advance online issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Here’s more from the EPA on perchlorate.

A Special Delivery: “‘Juno’ is the only film in recent history in which the protagonist seriously considers termination,” writes Jennie Yarbroff in Newsweek. Of course if you’ve read any of the reviews (which are almost uniformly stellar) you know that consideration is as far as it goes.

EW’s Lisa Schwarzbaum writes in her review: “The old-school feminist in me wishes Juno spent more time, even a tart sentence or two, acknowledging that the options taken for granted by this one attractive, articulate teen are in fact hard-won, precious rights, and need to be guarded by a new-generation army of Junos and Bleekers, spreading the word by text message as well as by hamburger phone. Separate but equal truth: This movie is so delightful and good-hearted a portrait of the kind of new-generation army I’d like to hang with that I accept the admonition ‘Silencio, old woman.’”

Plus: NPR’s “All Things Considered” interviews crush-worthy Ellen Page, and critic Bob Mondello finds this season’s films are where the girls are.

Environmental and Occupational Causes of Cancer: Scientists at the University of Massachusetts Lowell & Boston University last month published an updated scientific review, Environmental and Occupational Causes of Cancer: New Evidence, 2005-2007. According to the Collaborative on Health and the Environment, the report concludes that “mounting evidence linking unintentional exposures to toxins in our workplaces and general environment contribute to the nearly one and a half million new cases of cancer in the U.S. in just 2007 alone.”

The report synthesizes the recent peer-reviewed scientific literature and finds compelling new evidence linking cancer with specific exposures, namely:

* Breast cancer from exposure to the pesticide DDT before puberty;
* Leukemia from exposure to 1,3-butadiene;
* Lung cancer from exposure to air pollution;
* Non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma from exposure to pesticides and solvents;
* Prostate cancer from exposure to pesticides and metal working fluids;
* Brain cancer from exposure to non-ionizing radiation; and
* A range of cancers from exposure to pesticides based on early findings from the Agricultural Health Study

Here’s the executive summary and the full 45-page report (PDF).

Dr. Drug Rep: In a confessional essay published in last Sunday’s New York Times Magazine, Dr. Daniel Carlat writes about his awakening after making $30,000 in one year (on top of the $140,000 he took home from his private practice) by recommending Wyeth’s antidepressant Effexor XR to other doctors. It’s a great read.

Today Carlat is an assistant clinical professor of psychiatry at Tufts University School of Medicine and publishes The Carlat Psychiatry Report, a peer-reviewed medical-education newsletter for psychiatrists that is not financed by the pharmaceutical industry. He also has a blog; read here how he plans to part with his “dirty thirty.”

“The Business of Being Born”: A couple of weeks ago I mentioned this new documentary on childbirth practices directed by Abby Epstein and produced by Ricki Lake (and what a hit it’s become in Australia!). Rachel has seen it and wrote a terrific review over at Women’s Health News in which she comments on the film’s two biggest strengths:

The first is that important information about the cascade of interventions in managed birth, U.S. practices vs. other countries and the resulting outcomes, drugs, c-section rates, and medical evidence is presented in a way that is accessible and informative even to those who are taking their first look at birth issues. [...]

The second major strength is that the film clearly locates birth issues inside feminism and choice, noting the power disparities of the traditional hospital birth system, the often misguided focus on outcomes and potential litigation that ignores women’s needs and experiences, and the empowerment that many women feel when able to give birth on their own terms.

Check out the full review. A list of upcoming screenings is available here.

Abortion Splits Hollywood: Ready for another look at “the A-word” — or lack thereof — in films? Of course you are.

Imaging Exams/Radiation Exposure Increasing: Pregnant women are receiving more high-tech imaging exams than a decade ago, according to a study presented Nov. 27 at the annual meeting of the Radiological Society of North America.

“Through medical imaging examinations, we are exposing pregnant women to twice the amount of radiation as we did 10 years ago,” said Elizabeth Lazarus, M.D., assistant professor of diagnostic imaging at the Warren Alpert School of Medicine at Brown University in Providence, R.I. “Overall, the levels of radiation to which we are exposing pregnant women are low, but they do carry a slight risk of harm to the developing fetus.”

