A mother-of-three had half of her face sliced off after developing a potentially deadly infection after whacking her head on her oven.

Donna Corden, 46, of Leeds knocked herself out during the incident earlier this year and sustained a small cut above her left eyebrow.

Within just 24 hours, her face turned a frightening shade of black and she became delirious and dizzy. She was rushed to hospital.

Doctors diagnosed her with necrotising fasciitis - a flesh-eating bug that often kills. Her children were told to 'prepare for the worst'.

Surgeons were able to cut away the rotten flesh to keep her alive, but days later she went onto develop sepsis and her life hung in the balance.

Her body went into organ failure and she was placed in an induced coma so she could recover, she was pumped full of antibiotics.

Speaking for the first time since recovering, Ms Corden, who has had skin grafted from her lower limbs onto her face, said: 'I'm alive. It could be worse.' Ms Corden, who is currently on sick leave, said that her legs gave way, because of her arthritis, as she stood in the kitchen in January this year. 

Knocking herself out on the oven, her son David Lawton, 24, discovered that she was unconscious sometime later.

Ms Corden added: 'I had a nasty cut and there was blood everywhere. I didn’t want to go to hospital, so David called a doctor and butterfly strips were put across the cut.'

The next day, her cut began turning a frightening shade of black. Ms Corden said: 'Jayde apparently told doctors, "Please save my mum’s eye". But they said, "It’s not a case of saving her eye, it’s a case of saving her life".' 

After three hours in theatre, surgeons successfully managed to cut away the rotten flesh.

But, days later, she also developed sepsis, which occurs when the body attacks its own organs and tissues in response to an infection.

Her body went into organ failure. Put in an induced coma so she could recover, she was pumped full of antibiotics.

Then, after being brought round, she was discharged as an out-patient on February 10.  Since being discharged, Ms Corden has been in-and-out of hospital, having bouts of repeated surgery on her face as it heals. 

Initially, she was told she would have to wait months for reconstructive surgery, as it was believed she would not be strong enough, 

But she recovered quickly and was ready for her first reconstructive operation in January. It lasted 11 hours.

Surgeons were able to graft skin from her legs and thigh onto her face. Some of this excess skin was removed during another operation in July. 

There will be many more operations in the coming months, Ms Corden explained. She said: 'It's a long road, but it is a start.' 

Now eager to raise awareness of the signs and symptoms of NF, Ms Corden is looking to the future.

She added: 'I can’t change what happened. But I have a wonderful family and lovely friends. I’m lucky to be alive. 

Armed police have flooded London's streets as the terror threat level was raised to critical amid fears the Parsons Green bomber could strike again, Theresa May announced tonight.

The introduction of Operation Temperer will see soldiers replacing police at key sites including nuclear power plants to free up extra armed officers for regular patrols.

Scotland Yard said it is making 'excellent' progress in hunting the suspected terrorist who set off a crude bucket bomb on a packed commuter train by Parsons Green tube station in west London at 8.20am.

Mrs May said in a statement from Number 10: 'The Joint Terrorism Analysis Centre has now decided to raise the national threat level from severe to critical - this means their assessment is that a further attack may be imminent.'

Minutes later Assistant Commissioner Mark Rowley suggested there might have been more than one person involved, stating that police were 'chasing down suspects'.

Police identified the suspected terrorist using CCTV footage but the investigation has been overshadowed by an extraordinary diplomatic row triggered by Donald Trump

The US President tweeted just hours after the rush hour blast that police had the attacker 'in their sights' and should have been 'more proactive' in catching 'the loser'.

Scotland Yard hit back and said Mr Trump's comments were 'pure speculation' while senior officers refused to name the suspect.

The President later rowed back on his controversial comments by posting another tweet saying, ‘our hearts and prayers go out to the people of London’.

The Islamic State group claimed responsibility for the attack tonight, saying its 'soldiers' had 'planted IEDs'.  It was the middle of rush hour when the crude bucket bomb - which had a timer - went off at 8.20am inside a tube train packed with commuters, including children and a pregnant woman.

The device was hidden in a builder's bucket and could have killed dozens but failed to properly detonate and sent a 'wall of fire' through the carriage at Parsons Green, injuring at least 29 people.

Terrified passengers were left covered in blood with scorched hands, legs, faces and hair – others suffered crush injuries during a stampede as they 'ran for their lives' over fears the 'train would blow up'.

