Health

HPV vaccine recommended for pre-teen girls

By MAGGIE FAZELI FARD While California state guidelines list required immunizations for school-aged children, there are also several optional vaccines available, such as the flu shot. The one making the biggest waves in medicine today, as much for its flashy advertisements as for its taboo nature, is a vaccine marketed widely as Gardasil, which protects girls and women from the types of human papillomavirus (HPV), a sexually transmitted disease, that can cause cervical cancer.

A celebration of Latino art, health and community

By MAGGIE FAZELI FARD SEPT. 6 —  A short stretch of 58th street in North Oakland was alive with the sights, sounds and smells of Latin America this morning as local artisans lined the sun-bleached curb with their small works and residents took time out to talk, eat, laugh and dance in the street. But this was no block party. Alongside the artists sat women’s healthcare advocates, and behind the makeshift bandstand on the corner of Telegraph Avenue and 58th Street…