News of New Zealanders via Global Media

NZ Scientists Help Crack Malaria Vaccine

NZ Scientists Help Crack Malaria Vaccine

A team of researchers from Victoria University of Wellington’s Ferrier Research Institute, the Malaghan Institute and the Peter Doherty Institute for Infection and Immunity in Australia have created a new malaria vaccine believed to…

Study Sheds Light on Mental Illness and Dementia

Study Sheds Light on Mental Illness and Dementia

“Certain mental conditions, particularly depression and schizophrenia, have also been linked to dementia. But because depression can itself be a sign of cognitive decline, the causality has been a bit muddy,” Claudia Wallis writes…

Siouxsie Wiles Makes BBC List of Inspiring Women

Siouxsie Wiles Makes BBC List of Inspiring Women

Scientist and public health communicator Siouxsie Wiles has been named on this year’s BBC list of 100 Women, a roll call of “inspiring and inspirational women from around the world”. This year, the BBC reports,…

New Zealand 32nd in Global Rankings for Children Surviving and Thriving

New Zealand 32nd in Global Rankings for Children Surviving and Thriving

While New Zealand tops global rankings for natural beauty, an absence of corruption and business competitiveness, it ranked only 32th for “flourishing children” according to a just-published report from the WHO-UNICEF-Lancet Commission, “A…

New Zealand Launches First HIV Positive Sperm Bank

New Zealand Launches First HIV Positive Sperm Bank

The world’s first HIV positive sperm bank has been launched in New Zealand in an effort to reduce the stigma experienced by those living with the virus, the Press Association reports in an article…

Surgeon Simon Talbot Heads World-Leading Team

Surgeon Simon Talbot Heads World-Leading Team

Harvard-based New Zealander Dr Simon Talbot M.D. leads a team of surgeons performing astonishing hand transplants and plays a part in operations that give patients a new face, reports Clare de Lore…

New Zealand Launches Testicular Cancer Booth Check

New Zealand Launches Testicular Cancer Booth Check

Ever thought of getting a health check but worried about having to? Well, drop your pants. Meet the Testimatic, a booth allowing New Zealand men to have their testicles checked without having to face…

The Healing Powers of Manuka Honey

The Healing Powers of Manuka Honey

Freelance writer Chaney Kwak took his cancer-survivor mother on a road trip through New Zealand in search of the magical healing powers of manuka honey. He writes about his experience in an article for…

First 3D Colour X-Ray Of A Human Using CERN Technology

First 3D Colour X-Ray Of A Human Using CERN Technology

“A New-Zealand company has scanned a human body using a colour medical scanner based on Medipix3 technology developed at CERN. Father and son scientists Professors Phil and Anthony Butler from Canterbury and Otago Universities…

Bioethicist Josephine Johnston on Egg-Freezing

Bioethicist Josephine Johnston on Egg-Freezing

Australia’s first dedicated egg-freezing clinic opened late last year, promoting the procedure as an insurance policy against infertility. But does it represent hope, hype or heartbreak? Some call the egg freezing drive a feminist…

New Zealand Publicly Funds HIV Protection Drug

New Zealand Publicly Funds HIV Protection Drug

New Zealand is about to take a pioneering approach to fighting HIV/AIDS – by publicly funding pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) medication Truvada, manufactured by US biotech giant Gilead. Taking this drug daily has shown to offer…

Hamish MacDonald’s Healthy Approach to Data

Hamish MacDonald’s Healthy Approach to Data

The days of haphazardly following a GP’s advice will be over if New Zealander Hamish MacDonald’s health app The Diary has its way, The Australian reports. Many of us fall victim to waning interest in…

Kiwi Researcher Lifts the Lid on US Medical-Care Prices

Kiwi Researcher Lifts the Lid on US Medical-Care Prices

“The US has the highest medical-care prices in the world. Now, Kiwi researcher Miriam Laugesen has lifted the lid on why this is,” in her book Fixing Medical Prices: How Physicians Are Paid, writes…

Parkinson’s Disease Breakthrough

Parkinson’s Disease Breakthrough

University of Auckland scientists have made a breakthrough in potential treatments for the debilitating Parkinson’s disease by identifying how it spreads in the brain. The scientists said they had the first strong evidence that the…

Immunotherapy Researcher’s Aim for T-Cells

Immunotherapy Researcher’s Aim for T-Cells

In Seattle, at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, Christchurch-born Dr Rachel Perret, a postdoctoral research fellow, spends her days – and sometimes her nights – working toward an “off-the-shelf” version of T-cell therapy. The…

NZ Launches Healthier Lives Challenge

NZ Launches Healthier Lives Challenge

The New Zealand government recently launched the Healthier Lives National Science Challenge – a program that “will seek better prevention, diagnosis and treatment methods for cancer, diabetes, cardiovascular disease and obesity, with a burden…

Ron Butler Gets Behind New Emergency Vehicle

Ron Butler Gets Behind New Emergency Vehicle

The Cobra Litter is the brainchild of New Zealand-born racecar designer Ron Butler, who has spent countless hours working on the Ford Shelby Cobra, and retired Santa Barbara County firefighter Michael Schlags. “With Schlags’ real-world…