Dora’s Scary Makeover: Why is it that doll versions of spunky role models end up passive and super-feminine? To wit: Dora the Explorer’s new “tool” is a comb. Great post over at Hoyden About Town, and Ampersand delivers on the visual.

Girls You Should Know: These two teenagers, finalists in the Siemens Competition in Math, Science & Technology, are researching why some breast cancer patients develop resistance to the cancer drug Herceptin. This story made me feel a little better about the world.

Jane Addams Day: The first annual Jane Addams Day will be celebrated Dec. 10, 2007. The first woman first American woman to win the Nobel Peace Prize, Addams co-founded the social settlement Hull-House in Chicago in 1889. She went on to campaign for suffrage and supported the founding of the NAACP and the ACLU. Check out the Jane Addams Hull-House Museum for more information.

The Outsiders: John Tierney tries to restart a debate about criticism of female genital mutilation being an issue of cultural imperialism. Fortunately, many of Tierney’s commenters aren’t buying it.

Missing, however, is a look at what local health advocates and community-based organizations such as Tostan are doing to raise awareness and to stop this brutality. The New York Times reported on community-based efforts in Egypt earlier this year.

Hysterectomies by the Numbers: “Hysterectomy, the second most frequent major operation performed on women in the United States, has long been criticized as being over performed, especially for benign conditions,” writes Linda Steinberg at the Women’s Media Center. “In the late sixties, the women’s health movement tried to bring national focus to this issue, but still today, some experts say, most of the 600,000 hysterectomies performed annually in this country may be unnecessary.”

World AIDS Day: For World AIDS Day (Dec. 2, 2007 marks the 20th World AIDS Day, if you’re keeping count), Kaiser Family Foundation has updated several resources with new data from UNAIDS on the global HIV/AIDS pandemic. From KFF:

The updates reflect major revisions based on refinements in methodology, increased data availability, and growing knowledge about the natural history of HIV disease. An updated fact sheet provides data on the global impact of HIV/AIDS by region, on women and young people, and data on the global response. Several indicators on globalhealthfacts.org have been updated, including the total number of men, women and children living with HIV/AIDS, and the total number of AIDS deaths worldwide. Both the HIV/AIDS Overview and Facts at a Glance sections on GlobalHealthReporting.org have also been revised.

In addition, there are many new developments in Kaiser’s public education campaigns designed to raise awareness about HIV/AIDS in the U.S. and around the World. The campaigns include the Global Media AIDS Initiative, the Caribbean Broadcast Media Partnership on HIV/AIDS, the African Broadcast Media Partnership Against HIV/AIDS, Rap-It-Up with BET, It’s Your (Sex) Life with MTV and ¡Entérate! with Univision.

Plus: Worldview, an excellent public radio program, on Friday broadcast an interview recorded earlier this year with Stephen Lewis, UN special envoy for AIDS in Africa from 2001 to 2006. He now co-directs AIDS-Free World and is chair of a foundation that funds grassroots projects addressing HIV/AIDS in Africa.

Meet the new class of objectified 6-year-olds, stars of VH1’s “Little Beauties: Ultimate Kiddie Queen Showdown,” a documentary billed as a “light-hearted look into the wonderful world of children’s beauty pageants through the eyes of four, precocious six-year old girls.”

If that isn’t enough to turn your stomach, check out VH1’s list of what viewers will be privy to, including spray tanning sessions and fake teeth fittings. The show has also annoyingly given the girls descriptors, like “the flirt” or “the diva.”

A 6-year-old flirt. Nice.

As Samhita writes, “Please, just stop pornifying, beautifying, and making over our 6 year old girls!!!”

From the It’s About Time Files: “The Department of Veterans Affairs is opening a treatment center exclusively for traumatized female veterans amid an unprecedented wave of reported rapes, assaults and harassment against women,” reports Newhouse News Service. “The facility, to be opened in late December in Bernards Township, N.J., will be the only residential program in the VA system devoted solely to treating women who experienced military sexual trauma.”

Death Tally in Nicaragua: “Nearly 90 women have died in Nicaragua as a direct or indirect result of the repeal, one year ago, of the legislation permitting abortion in cases of risk to the mother’s health, according to women’s and human rights groups,” reports IPS. “In practice what is happening is a government death penalty imposed on women,” said Ana María Pizarro, a gynecologist and the head of the non-governmental organization Sí Mujer.

