Author: The Lancet

The Global Burden of Disease Study 2010 (GBD 2010) is the largest ever systematic effort to describe the global distribution and causes of a wide array of major diseases, injuries, and health risk factors. It consists of seven articles, each containing a wealth of data on different aspects of the study.

According to this study, in 2010, alcohol was the world’s third most important risk factor for disability adjusted life years (a composite measure of years lived with disability and years of life lost due to premature death), after high blood pressure and tobacco smoking, and up from 6th place in 1990.

Check here the complete list of articles of GBD 2010.

Author: Ministry of Social Affairs and Health, Finland

‘Health in All Policies (HiAP): Seizing opportunities, implementing policies’, published by the Ministry of Social Affairs and Health of Finland, identifies practical opportunities and challenges for raising health on political agendas. It stresses the importance of seizing opportunities for negotiating and implementing feasible policy solutions.

Author: Global Thematic Consultation on Health

The ‘Health in the Post-2015 Agenda’ from the Global Thematic Consultation on Health (led by WHO and UNICEF) states that the post-2015 health agenda should:

1) Include specific health-related targets as part of other development sector goals.

2) Take a holistic, life-course approach to people’s health with an emphasis on health promotion and disease prevention.

3) Accelerate progress where MDG targets have not been achieved and set more ambitious targets for the period to come.

4) Address the growing burden of NCDs, mental illness, and other emerging health challenges.

This is the first time mental illness has been explicitly included in the Post-MDG agenda.

Author: Bruce Alberts (Science)

Science's editorial, against the use of the journal impact factor in judging the individual scientist's work.

Authors: Sunita Bava, Joanna Jacobus, Rachel E. Thayer and Susan F. Tapert

The influence of repeated substance use during adolescent neurodevelopment remains unclear as there have been few prospective investigations. The aims of this study were to identify longitudinal changes in fiber tract integrity associated with alcohol- and marijuana-use severity over the course of 1.5 years.