People Age at Wildly Different Rates Study Shows

People Age at Wildly Different Rates Study Shows

Tests done in Dunedin on physiological markers in nearly 1000 38-year-olds has found that some had biological ages many years older than their birthdates would suggest. The research confirms that people grow old at…

New Zealand Black Currants Boost Brain: Study

New Zealand Black Currants Boost Brain: Study

A study conducted by scientists at the New Zealand Plant & Food Research center and UK Northumbria University has found that compounds in juice from New Zealand black currants increases mental performance, mood, and…

Research Looks at Preventing Genetically Inherited Cancers

Research Looks at Preventing Genetically Inherited Cancers

Deadly stomach and breast cancers that are genetically inherited could be treated or even prevented with existing drugs identified by Otago University cancer researchers. The researchers said their research showed that the key genetic mutation…

University of Auckland professors call on United Nations to lead efforts against smoking

University of Auckland professors call on United Nations to lead efforts against smoking

Professors Robert Beaglehole and Ruth Bonita, from the University of Auckland have called on the United Nations to lead ‘a turbocharged’ campaign to make the world tobacco free by 2040. “A world where tobacco is…

Malaghan Institute Observes Extraordinary Cell Transfer

Malaghan Institute Observes Extraordinary Cell Transfer

New Zealand and Australian scientists have observed DNA moving between animal cells in a breakthrough discovery that may lead to a better understanding of a range of human diseases and new gene therapies. The team…

Plastic Surgeon Simon Talbot Completes Double Arm Transplant

Plastic Surgeon Simon Talbot Completes Double Arm Transplant

Originally from Hamilton, Dr Simon Talbot, 38, a reconstructive plastic surgeon specialising in hand surgery, has led a team in a ground-breaking double arm transplant on a quadruple amputee at Brigham and Women’s Hospital…

Precious Life Preserved on Ward 3

Precious Life Preserved on Ward 3

The beginnings of plastic surgery during World War II and pioneer New Zealand-born Archie McIndoe’s work with the Guinea Pig Club at Queen Victoria Hospital are related in an excerpt taken from Extreme Medicine: How…

Kiwi Doctor to Perform Double Arm Transplant

Kiwi Doctor to Perform Double Arm Transplant

New Zealand Doctor Simon Talbot will lead a surgical team to give a quadruple amputee both his arms back. Will Lautzenheiser, filmmaker and former BU professor, lost all four of his limbs three…

What’s Not to like about Grown Men Dancing?

What’s Not to like about Grown Men Dancing?

English socialite and sister of the Duchess of Cambridge, Pippa Middleton, who prefers “rugger” to soccer, explains the game to Vanity Fair readers in the latest issue of the magazine, mentioning the “battle cry”…

Building on the Holistic Work of Esteemed Surgeon

Building on the Holistic Work of Esteemed Surgeon

British scientists are looking to the work of New Zealander Sir Archibald McIndoe, hoping to find ways to help burns victims regenerate new nerves and skin so that they are only left with minimal…

McIndoe Sculpture Unveiled

McIndoe Sculpture Unveiled

The design for a memorial honouring pioneering plastic surgeon, Dunedin-born Sir Archibald McIndoe, the hundreds of Second World War air crew whom he rescued from despair, and the town of East Grinstead crucial in…

Britain Gets a Health Lesson

Britain Gets a Health Lesson

Midlands Health Network in New Zealand is exploring how best to tackle the problem of the country’s ageing population. Midlands Health Network chief executive John Macaskill-Smith explains in the Guardian how Britain’s…

Clark Calls for Action

Clark Calls for Action

Helen Clark is calling for swift action to halt a surge of diseases such as cancer and diabetes in the Pacific, writes the Samoa Observer. Ms. Clark, a former New Zealand Prime Minister, is…

NZ Congratulated for Plain Packaged Cigarettes

NZ Congratulated for Plain Packaged Cigarettes

New Zealand will follow Australia’s lead in forcing cigarette makers to sell their products in plain packs, writes Dan Harrison, Health reporter for The Age. ‘Associate Health Minister Tariana Turia announced that she would…

Kids TV and Crime Linked

Kids TV and Crime Linked

Otago University Professor Bob Hancox has found that the risk of having a criminal conviction in adulthood increases with every hour that children spend watching TV. The New Zealand study followed a group of…

Memorial To A Friend

Memorial To A Friend

A sculpture in memorial to pioneering New Zealand plastic surgeon Archibald McIndoe will be created by Martin Jennings, whose war hero father was one of McIndoe’s grateful guinea pigs. Jenning’s own father was one…

Potheads Lose Brainpower

Potheads Lose Brainpower

A study of marijuana’s mounting neuropsychological effects over time tracked a group of 1037 children born in New Zealand for 38 years from the times of their births in 1972 and 1973. Adults who…

Hypnosis as Anaesthetic

Hypnosis as Anaesthetic

Auckland Regional Pain Service pain specialist Dr Bob Large says he expects hypnosis will be used more widely in the future as a form of analgesia and anaesthesia. Large, who was a guest speaker…

