Here are some of the latest health and medical news developments, compiled by the editors of HealthDay:
Asher's Chocolate Products Recalled
A number of Asher's brand chocolate products are being recalled due to possible salmonella contamination.
The recalled items were sold in stores nationwide, but no illnesses have been reported so far, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration said.
Consumers with the recalled products should not eat them. To arrange for the return of products and a refund, call the company at 888-288-3880 between 9 a.m. and 5 p.m. ET, Monday through Friday.
Salmonella can cause fever, diarrhea (which may be bloody), nausea, vomiting and abdominal pain in healthy people, and serious and sometimes fatal infections in young children, frail or elderly people, and others with weakened immune systems, the FDA said.
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World's First Face Transplant Patient Dies
The women who underwent the world's first partial face transplant 11 years ago died in April, a hospital in France announced Tuesday.
Isabelle Dinoire, 49, died after a long illness and news of her death was withheld until now because her family wanted her death kept private, the Associated Press reported.
No further details were provided by Amiens University Hospital in northern France, and it's not known if her illness was associated with the transplant in 2005.
Dinoire was severely disfigured by her pet dog and received a new nose, chin and lips. Her surgery helped lead to dozen of other face transplants worldwide, the AP reported.
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Powerful Animal Drug Linked to Spike in Overdoses in Cincinnati
An animal tranquilizer called carfentanil is believed to be most of the more than 200 drug overdoses, including three deaths, in the Cincinnati area in the past two weeks.
Carfentanil is a synthetic drug used on livestock and elephants and is 100 times more powerful than the synthetic painkiller fentanyl, which is 50 times stronger than heroin. An amount of carfentanil smaller than a snowflake can kill a person, an expert told The New York Times.
Carfentanil has been confirmed as the cause of several recent overdose deaths, the first confirmed cases in the United States, according to Hamilton County coroner Dr. Lakshmi Kode Sammarco.
Deaths dating back to early July are now being investigated to determine if carfentanil was the cause.
"We'd never seen it before," Sammarco told The Times. "I'm really worried about this."
Similar spikes in overdoses have occurred recently in Indiana, Kentucky and West Virginia.
Officials believe the carfentanil is being made in China or Mexico and arriving the Cincinnati area in heroin shipments that come north on Interstates 71 and 75, The Times reported.
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High Levels of Toxic Smog Particles Found in Human Brains
Researchers have discovered "abundant" amounts of toxic nanoparticles from air pollution in people's brains.
The discovery of high levels of the magnetite particles in the brain tissue of 37 people, ages 3 to 92, is alarming because recent research suggest a link between these particles and Alzheimer's disease, according to The Guardian newspaper in the U.K.
The study was published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
"This is a discovery finding, and now what should start is a whole new examination of this as a potentially very important environmental risk factor for Alzheimer's disease," said study leader Barbara Maher, a professor at Lancaster University, The Guardian reported.
"Now there is a reason to go on and do the epidemiology and the toxicity testing, because these particles are so prolific and people are exposed to them," she added.
The high levels of magnetite, an iron oxide, were found in brain tissue from people in the U.K. and Mexico.
"Magnetite in the brain is not something you want to have because it is particularly toxic there," because it can create reactive oxygen species called free radicals, Maher told The Guardian.
"Oxidative cell damage is one of the hallmark features of Alzheimer's disease, and this is why the presence of magnetite is so potentially significant, because it is so bioreactive," she explained.
"This is a very intriguing finding and it raises a lot of important questions," Jon Dobson, a professor at the University of Florida who not part of the research team, told The Guardian.
However, further investigation is needed, he added.
"One thing that puzzles me is that the [particle] concentrations are somewhat higher than those previously reported for the human brain. Further studies [are needed] to determine whether this due to regional variations within the brain, the fact that these samples are from subjects who lived in industrial areas, or whether it is possibly due to [lab] contamination," Dobson said.
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Vitamin D Reduces Severe Asthma Attacks
Vitamin D supplements may help reduce the risk of severe asthma attacks, according to researchers.
They reviewed nine clinical trials that included hundreds and children and adults and fouind that taking vitamin D in addition to asthma medication lowered the risk of severe asthma attacks from 6 percent to 3 percent, BBC News reported.
Taking vitamin D supplements also reduced the rate of asthma attacks requiring steroid treatment from 0.44 to 0.28 attacks per person per year, but did not improve lung function or day-to-day asthma symptoms according to the independent review by the Cochrane researchers.
They said it's unclear whether vitamin D supplements only help asthma patients who are vitamin D deficient, and that further studies are needed before any official advice can be given to patients, BBC News reported.
People with asthma should talk to a doctor or pharmacist before taking a vitamin D supplement, the researchers advised.
"While this research shows promise, more evidence is needed to conclusively show whether vitamin D can reduce asthma attacks and symptoms," Erika Kennington, Asthma UK's head of research, told BBC News.
"With so many different types of asthma it could be that vitamin D may benefit some people with the condition but not others," she added.
