A study in this week's PLOS Medicine finds that the painkiller diclofenac (a non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drug (NSAID) in the same class as aspirin) is the most commonly used NSAID in the 15 countries studied and is included in the essential medicines lists of 74 low-, middle- and high-income countries, despite its known tendency to cause heart attacks and strokes in vulnerable patients.

Discovering what they call the "Achilles' heel" for lymphoid leukemia, an international research team has tested a possible alternative treatment that eradicated the disease in mouse models. Reporting their results in the journal Cancer Cell, the scientists said the targeted molecular therapy described in their study could have direct implications for current treatment of Acute Lymphoid Leukemia (ALL) in people.

Large pharmaceutical companies join forces with small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and academia in an IMI-supported public private partnership (PPP) to enhance early drug discovery and so address the ever-increasing need for innovative therapeutics to tackle unmet medical needs.

A compound that stimulates the production of a tumor-fighting protein may improve the usefulness of the protein in cancer therapy, according to a team of researchers. TRAIL is a natural anti-tumor protein that suppresses tumor development during immune surveillance - the immune system's process of patrolling the body for cancer cells.

Ottawa scientists have discovered a trigger that turns muscle stem cells into brown fat, a form of good fat that could play a critical role in the fight against obesity. The findings from Dr. Michael Rudnicki's lab, based at the Ottawa Hospital Research Institute, were published in the prestigious journal Cell Metabolism.

Having adequate levels of vitamin D during young adulthood may reduce the risk of adult-onset type 1 diabetes by as much as 50%, according to researchers at Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH). The findings, if confirmed in future studies, could lead to a role for vitamin D supplementation in preventing this serious autoimmune disease in adults.

The Union for International Cancer Control (UICC) and the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) today announced that 1.5 million lives which would be lost to cancer, could be saved per year if decisive measures are taken to achieve the World Health Organization's (WHO) '25 by 25' target; to reduce premature deaths due to non-communicable diseases (NCDs) by 25% by 2025.