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Thursday, Dec. 23, will be the 50th anniversary of the first successful organ transplant, a kidney transplant from a living donor performed in Boston in 1954. Mr. [Robert Phillips] and a small number of other long-term survivors attest to how well organ transplants can work in the best cases. A face transplant could also raise unrealistic hopes, experts say. No guarantee exists that the transplant recipient will look normal. The new face could worsen the appearance and reduce facial expression. A face transplant could be technically successful but leave the recipient and the family dissatisfied. At the same time, a successful transplant may send a message that disfigured people who do not choose to have transplants cannot have a high quality of life. Robert Phillips has lived almost 42 years since a kidney transplant. (Photo by Steve Ruark for The New York Times); [Richard Herrick], front left, recipient, and Ronald Herrick, donor, with the surgical team after the 1954 kidney transplant. (Photo by Courtesy of Brigham and Women's Hospital); The first successful organ transplant took place on Dec. 23, 1954, when Richard Herrick received a kidney from his healthy identical twin brother, Ronald. Richard survived for eight years until the original kidney disease struck again. (Photo by Courtesy of Brigham and Women's Hospital)(pg. F7); (Illustrations by Al Granberg, Alain Delaqueriere/The New York Times)(pg. F1)

In October, the nation's expected supply of influenza vaccine was suddenly cut in half when the British government suspended the manufacturing license of the Chiron Corporation, an American biotechnology company, because of contamination at its factory in Liverpool, England. Chiron, one of two major manufacturers of the vaccine for Americans, had been expected to supply nearly 50 million doses. The C.D.C. responded by limiting use of the vaccine to the vulnerable groups. Health officials still consider those groups a priority for influenza vaccine. But midseason estimates of vaccination rates are below those of last season for adults in the priority groups, said Dr. Julie L. Gerberding, the director of the centers

The Bush administration and a number of health officials have expressed fear that terrorists might have obtained smallpox virus from Russia or that scientists in some countries might have kept the virus without telling the U.N. agency. The proposed laboratory experiments would involve inserting a so- called marker gene into the smallpox virus that glows green under fluorescent light. The technique is a standard way to screen for potential anti-viral drugs, and the manipulation would not change the virulence of the virus, said officials at the WHO. At the meeting of the international advisory committee last week, its 20 members voted unanimously to allow insertion of the gene, known as GFP for green fluorescent marker protein, into variola virus at the two laboratories in Russia and the United States, said Dr. Daniel Lavanchy, a smallpox expert for the health organization

The proposed laboratory experiments would involve inserting a so- called marker gene into the smallpox virus that glows green under fluorescent light. The technique is a standard way to screen for potential antiviral drugs, and the manipulation would not change the virulence of the virus, said officials at the UN agency. The agency's initial intent was to destroy the remaining stocks of smallpox virus after it stopped person-to-person transmission of the disease. But the agency's member states delayed destroying the virus, demanding additional research to find effective drugs, develop safer vaccines and improve diagnostic tests. Such research must be conducted in the highest biosecurity-level laboratories, with scientists wearing elaborate protective gear resembling space suits. The idea of conducting any genetic research on the virus has been a subject of controversy. At the meeting of the international advisory committee last week, its 20 members voted unanimously to allow insertion of the gene, known as GFP for green fluorescent marker protein, into variola virus at the two laboratories in Russia and the United States, said Dr. Daniel Lavanchy, a smallpox expert for the health organization. The U.S. laboratory is at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta

The drug industry would have to manufacture billions of doses of an influenza vaccine within weeks to counter an epidemic like the one that caused more than 20 million deaths in 1918 and 1919, the participants said. Right now the industry makes just 300 million doses a year for regular influenza seasons. Only two million doses of an experimental vaccine against the avian strain are being made; the first batches are about to undergo testing in the United States. But Dr. [Klaus Stohr] said that ''there is currently too little momentum in the development of influenza pandemic vaccine'' -- largely because companies would lose millions of dollars by producing a vaccine that became outdated or might never be needed. Also, a vaccine produced now might prove to be the wrong one if another strain of virus caused a pandemic. Dr. Luc Hessel, an executive of Aventis-Pasteur, one of two companies that are preparing the experimental vaccine, said the industry did not know how many doses it could produce. ''Production capacity cannot be doubled overnight,'' Dr. Hessel said, and ''you cannot switch from measles vaccine to a flu vaccine,'' because the production processes are so different