London Ambulance took 19 patients to hospitals, while the others went in themselves. The four hospitals dealing with patients were Imperial, Chelsea and Westminster, Guy's and St Thomas' and St George's.

Officers are tonight hunting for the bomber across London amid claims he could be armed and might have planted other explosive devices.

An officer at the scene told MailOnline: 'We believe there is a second bomb - there is a man with knives on the loose.'

In a pre-recorded television statement released around 8.30pm, May said military personnel would replace police officers 'on guard duties at certain protected sites which are not accessible to the public'.

The hope is to implant human stem cells in an animal embryo so that it will grow specific human organs. The approach could, in theory, provide a ready-made replacement for a diseased heart or liver – eliminating the wait for a human donor and reducing the risk of organ rejection.  It's going to open up a new understanding of biology 

These bold and controversial plans are the culmination of more than three decades of research. These experiments have helped us understand some of the biggest mysteries of life, delineate the boundaries between species, and explore how a ragbag bunch of cells in the womb coalesce and grow into a living, breathing being.

With new plans to fund the projects, we are now reaching a critical point in this research. "Things are moving very fast in this field today," says Janet Rossant at the Hospital for Sick Children in Toronto, and one of the early pioneers of chimera research. "It's going to open up a new understanding of biology."

That is, provided we can resolve some knotty ethical issues first – questions that may permanently change our understanding of what it means to be human.

For millennia, chimeras were literally the stuff of legend. The term comes from Greek mythology, with Homer describing a strange hybrid "of immortal make, not human, lion-fronted and snake behind, a goat in the middle". It was said to breathe fire as it roamed Lycia in Asia Minor. Previous attempts to produce a hybrid "interspecific" chimera often ended in disappointment. The embryos simply failed to embed in the uterus, and those that did were deformed and stunted, and typically miscarried before they reached term.

Nano implants microchips devices   Get ready. A new science is developing that victimizes countless individuals and promotes bigotry and inhumane practices on an inconceivable scale. That science involves the use of involuntarily implanted microchips in humans. A new form of torture and mind control from traditional methods, the science is little understood and little accepted in the scientific community. Psychiatrists and other doctors treating victims of microchip implants normally mis-diagnose their symptoms as Alzheimer’s disease or dementia.

Miracle technology could allow people to transmit their brainwaves and speak to each other mind-to-mind. Scientists are working to create computers that read thoughts to find terrorists, and machines to scan our minds like thumbprints–causing some to wonder if “thought theft” could become the crime of the future.

First, let me say a word about microchip devices. Microchips are tiny instruments that drive various functions of computers and other electronic equipment. They are about the size on, however, they are getting increasingly smaller. Veterinarians started implanting them in dogs, cattle, and horses fifteen to twenty years ago to allow the owners to track their animals and prove ownership. Today’s microchips are almost microscopic and represent state-of-the-art technology. Manufactured from silicone, they are virtually impossible to detect once they are implanted

Knowing the value of documentation, I began keeping a journal of those unusual happenings. I not only studied my notes for clues about who was involved and how they conducted their handiwork but I also performed research on microchip implants and their use in electronic torture and mind control over the internet. The result of that research revealed that other people who claimed that they hosted microchip implants had suffered similar experiences. Many of their symptoms paralleled mine. In addition to those firsthand accounts, I found other data on the internet using the keywords “microchips, microchip implants, electronic torture, and mind control.” Although most of the articles took a particular slant on the topics, e.g. “the säpo sweden”,CIA, government control, etc., they all contained useful information.

Knowledge about my harassers and their modus operandi evolved slowly. More than six months went by before I knew the extent of their capability. Finally, however, I found out from experience that through the microchip implant and the computer program that operated with it, my torturers were able to perform the following actions:

Medical experiments conducted on human beings during the Nazi period are often associated with notorious SS doctors and concentration camps. The experiments have been described as ‘pseudo-science’ and viewed as a precursor to the killing centres of the Holocaust.

Yet many respected German scientists, research institutes and funding bodies were intimately involved in coerced experiments and research. Medical practitioners seized opportunities offered by war and genocide to advance scientific agendas, without regard for the moral and ethical consequences of human exploitation. 

