Our roundup of the health news headlines on Thursday 12 January.
Reading this online? Watch out- the brains of web addicts showed changes similar to those seen in alcohol or cocaine addicts, The Telegraph reports.
Up to one in ten internet users are thought to have "internet addiction disorder", a condition meaning they have become so dependent on the web they forgo their responsibilities in life. Henrietta Bowen Jones, a consultant psychiatrist at Imperial College who runs Britain's only NHS clinic for internet addicts, describes how those addicted to the web tend to be gamers who lose the ability to make emotional connections with anything outside the game.
The Independent flagged up the cases of an Xbox addict who was killed by a blood clot after regularly spending up to 12 hours a time playing on his console as well as a mother who left her toddler to starve to death as she played the simulation game World of Warcraft.
Students with asthma are being put at risk as schools are banned from keeping spare inhalers as they are prescription-only medicines, the Daily Mail reports. Charity Asthma UK surveyed over 200 youngsters and found that over two thirds of students have had an asthma attack at school, but 55% did not always know where to find their inhaler.
The Guardian reveals warnings from senior doctors who say that ‘stifling' EU laws limit doctors working hours and mean they do not get enough time to train properly for the job. Norman Williams, president of the Royal College of Surgeons, and Sir Richard Thompson, president of the Royal College of Physicians, have called for change in the law.