Computer Games Raise Spirits

Computer Games Raise Spirits

A computer game designed to lift teenagers out of depression is as effective as one-on-one counselling, researchers at the University of Auckland have found. Researchers tested an interactive 3-D fantasy game called SPARX on…

First With Pig Cells

First With Pig Cells

New Zealand company Living Cell Technologies plans to implant pig cells in the human brain in clinical trials to treat Parkinson’s disease and help improve movement and brain functions in patients. The clinical trials,…

Pacific Edge To Pennsylvania

Pacific Edge To Pennsylvania

Dunedin-based biomedical company Pacific Edge, which has developed an easy and accurate method for detecting bladder cancer, plans to open a facility in Hershey, Pennsylvania. Pacific Edge Diagnostics should open by the end…

Kindness Donated By Strangers

Kindness Donated By Strangers

Donors from across the globe have helped fund a New Zealand English teacher’s life-saving liver transplant, which was carried out at Pusan National University Hospital in Yangsan, South Korea. Mick Milne, 47, who has…

Healthy UK Appointment

Healthy UK Appointment

New Zealander Professor Malcolm Grant will be appointed chair of the UK’s new National Health Service (NHS) commissioning board. Grant, who is currently president and provost of University College London (UCL), would…

Fear the Spud No More

Fear the Spud No More

Researchers at Otago University have found that potatoes may not be the fat-gain ogres that many dieticians claim and that when you eat these carbohydrates as part of a meal of meat and vegetables…

Flu Research Coup

Flu Research Coup

The Institute of Environmental Science and Research (ESR) has won a five-year, multi-million-dollar contract awarded by the United States Centre for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to study influenza in an effort to better…

Farmyard Cancer Link

Farmyard Cancer Link

Researchers from Massey University in Wellington have found that growing up on a farm is linked to an increased risk of developing blood cancer later in life. The academics studied the death certificates of…

Midwives Lead the World

Midwives Lead the World

New Zealand midwives provide the best care in the world for mothers and newborn babies, described international delegates attending the recent 29th Triennial Congress of the International Confederation of Midwives (ICM) in South Africa….

Silencing Cancer Genes

Silencing Cancer Genes

Otago University Professor Michael Eccles and colleagues have found a way to stop the growth of certain cancer tumours by “silencing” a group of PAX genes, members of a small family of genes that…

Sunshine Beats Pneumonia

Sunshine Beats Pneumonia

Researchers at Waikato University have found that sunshine can help save the lives of pneumonia patients. Medical scientists at the University have found that vitamin D, which is absorbed through the skin and produced…

Medal of Honour for Doctor

Medal of Honour for Doctor

Aucklander Dr Alan Kerr (left) has received Palestine’s highest honour, the “Medal of Honour”, from PNA President Mahmoud Abbas for saving more than 6 children’s lives in the West Bank and Gaza…

Anti-cancer Effects

Anti-cancer Effects

Otago University scientists have found that children who regularly drink milk are up to 40 per cent less likely to suffer from bowel cancer. The researchers found that drinking nearly 250ml of milk daily…

World-first treatment

World-first treatment

Auckland-based Living Cell Technologies, which is pioneering a world-first treatment for type 1 diabetes using insulin-producing cells grown in pigs, has been approved for sale in Russia. Professor Bob Elliott, who heads the Auckland…

Totally natural

Totally natural

Former Miss Universe Auckland-born Lorraine Downes, 46, is the new face of natural skin care company Living Earth. CEO of Living Nature, New Zealand John O’Toole says: “Lorraine and Living Nature is a match…

Californian Appointment

Californian Appointment

Aucklander Brian Kelly has been appointed president-designee at Life Chiropractic College West in San Lorenzo, California. Kelly owned a chiropractic practice in Melbourne for over a decade before being selected to serve as the…

Height advantage

Height advantage

A study of 2 children undertaken by researchers at New Zealand’s Liggins Institute has found individuals conceived using a certain In Vitro Fertilisation technique were several centimetres taller, by age six, when compared to…

Patent Challenge

Patent Challenge

New Zealand patent lawyer Professor Yvonne Cripps, who is now based in London, was recently a guest on the BBC World’s radio programme The Forum discussing the patenting of genes and whether “we really…

Everyday hero

Everyday hero

Ray Avery — New Zealander of the Year 21 — is interviewed by Hindustan Times reporter Tithiya Sharma for a series she is undertaking throughout the year profiling 1 “everyday heroes”. In 23, Avery…

Colostrum for all

Colostrum for all

Taranaki-raised biochemist Dr Andrew Keech is the founding and managing director of Phoenix-based APS BioGroup, which adds bovine colostrum to dietary supplements in order to boost the human immune system. Keech and American Les…

Humanitarian career

Humanitarian career

Wellington doctor Adrick Baker, 69, has devoted a large part of his career to serving thousands of poor villagers for free in northeastern Bangladesh, opening a free health centre in Kailakuri, which has since…