Based on the ground-breaking research of Wellcome Trust Professor at Oxford Brookes University, Paul Weindling, this exhibition examines coerced experimentation in Nazi-dominated Europe. Through the portraits of victims and perpetrators, the exhibition explores the legacy of medical research under Nazism, and its impact on bioethics today. 

Black athletes are often portrayed as gods—though not always saints. They’re gravity defying (Air Jordan), invincible (Iron Mike), supercharged (if Usain Bolt’s last name didn’t exist, we would have had to invent it), or all-around supernatural (Magic Johnson). These monikers help sell magazines and sneakers, but there may be a deeper bias at play. New research suggests that whites think of blacks in general as superhuman, or at least more so than whites. And this bias may have implications far outside the wide world of sports. Adam Waytz of Northwestern University and Kelly Marie Hoffman and Sophie Trawalter of the University of Virginia report the results of several studies on this subject in an upcoming issue of Social Psychological and Personality Science. In one experiment, white Internet users were shown a white face and a black face and asked to decide: Adam Waytz of Northwestern University and Kelly Marie Hoffman and Sophie Trawalter of the University of Virginia report the results of studies on this subject in an upcoming issue of Social Psychological and Personality Science. In one experiment, white Internet users were shown a white face and a black face and asked to decide: Blacks were selected 63.5 percent of the time, significantly more than whites. The only two items that did not differ significantly were the ones about reading minds (52 percent blacks) and falling from a plane (54 percent). If whites see blacks as excelling at superhuman physical tasks, do whites think they’re better at everyday stuff too? In another experiment, white subjects saw pictures of a black man and a white man and judged who was more capable when it came to everyday activities like walking a dog, picking a ripe avocado, and sitting through a baseball game, as well as superhuman ones like running as fast as light, lifting up a building, and suppressing bodily needs. They also judged who would require more pain medication for various incidents such as touching a hot dish or dislocating a shoulder. For superhuman abilities, blacks were chosen 65 percent of the time, but for everyday abilities they were chosen only 46 percent of the time, so whatever leads whites to see blacks as superhuman doesn’t apply to commonplace tasks. Meanwhile, blacks were chosen as more sensitive to pain 31 percent of the time, confirming work by the same authors: In a paper in PLOS ONE, they showed that whites, blacks, and nurses of any race see blacks as less sensitive to pain than whites, and that black NFL players are put back in the lineup sooner after injuries. 

3) Which person “is more capable of using supernatural powers to read a person’s mind by touching the person’s head?”

4) Which person “is more capable of surviving a fall from an airplane without breaking a bone through the use of supernatural powers?”

5) Which person “has supernatural quickness that makes them capable of running faster than a fighter jet?”

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6) Which person “has supernatural strength that makes them capable of lifting up a tank?”

Blacks were selected 63.5 percent of the time, significantly more than whites. The only two items that did not differ significantly were the ones about reading minds (52 percent blacks) and falling from a plane (54 percent).

If whites see blacks as excelling at superhuman physical tasks, do whites think they’re better at everyday stuff too? In another experiment, white subjects saw pictures of a black man and a white man and judged who was more capable when it came to everyday activities like walking a dog, picking a ripe avocado, and sitting through a baseball game, as well as superhuman ones like running as fast as light, lifting up a building, and suppressing bodily needs. They also judged who would require more pain medication for various incidents such as touching a hot dish or dislocating a shoulder.

Most random genetic changes caused by evolution are neutral, and some are harmful, but a few turn out to be positive improvements. These beneficial mutations are the raw material that may, in time, be taken up by natural selection and spread through the population. In this post, I'll list some examples of beneficial mutations that are known to exist in human beings. Heart disease is one of the scourges of industrialized countries. It's the legacy of an evolutionary past which programmed us to crave energy-dense fats, once a rare and valuable source of calories, now a source of clogged arteries. But there's evidence that evolution has the potential to deal with it. One of the genes that governs bone density in human beings is called low-density lipoprotein receptor-related protein 5, or LRP5 for short. Mutations which impair the function of LRP5 are known to cause osteoporosis. But a different kind of mutation can amplify its function, causing one of the most unusual human mutations known. This mutation was first discovered fortuitously, when a young person from a Midwest family was in a serious car crash from which they walked away with no broken bones. X-rays found that they, as well as other members of the same family, had bones significantly stronger and denser than average. (One doctor who's studied the condition said, "None of those people, ranging in age from 3 to 93, had ever had a broken bone.") In fact, they seem resistant not just to injury, but to normal age-related skeletal degeneration. Some of them have benign bony growths on the roof of their mouths, but other than that, the condition has no side effects - although, as the article notes dryly, it does make it more difficult to float. As with Apo-AIM, some drug companies are researching how to use this as the basis for a therapy that could help people with osteoporosis and other skeletal diseases.

