How to protect yourself from tick bites? How to recognize a tiger mosquito and protect yourself from it? And the toxicity test becomes mandatory before 5-FU chemotherapy. We tell you everything.
Lyme disease: how to protect yourself from tick bites?
Like every year, the arrival of fine weather encourages ticks to come out of hiding. Vectors of Lyme disease when infected with the bacteria Borrelia burgdorferi – they are not all, ticks transmit it during a bite to a walker or an animal. Knowing how to protect yourself from these small pests and act quickly in the event of a bite is therefore essential. To begin with, it is important to protect yourself against tick bites, in particular by wearing light-colored clothing to distinguish them more easily on the fabric, closed shoes, covering your head and tucking your pants into your socks. Beware of tall grass, where they settle to be at the level of walkers and jump on their prey as soon as they are at a good distance. So stay on the cleared paths during your walks in the forest, avoid venturing off the trails… To read more, click here.
Tiger mosquito: how to recognize it and protect yourself from it?
This year again, the tiger mosquito, which is known to be a vector of several diseases such as zika, dengue or even chikungunya, is present in a large part of the country. “Its anthropophilic character (which likes places inhabited by man) explains that once installed in a municipality or a department, it is practically impossible to get rid of it”, indicates the Ministry of Health. How to recognize a tiger mosquito? Already know that the tiger mosquito is smaller than a penny: it measures only a few millimeters and has a fairly slow flight that allows it to be crushed in flight. If you look closely, you’ll see that it’s black with white stripes on its legs and abdomen, earning it its nickname, the tiger mosquito. To see photos and learn more, click here.
5-FU chemotherapy: the toxicity test becomes mandatory
Cancer affects approximately 385,000 people each year in France. The most frequent are cancers of the prostate, breast, colon and rectum, as well as that of the lung. Used for more than 60 years, chemotherapy based on 5-FU or capecitabine is mainly used to treat cancerous tumors of the breast, of the digestive or ENT type. Each year, 80,000 people are therefore treated with this molecule. But this treatment, one of the most powerful, is questioned: it would be responsible for 133 deaths and 1500 serious poisonings in 10 years. Last February, the relatives of several victims filed a complaint against X to draw attention to this problem. We tell you more in our article.
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