The Bush administration and a number of health officials have expressed fear that terrorists might have obtained smallpox virus from Russia or that scientists in some countries might have kept the virus without telling the U.N. agency. The proposed laboratory experiments would involve inserting a so- called marker gene into the smallpox virus that glows green under fluorescent light. The technique is a standard way to screen for potential anti-viral drugs, and the manipulation would not change the virulence of the virus, said officials at the WHO

The proposed laboratory experiments would involve inserting a so-called marker gene into the smallpox virus that glows green under fluorescent light. The technique is a standard way to screen for potential antiviral drugs, and the manipulation would not change the virulence of the virus, said officials at the W.H.O. Last week the W.H.O.'s 20-member international advisory committee voted unanimously to allow insertion of the gene, known as G.F.P. for green fluorescent marker protein, into variola virus at the two laboratories in Russia and the United States, said Dr. Daniel Lavanchy, a smallpox expert for the health organization. The American laboratory is at the Centers for Disease Control in Atlanta. Dr. Lavanchy said the experiments the advisory committee rejected last year were ''fundamentally different'' than those recommended last week, and that the insertion of the marker gene in the experiments now being proposed would not alter the ability of variola virus to cause disease

Because Chief Justice [William H. Rehnquist] has not released the most crucial information about his illness -- the specific type of thyroid cancer and the extent of its spread -- any assessment must rely on speculation, the experts emphasized. But they said the chief justice had provided important medical clues to the seriousness of his case in disclosing the need for radiation and chemotherapy in addition to his tracheotomy last month. In addition, they noted that he had omitted any mention of the usual treatment for thyroid cancer: surgical removal of the thyroid gland. Anaplastic thyroid cancer is rare, one of the most aggressive human cancers, and when it occurs it is mostly in older people. Anaplastic cancers often arise among people with a long history of an enlarged thyroid gland that also contained nodules, or bumps, that a doctor can feel with the fingers. Patients with the usual, less aggressive kind of thyroid cancer usually receive radioactive iodine to destroy the thyroid. But the kind of radiation Chief Justice Rehnquist is undergoing -- external beam radiation -- is different and more powerful

Not at all, each said, though their relationship was unusual in two ways. First, they were friends before Mr. [John Edwards] became Dr. Edmundson's patient. Second, because of Mr. Edwards's good health, Dr. Edmundson had not yet needed to treat Mr. Edwards since 1998, when he had an attack of vertigo. Dr. Edmundson met Mr. Edwards when their daughters were on a soccer team in Raleigh that Mr. Edwards coached. In the mid-1990's, one of Dr. Edmundson's partners, who was retiring, asked him to take on one of his patients. Mr. Edwards may have been among those who got extra tests. Dr. Edmundson said that when Mr. Edwards once fainted in 1996, two years before he was Dr. Edmundson's patient, a neurologist found no serious medical reason for the episode and Mr. Edwards was then referred to a cardiologist. It was a more extensive work-up than ''most people would have because he was a famous trial lawyer,'' Dr. Edmundson said

Mr. Edwards, 51, has experienced only ''minor, brief illnesses,'' his physician and longtime friend, Dr. W. L. Wells Edmundson, said in an interview at his office in Raleigh, N.C., on Oct. 14. These included one-time attacks of fainting in 1996 and vertigo in 1998; an appendectomy in 1996; noncancerous colon polyps; an episode of altitude sickness while Mr. Edwards was climbing at about 17,000 feet on Kilimanjaro in Africa; and elevated levels of cholesterol and other lipids that might require treatment with a statin drug if, on further testing, they remained high. Dr. Edmundson said a physical examination he performed last June 21 and findings from standard laboratory tests, including one for prostate cancer, were normal. It was Mr. Edwards's first full checkup in six years. Two weeks later, Senator John Kerry announced that Mr. Edwards would be his running mate. Dr. Edmundson first examined Mr. Edwards on Dec. 10, 1998, when he was a senator-elect. It was a house call because Mr. Edwards was in bed with acute vertigo, a condition in which the room appears to be spinning around when the eyes are open. Dr. Edmundson said the cause was a viral infection of the inner ear