Here First - Science and Technology Blog

Skin from a factory – this has long been the dream of pharmacologists, chemists and doctors. Research has an urgent need for large quantities of ‘skin models’, which can be used to determine if products such as creams and soaps, cleaning agents, medicines and adhesive bandages are compatible with skin, or if they instead will lead to irritation or allergic reactions for the consumer. Such test results are seen as more meaningful than those from animal experiments, and can even make such experiments largely superfluous. source: ScienceDaily

As if there weren't enough health scares over mobile phones already, heavy users were yesterday given another reason to cut down on their habit. It can bring you out in a rash. Doctors claim 'mobile phone dermatitis' is a risk for those who develop an allergic reaction to the phone's nickel surface. The British Association of Dermatologists is warning other doctors about the newly-identified allergy as it suspects many cases are going unreported or untreated. Cases reported in journals so far include an 18-year-old U.S. man, a 19-year-old woman in Austria and a 14-year-old girl in Scotland. The alert comes after scientists last month urged caution over mobile phone use saying it could take years for the health risks to emerge, although there is a consensus that children are likely to be more vulnerable. Nickel allergy is the most common contact allergy in the UK and is thought to affect 30 per cent of the population, and rising. Women have a higher risk of developing mo...