Every year, tens of thousands of adults die and hundreds of thousands more are hospitalized due to diseases that could have been prevented by vaccination. The cost of this health burden to society, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), is roughly $10 billion per year. This failure stands in stark contrast to the success of childhood immunization. By integrating vaccinations into regular early-childhood health care visits—and by supporting them through public programs, for those who cannot afford to pay—many vaccine-preventable diseases are now nearly nonexistent among children aged <5 years in this country. Many of the lessons learned from developing a highly effective pediatric immunization program can be applied to the problem of underimmunization in adults (see the editorial commentary by Hinman and Orenstein 1  in this issue of the journal).

The nation has before it a major opportunity to improve immunization for adults. Newly licensed adult vaccines can prevent shingles (the zoster vaccine) and cervical cancer (the human papillomavirus vaccine). Other vaccines already recommended for many adults can prevent liver cancer (the hepatitis B vaccine) and complications of infections caused by influenza virus and pneumococci. Yet our track record in assuring that adults receive the vaccines recommended for them is poor. Although >90% of young children have received the individual vaccines recommended for them, coverage for adult vaccines can range from 26% to 65%, depending on the vaccine and the target population. For example, <60% of persons aged 50 years have received a dose of tetanus toxoid in the past 10 years 2  and <50% of persons aged 50–64 years at high risk of influenza receive the annual influenza vaccine 3 Coverage rates are even lower for the pneumococcal vaccine in high-risk groups 4 Racial and ethnic disparities compound the problem. Strengthening adult immunization coverage will require significant improvements in the health care system's ability and willingness to provide and deliver vaccines to adults. Policymakers, the public, providers, insurers, employers, and employees need to become more aware of the value of adult immunization. Providers often lack the technical expertise and resources to acquire certain vaccines and to keep them on hand. The infrastructure to deliver vaccines to underinsured and uninsured adults must be significantly bolstered. Vaccine payment in both private and public health sectors must be sufficient to cover costs and to serve as an incentive to make adult immunization a prominent part of the practices of physicians who care for adults. Health care quality measures, surveillance, and research are additional areas that are in need of improvement.

Most vaccines in use today have been recommended for young children or adults. Recently, several new vaccines targeted for adolescents have been licensed and recommended, including vaccines against meningococcal meningitis and cervical cancer and boosters against pertussis ("whooping cough"). Delivery, payment, monitoring, and support systems to vaccinate adolescents also need to be bolstered.

The Infectious Diseases Society of America (IDSA) offers the following principles as a blueprint for action and urges all health care providers, health officials, and policymakers to participate in the solutions. These principles may be further modified as new developments emerge. Improvements in the national capacity to immunize adults and adolescents can help to prevent disease, save lives, and ensure an effective system for the delivery of vaccines now in development. Importantly, this goal should be pursued in a manner that enhances rather than compromises pediatric immunization programs.

Spice is so rife in Britain’s jails that prisoners are now twice as likely to be addicted to the drug when they leave than before they enter, a leading expert has warned.

Dr George Ryan, of Public Health England, said spiralling use of the drug – a potent form of synthetic cannabis - was behind an explosion of violence in prisons, causing ‘deaths, bullying and violence’.

Dr Ryan, a Government advisor, warned that it was relatively easy for prisoners to smuggle in spice as it was a liquid which could be sprayed onto regular tobacco – which most prisons allow. It can even be sprayed onto a piece of paper ‘the size of a thumbnail’, to be smoked later.

He revealed that urine tests carried out in 10 prisons in north west England had showed around 8 per cent of prisoners tested positive for spice on arrival but 16 per cent were positive on release.

By contrast, levels of other drugs like cannabis, cocaine and heroin all dropped dramatically during prison sentences. Just one in 100 prisoners tested positive for cocaine on release compared to one in four on arrival.

