Unhealthy gut promotes spread of breast cancer, study finds – An unhealthy, inflamed gut causes breast cancer to become much more invasive and spread more quickly to other parts of the body, new research from the University of Virginia Cancer Center suggests. Melanie Rutkowski, Ph.D., of UVA’s Department of Microbiology, Immunology and Cancer Biology, found that disrupting the microbiome of mice caused hormone receptor-positive breast cancer to become more aggressive. Altering the microbiome, the collection of microorganisms that live in the gut and elsewhere, had dramatic effects in the body, priming the cancer to spread. “When we disrupted the microbiome’s equilibrium in mice by chronically treating them antibiotics, it resulted in inflammation systemically and within the mammary tissue,” she said. “In this inflamed environment, tumor cells were much more able to disseminate from the tissue into the blood and to the lungs, which is a major site for hormone receptor-positive breast cancer to metastasize.”

Waning potency of pertussis vaccine a significant contributor to recent whooping cough outbreaks – In a large new Kaiser Permanente study, children who were up to date on their pertussis vaccine schedule were far less likely to develop the disease than unvaccinated children. However, most pertussis cases were in fully vaccinated children. The risk of vaccinated children becoming ill increased with the time since vaccination, suggesting that waning effectiveness between doses was a significant contributor to recent outbreaks. The study, “Acellular Pertussis Vaccine Effectiveness Over Time,” was published on June 10 in the journal Pediatrics. Pertussis, widely known as whooping cough, is a highly contagious and potentially life-threatening respiratory infection caused by the bacterium Bordetella pertussis. To help prevent it, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recommends five doses of DTaP vaccine—a combination vaccine that protects against pertussis, diphtheria, and tetanus—between the ages of two months and six years.

Chickenpox Vaccine Shields Against Shingles Too – Shingles isn’t usually considered a kids’ disease, but children can get this painful condition. Fortunately, the chickenpox vaccine can also protect them against it, a new study finds. “The virus that causes chickenpox also causes shingles. It’s pretty uncommon in kids, but we wanted to see what would happen to the rates of shingles among children over time as more kids received the vaccine,” said study lead author Sheila Weinmann. She’s a senior investigator and epidemiologist at Kaiser Permanente Northwest in Portland, Ore. What the researchers found was that kids who were vaccinated against chickenpox had a 78% lower risk of developing shingles. And the rate of shingles dropped in the entire group — vaccinated and unvaccinated — by 72% between 2003 and 2014. Weinmann said the overall drop was large because so much less of the virus was circulating in the general population. The study was published online June 10 in Pediatrics. Dr. Anne Gershon from Columbia University wrote a companion editorial that argued all children should get the vaccine for the dual protection it offers.