Here are some of the latest health and medical news developments, compiled by the editors of HealthDay:

Number of Diabetic Americans Continues to Rise

Close to 21 million Americans -- seven percent of the population -- now has diabetes, up 2.6 million from just three years ago, according to new statistics from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

Close to 6 million Americans may have diabetes and not know it, the CDC noted in its 2005 National Diabetes Fact Sheet released Wednesday. Another 41 million suffer from what experts call "pre-diabetes" -- a condition greatly increasingly risks for the type 2 form of the disease.

"Diabetes is a leading cause of adult blindness, lower-limb amputation, kidney disease and nerve damage," CDC diabetes program director Dr. Frank Vinicor said in a prepared statement. "Two-thirds of people with diabetes die from a heart attack or stroke."

According to the CDC, diabetes remains the sixth leading cause of death in the United States. The disease is hitting minorities especially hard, with Hispanics and blacks facing about twice the risk of becoming diabetic compared to whites. Medical expenditures and lost worker productivity means diabetes costs the country more than $132 billion annually, the CDC added.

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FDA Warns of Glucose Meter Foul-Up

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has notified patients and health care providers that blood glucose meters made by Abbott Diabetes Care of Alameda, Calif., can unintentionally be switched from one unit of measurement to another, resulting in an inaccurate blood glucose interpretation by the user.

The agency warns users in the United States to make sure that their meter reading is displayed as mg/dL because an inaccurate reading can lead to taking the wrong dose of insulin or dietary changes, resulting in higher levels of sugar in the blood or hyperglycemia. Several cases of hyperglycemia, a serious and even life-threatening condition, have been reported, according to a prepared statement by the FDA.

The meters are designed to report blood glucose levels in two different measurements -- the U.S. standard, milligrams per deciliter or mg/dL, and the foreign standard, millimoles per liter or mmol/L -- and can be accidentally switched from one measurement to the other when a user is setting the time and date for the meter or if a meter is dropped or a battery replaced.

Abbott is not instructing users to return their blood glucose meters . It has undertaken a worldwide correction and notification to all healthcare professionals and users about the measurement-switching problem.

For information on how to change the meter reading back to mg/dl, users should refer to their owner's manual or contact Abbott Diabetes Care at 1-800-553-4105 (open 24 hrs. per day) or AbbottDiabetesCare.com. Doctors and consumers who have experienced a problem with any of the affected glucose meters should call the FDA (1-800-332-1088), or Abbott.

The affected glucose meters made by Abbott that are sold in the United States are: FreeStyle, FreeStyle Flash, FreeStyle Tracker, Precision Xtra, MediSense, Sof-Tact, Precision Sof-Tact, MediSense, Optium, and private label brands ReliOn Ultima, Rite Aid, and Kroger blood glucose meters. Affected glucose meters sold outside of the United States are: Xceed, Liberty, Boots, Xtra Classic, Easy, and SofTrac.

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McDonald's to Offer Nutrition Information on Food Packaging

Starting next year, you'll be able to see exactly how large a side order of calories you get with your Big Mac.

McDonald's announced Tuesday that in 2006 it will begin to include nutrition information on most of its food packaging. The labels will tell consumers the amount of fat, protein, calories, carbohydrates, and sodium in each product, along with the percentage of the U.S. government's daily recommended intakes, The New York Times reported.

The new packaging is expected to be in 20,000 of McDonald's 30,000 restaurants worldwide by the end of 2006.

Consumers can already get nutrition information at the McDonald's Web site or in brochures at the fast-food giant's stores. Company executives said they decided to put that information on food packaging to make it more available and more accessible to customers, the Times reported.

The move may do more than help consumers make better food choices when they eat at McDonald's. It may also help the company fight lawsuits related to obesity and nutrition, one legal expert noted.

"If they have the information out there, easy to understand and in people's faces, then at that point the burden of responsibility switches to people protecting themselves," Richard A. Daynard, associate dean at Northeastern University School of Law and head of its Obesity and Law Project at the Public Health Advocacy Institute, told the Times.

There's no sign yet that other major fast-food chains plan to follow McDonald's move.

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U.S. Heart Device Makers Served with Subpoenas

The U.S. Department of Justice has served subpoenas on the nation's three big makers of implantable cardiac devices -- such as defibrillators and pacemakers -- as part of an investigation into whether any of the companies offered illegal payments or other measures to convince doctors to use their products.

Medtronic, the Guidant Corporation, and St. Jude Medical all confirmed late Tuesday that they'd received the subpoenas from the U.S. attorney in Boston, The New York Times reported.

In a statement, Medtronic said its subpoena sought information related to possible breaches of U.S. federal anti-fraud and anti-kickback laws, which prohibit payments or other inducements to doctors to promote the use of a company's product.

Guidant said in a statement that it also received a separate administrative subpoena from the U. S. attorney in Minneapolis. That subpoena was related to specific Guidant cardiac devices, including the Prizm 2 DR defibrillator and the Contak Renewal advanced pacemaker and a related item called the Contak Renewal 2, the Times said.

A design flaw in the Prizm 2 DR meant it could short-circuit and fail, a problem that's been linked to the deaths of several patients, the Times said. Guidant knew about the flaw since 2002 but did not inform doctors about it until this year. The devices were recalled several months ago, the newspaper reported.

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FDA Commissioner's Resignation Being Investigated

An investigation has been launched into last month's sudden retirement of U.S. Food and Drug Commissioner Lester M. Crawford.

In a letter to Congress this week, Department of Health and Human Services Inspector General Daniel R. Levinson said he was reviewing the circumstances surrounding Crawford's resignation, the Washington Post reported.

"Depending on the results of the review, we will determine the next appropriate action," Levinson wrote.

Crawford resigned less than three months after he was confirmed as FDA commissioner. He said he'd simply decided it was time to move on. However, some members of Congress received information that Crawford's resignation was linked to problems with his financial disclosure forms, the newspaper said.