Speaking at PHE’s conference at Warwick University, Dr Ryan said: ‘Perhaps the most alarming statistic of all is that prisoners are twice as likely to use spice when they leave prisons as when they arrive.

‘So, effectively, use of spice doubles when people are incarcerated.  ‘It’s a very potent drug so people get a lot more bangs for their buck. It remains a very affordable drug in prison for some people. Higher potency forms increase the risk of people becoming dependent.’

Spice is not one single drug but the name for a group of similar chemicals known as synthetic cannabinoids designed to mimic the effects of cannabis. The drugs were sold as legal highs but were banned last year.

Experts say newer versions are stronger and more unpredictable. The highly addictive drug can leave users in a ‘zombie-like’ state or trigger psychotic episodes.

Spice is attractive to prisoners because it is cheap and was previously hard to detect – effective tests have only recently been developed. Until May last year there were no sanctions for prisoners possessing spice in jail, but the law now says offenders caught with the drug could face up to two further years in custody and a fine.

But prison officers warn use of the drug is at epidemic levels. In July, a two-day riot linked to a jump in supplies of the drug took place at The Mount prison in Hertfordshire.

Home Office figures show two thirds of all prison drugs seizures are for so-called ‘new psychoactive substances’, of which 99 per cent are spice.

In the first 10 months of 2015, officers at HMP Forest Bank, near Manchester, seized 4.4kg of spice – 39 times more than the 114g of cannabis and 210 times more than the 21g of heroin seized over the same period.

Dr Ryan said the wide use of spice could explain an increase in violence in prisons, as potent strains could leave up to 10 or 12 prisoners needing hospital treatment in a day. He said: ‘You have the toxic combination of wide-ranging effects and high, variable and unpredictable potency. In a closed environment like a prison it’s particularly challenging.

‘Each [hospitalised] prisoner is accompanied by a minimum of two people as an escort - that would lead to a meltdown with already over-worked staff brought to breaking point.

‘Other prisoners who have done nothing wrong will be confined to their cells due to staff shortages and will be rightly frustrated, aggrieved and angry… This level of dissatisfaction will lead to prisoners being volatile and probably is the explanation for some of the disorder we are seeing in our prisons over the past 12 month or so.

                                                                  estimated 101,200 people are living with HIV In UK  Of these, 13% are undiagnosed and do not know about their HIV infection. 594 people with HIV died. 305 were diagnosed with an AIDS defining illness, this is less than half than those diagnosed with AIDS in 2006. There were 6,095 new HIV diagnoses. Two-fifths (39%) of people diagnosed with HIV in 2015 were diagnosed late, after they should have already started treatment. 88,769 people accessed HIV care services, 41% of whom live in London. Of new HIV diagnoses in 2015, 54% were among men who have sex with men (MSM). Of those accessing HIV care, one in three (34%) are aged 50 years or older, and 5% are 65 or older. HIV testing has increased over the past 10 years. Testing rates are highest in MSM and black African people. There are now more people living with HIV in the UK than ever before. In 2015, an estimated 101,200 people in the UK were living with HIV, 13% of whom were unaware of their infection. A total of 6,095 people were newly diagnosed with HIV in 2015. The proportion of new infections from heterosexual contact that were UK-acquired has increased from 40% to 57% (2006-2015). This proportion for MSM (men who have sex with men) has seen a slight decrease over the same time period. Two-fifths (39%) of people diagnosed with HIV were diagnosed late, after they should have begun treatment. Late diagnosis is most common in certain groups, heterosexuals in particular: heterosexual men (55%) black African (53%) heterosexual women (49%) black other (49%) black Caribbean (46%) ??????? older people aged 65 and over (63%) The number of new HIV diagnoses among MSM continues to surpass the number among heterosexuals (3,320 MSM and 2,360 heterosexuals in 2015). 

• Heterosexual infections accounted for 39% of new diagnoses. Out of all newly diagnosed heterosexual men and women, 28% and 18% respectively were aged 50 or older. 
  Out of all people accessing HIV care, 34% were aged 50 or over. 
  16% of all new HIV diagnoses were among people born in Africa. This is a third of the same figure in 2006, when 41% of all new HIV diagnoses were among people born in Africa.
  The proportion of new diagnoses reported in people born in the UK has increased from 35% to 44% over the same period.