Healthcare Behind Bars: In her new book, “Women Behind Bars: The Crisis of Women in the U.S. Prison System,” investigative journalist Silja J.A. Talvi looks at multiple aspects of the prison system, including the neglect of women’s health. AlterNet has published an excerpt from the book, a moving account of one prisoner’s death from cervical cancer.

Clinical Trials Loop Hole: “When Congress passed a bill last month requiring makers of drugs and medical devices to disclose the results of clinical trials for all approved products, advocates of greater study disclosure applauded the move,” reports the New York Times. “But a provision that would have mandated disclosures for another group of products never made it into the final version of the bill. It would have covered products tested on patients, but dropped before marketing.”

Yes, that’s right, some patients never learn the results of the clinical studies — including patients in whom medical devices have been implanted. “Trial sponsors can still choose to keep information about some trials confidential, creating serious ethical concerns,” said Dr. Deborah A. Zarin, the director of ClinicalTrials.gov, a Web site run by the National Library of Medicine.

Just When You Think Congress is Getting Smarter About Sex Education … the Kaiser Daily Women’s Health Policy report, citing CQ Today, notes that a “House-Senate conference committee on Thursday approved a fiscal year 2008 appropriations measure that would include a $27.8 million increase in funding of abstinence education programs.”

Speaking of Kaiser … If you’ve been a subscriber to the excellent Daily Women’s Health Policy Report, you’ll have to sign up again at the National Partnership for Women and Families, which is taking over publishing the report as of Nov. 5.

Most People Support Access to Contraceptions in Schools: That’s the finding of a new AP poll (via L.A. Times). The survey of 1,004 adults found that 67 percent support giving contraceptives to students, but of that number, 37 percent would limit it to those whose parents have consented, and 30 percent would allow it for all who ask. A whopping 62 percent said they believe providing birth control reduces the number of teenage pregnancies. Which makes them smarter than Congress.

More Research on Caesarean Births: A new study from Latin America published at BMJ.com (read abstract) found that women who have a non-emergency caesarean birth have double the risk of illness compared to a vaginal birth and five times the risk of having to have antibiotics after birth. Researchers also found caesarean delivery prevented deaths in breech born babies. The intro to a related editorial is available here.

Joss is Back: Savor this news about a new Joss Whedon TV series starring Eliza Dushku (thanks, Jaclyn!)

Listen Up: Professor Kim recommends Farai Chideya’s interview on NPR with actress and singer Sheryl Lee Ralph, a longtime HIV/AIDS activist and organizer of the benefit show Divas Simply Singing.

Women and Science: “During a Congressional hearing focused on the recruitment and retention of female faculty members in the STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) fields Wednesday, witnesses discussed how the federal government can combat the underrepresentation of women through targeted grants and incentives — and even the creation of a new quasi-governmental agency that would expand the enforcement of Title IX, the landmark 1972 gender equity law, to better encompass academic practices,” reports Inside Higher Ed.

Plus: Female Science Professor, a blog by a professor at a research university, offers an inside look at her life and job.

Harassment Unchecked at Army Hotel: “For active and retired military members and their families, the U.S. Army-owned Hale Koa Hotel in Honolulu is a place to relax in a tropical paradise at affordable rates,” writes Kari Lydersen in In These Times. “For hotel parking manager and veteran John “Jack” Lloyd, it appears to be a place to touch and proposition female workers, mostly Filipina — according to complaints filed with the military’s Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) office and testimony from several workers.”

When Writing the Personal was Revolutionary: “By writing honestly about the ways in which women struggle with gender roles, motherhood, and sexuality, she threw open the doors to a more complex understanding of social interactions, and validated women’s experiences as key to political transformation,” Phoebe Connelly writes in this American Prospect essay on author Doris Lessing, winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature.

J.K. Rowling Outs Dumbledore: “Harry Potter” phenom author J.K. Rowling, responding to a question from a child about master wizard Dumbledore’s love life, made the big reveal: “I always saw Dumbledore as gay.” Interesting comments over at KnowThyNeighbor.org.