By Conor Bryant The U.S. government, led by the Department of Defense, announced plans on Monday to invest $200 million to help shorten the waiting list for organ transplants. It is designed to support technologies aimed at repairing and replacing cells and tissues, says Jeff Zients, director of the White House National Economic Council. $160 [...]

By Conor Bryant There are five reasons the Olympic games should not take place in Rio de Janeiro this year. The first begins back when the International Olympic Committee (IOC) declared Rio a “safe environment” for the Games in January. Brazil’s Ministry of Health temporized until February to declare Zika a notifiable disease and began [...]

By Conor Bryant A letter signed by over 200 scientists called the World Health Organization (WHO) to move or postpone the Olympic games in Rio de Janeiro due to the ongoing epidemic of Zika in Brazil. WHO responded by saying the Games in Rio does not pose a threat big enough to warrant moving the [...]

Tom Roddy/Newsweek Recently, there has been talk amongst athletes and Olympic officials alike about the state of the Zika virus and whether or not is poses a significant threat to the athletes who would be competing in Rio's 2016 Summer Olympics. A number of athletes have expressed concerns over whether or not [...]

By Genevieve Lewis In early June, the United Nations called on Ireland to amend its constitution in order to change the current laws regarding abortion, which were deemed a violation of human rights. The UN faces a deeply political struggle to change Ireland’s strict abortion laws because of the country’s Catholic roots. The United Nations [...]

By Aidan Appleby With 121,000 people in the U.S. actively awaiting organs, an increase in the number of organ donations could not have come at a better time. Unfortunately, the reason more organs are becoming available is because of a drug epidemic. According to the United Network of Organ Sharing (UNOS), the number of [...]

By Bobby Thomas According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), drug overdose deaths hit unprecedented numbers in 2014. Most of these deaths resulted from the misuse of prescription painkillers and heroin. In 2014, an estimated 47,000 individuals died, compared to 44,000 in 2013. Unfortunately, a staggering 6 out of 10 deaths is [...]

By Princess Chukwuneke According to the 2014 World Bank statistics, about 22.5% of Iraq’s population of 30 million live in severe poverty. Breadwinners do not earn enough to pay for rent, healthcare, or the needs of their children. Being proud, many Iraqi families refuse to beg for food. As a desperate solution, they turn instead to [...]

By Maria Coluccio Last month, the Russian Constitutional Court published a ruling that upheld the legality of harvesting organs from a cadaver without the family’s permission. The ruling was a response to a lawsuit over the harvesting of a deceased Moscow student’s organs without the family’s consent. Alina Sablina was killed in a car accident [...]

Perspectives from Working with Doctors Without Borders On October 2nd, 2013, over 200 University of Iowa Students, Faculty and Community members gathered to learn about the medical situation in Syria during the war. Dr. John Lawrence was invited to speak about his recent surgical mission in Syria with Doctors Without Borders/Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF). [...]