SOTT
SIGNS
OF THE
TIMES
OF THE
TIMES
Welcome to Sott.net
The World for People who Think
Health & WellnessS
The FDA has issued a proposed mandate that represents the greatest threat to dietary supplements since 1994. Back in the early 1990s, consumers were so alarmed by FDA bullying that they staged a massive revolt. The result was that Congress passed a law prohibiting the FDA from banning popular nutrients (as the agency had threatened to do).
There was, however, a loophole in the 1994 law. The FDA was given authority to regulate ingredients introduced after October 15, 1994.
It has been 17 years, but the FDA just issued draconian proposals as to how it intends to regulate what it now calls "new dietary ingredients". You can find the FDA Draft Guidance on New Dietary Ingredients (NDI's) here. If implemented, some of the most effective nutrients you are taking will be removed from the market. This includes many fish oil formulas and natural plant extracts. A detailed analysis of the FDA Draft Guidance is available here.
© SINCPrimary schoolchildren that sleep less than nine hours do not perform.
"Most children sleep less than is recommended for their intellectual development, which is hindered because the lack of sleep cannot be recovered. This is the first Spanish study that proves that losing out on hours of sleep and bad habits affect schoolchildren's academic performance," stated Ramón Cladellas, researcher at the Faculty of Psychology at the UAB.
The study's authors, published in the journal Cultura y Educación, assessed a total of 142 primary schoolchildren (65 girls and 77 boys) from different schools and which did not have any sleep-related pathological changes. Parents were asked to fill out a questionnaire, concerning the children's habits and number of hours slept per night. The experts also assessed a series of academic skills: communicative, methodological, transversal and specific.
© Taffi / Fotolia
Their new findings, published online in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, suggest several new approaches to treatment, including retraining the brain, and new avenues for developing drugs to suppress the ringing.
"This work is the most clearheaded documentation to this point of what's actually happening in the brain's cortex in ways that account for the ongoing genesis of sound," said Michael Merzenich, professor emeritus of otolaryngology at UC San Francisco and inventor of the cochlear implant, who was not involved with the research. "As soon as I read the paper, I said, 'Of course!' It was immediately obvious that this is almost certainly the true way to think about it."
Merzenich is also chief scientific officer at Posit Science, which develops software to retrain the brain, primarily to improve learning and memory but more recently to address problems like schizophrenia, Alzheimer's Disease and tinnitus.
© astrosociety.org
"White" light bulbs that emit light at shorter wavelengths are greater suppressors of the body's production of melatonin than bulbs emitting orange-yellow light, a new international study has revealed.
Melatonin is a compound that adjusts our biological clock and is known for its anti-oxidant and anti-cancerous properties.
The study investigated the influence of different types of bulbs on "light pollution" and the suppression of melatonin, with the researchers recommending several steps that should be taken to balance the need to save energy and protecting public health.
© kinderworld.us
A new study has found that the ubiquitous chemical might harm children's mental and behavioral development as well as their muscular coordination, said WebMD, citing a study published in the journal, Environmental Health Perspectives. How phthalates adversely affect development is unclear; however, emerging evidence suggests phthalates affect thyroid hormone levels, which are important to prenatal and newborn brain development.
© unknown
"It's mainly exposure through food. Diet is the driver," said pediatrician and public health expert Phil Landrigan, MD, professor and chair of the department of community and preventive medicine at Manhattan's Mount Sinai School of Medicine. "For most people, diet is the predominant source. It's been shown that people who switch to an organic diet knock down the levels of pesticide by-products in their urine by 85 to 90 percent," said Dr. Landrigan, wrote Rodale.
The Canadian team reviewed data from about 1,140 children participating in the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's (CDC) National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey. The team also looked at pesticide by-products found in urine. The team revealed that 119 children met ADHD criteria, said Rodale.
Comment: To learn more about how Fruit and Vegetables Have 'Unacceptable' Levels of Pesticides and the effects of pesticides on children's mental and physical health read the following articles:
Organic Foods Offer Alternative to Foods Containing Food Dyes & Pesticides Linked to Raising Children's Risk of ADHD
From the Fields to Inner City, Pesticides Affect Children's IQ
Research Links Pesticides with ADHD in Children
U.S. Study: Pesticides Tied to ADHD in Children
Pesticide Susceptibility In Children Lasts Longer Than Expected
Exposure to Pesticides in Womb Linked to Learning Disabilities
© Alternet
In the dark and uncertain days after Sept. 11, 2001, the sight of thousands of shaken New Yorkers returning to their apartments, offices and schools in Lower Manhattan seemed to signal a larger return to normalcy.
Now new documents have emerged showing that federal officials in Washington and New York went further than was previously known to downplay concerns about health risks, misrepresenting or concealing information that ultimately might have protected thousands of people from the contaminated air at ground zero.
© Illustration Works RM
In one clinical trial, patients with glioblastoma, a type of brain cancer, were given either radiation and melatonin, or radiation alone. Twenty-three percent of the patients who took the melatonin were alive after a year, while none who had received only radiation were still alive. Similarly, in another study by oncologists in Italy, patients with non-small cell lung cancers who had failed chemotherapy were given melatonin. They were compared with other patients with non-small cell lung cancers who weren't given melatonin. A year later, 26 percent of the patients who had taken melatonin were still alive; whereas, none in the non-melatonin group remained alive.
The medical world recently discovered that cigarette smoke decreases the risk of getting the degenerative neurological condition - but the genes responsible were a mystery.
US geneticist Professor Jeffrey Vance, from Duke University in North Carolina, has told the International Congress of Human Genetics in Brisbane he has found a gene that helps explain the link.
The gene - known as NOS2A - is found in every cell of the body and is responsible for the production of nitric oxide.
If too much is produced brain cells can die, leading to neuro-degenerative diseases like Parkinson's and Alzheimer's.
Cigarettes, according to China's tobacco authorities, are an excellent way to prevent ulcers.
They also reduce the risk of Parkinson's disease, relieve schizophrenia, boost your brain cells, speed up your thinking, improve your reactions and increase your working efficiency.
And all those warnings about lung cancer? Nonsense
You're more likely to get cancer from cooking smoke than from your cigarette habit.
Welcome to the bizarre parallel universe of China's state-owned tobacco monopoly, the world's most successful cigarette-marketing agency.
With annual sales of 1.8 trillion cigarettes, the Chinese monopoly is responsible for almost one-third of all cigarettes smoked on the planet today.
Comment: Reality truly is stranger than fiction! The Communist Chinese government preaches truth to the masses while the Kafkaesque western governments go on overseas propaganda missions to peddle their falsehoods.
This was 6 years ago.
Since then, the Chinese government has folded to international pressure. We would LOVE to know what went on in those meetings.
China ban on smoking in public places comes into force
Comment: For more information about Phthalates and their effects on children read the following: