Health & WellnessS


Attention

Soldiers Face Debilitating Diseases


NBC
Thu, 09 Feb 2006 12:00 UTC
They served their time in the military in places like Saudi Arabia and Kuwait, and more recently, Iraq and Afghanistan.

Most returned in good health.

But an NBC 30 investigation has found that for some soldiers, their service has meant a long and debilitating death sentence with mysterious diseases.

"I have good days, I have bad days," said M. Sterry, of New Haven. "There were eight of us that served together. Six of my friends are dead."

She looks healthy, but Sterry is a very sick woman who has no idea how much longer she will live.
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Magnify

Study Finds Low-Fat Diet Won't Stop Cancer or Heart Disease

Gina Kolata
NY Times
Wed, 08 Feb 2006 12:00 UTC
The largest study ever to ask whether a low-fat diet reduces the risk of getting cancer or heart disease has found that the diet has no effect.

The $415 million federal study involved nearly 49,000 women ages 50 to 79 who were followed for eight years. In the end, those assigned to a low-fat diet had the same rates of breast cancer, colon cancer, heart attacks and strokes as those who ate whatever they pleased, researchers are reporting today.
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Syringe

Flu Shots and Alzheimer's Disease


mercola.com/royalfire
Wed, 08 Feb 2006 12:00 UTC
According to Hugh Fudenberg, MD, the world's leading immunogeneticist and 13th most quoted biologist of our times (nearly 850 papers in peer review journals): If an individual has had 5 consecutive flu shots between 1970 and 1980 (the years studied) his/her chances of getting Alzheimer's Disease is 10 times higher than if he/she had one, 2 or no shots. Dr. Fudenberg said it was so and that it was due to mercury and aluminum that is in every flu shot. The gradual mercury and aluminum buildup in the brain causes cognitive dysfunction.
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Family

Stress 'Fueling Early Puberty'!


BBC
Wed, 08 Feb 2006 12:00 UTC
KIds walk
© BBCChildren's bodies are maturing faster
Unhealthy lifestyles and unstable family environments may be contributing to a fall in the age that girls reach puberty, research suggests.

Psychologist Dr Aric Sigman found girls are reaching puberty 18 months earlier than their mothers, and almost two years earlier than their grandmothers.

He found girls currently start puberty at an average of 10.25 years of age.

His findings echo previous research suggesting 'precocious puberty' is a growing trend.
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Book

Mental Exercise Nearly Halves Risk of Dementia


LiveScience
Tue, 07 Feb 2006 12:00 UTC
Staying mentally and physically active throughout life is the best way to keep the mind sharp and reduce the risks of developing dementia, two recent studies show.

One large group study found that staying mentally active reduces the risk of Alzheimer's disease and other forms of dementia by nearly half by building and maintaining a reserve of stimulation.

Comment: Well, that leaves out Dubya...

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Evil Rays

Chronic Pain Shrinks People's Brains

Robert Roy Britt
Livescience
Tue, 07 Feb 2006 12:00 UTC
Pain causes an unexpected brain drain, according to a new study in which the brains of people with chronic backaches were up to 11 percent smaller than those of non-sufferers.

People afflicted with other long-term pain and stress might face similar brain shrinkage, said study leader A. Vania Apkarian of Northwestern University.

The results suggest those with constant pain lose gray matter equal to an oversized pea for each year of pain. Gray matter is an outer layer of the brain rich in nerve cells and crucial to information and memory processing.
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Health

Hormone Transforms Fat Cells from Foes to Friends, Rat Study Suggests

Sarah Graham
sciam.com
Fri, 03 Feb 2006 12:00 UTC
Set against the backdrop of an increasingly overweight population, the 1994 discovery of the fat-regulating protein leptin was widely heralded as a boon for obesity research. The hormone continues to be a focus of investigation. Findings published online this week by the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences indicate that increasing leptin levels in the body can fundamentally change the nature of fat cells—from idle storage containers to fat-burning machines.
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Magnify

Study Strengthens Link between Virus and Weight Gain

David Biello
scientificamerican.com
Fri, 03 Feb 2006 12:00 UTC
New study results bolster the controversial hypothesis that certain cases of obesity are contagious. Over the last 20 years, some research has suggested that certain strains of human and avian adenoviruses--responsible for ailments ranging from the chest colds to pink eye--actually make individuals build up more fat cells. Having antibodies to one strain in particular, so-called Ad-36, proved to correlate with the heaviest obese people, and in one study, pairs of twins differed in heft depending on exposure to that virus. Now researchers have identified another strain of adenovirus that makes chickens plump.
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Health

Contagious obesity? Identifying the human adenoviruses that may make us fat

BJS
Scienceblog
Tue, 31 Jan 2006 12:00 UTC
There is a lot of good advice to help us avoid becoming obese, such as "Eat less," and "Exercise." But here's a new and surprising piece of advice based on a promising area of obesity research: "Wash your hands."

There is accumulating evidence that certain viruses may cause obesity, in essence making obesity contagious, according to Leah D. Whigham, the lead researcher in a new study, "Adipogenic potential of multiple human adenoviruses in vivo and in vitro in animals," in the January issue of the American Journal of Physiology-Regulatory, Integrative and Comparative Physiology published by the American Physiological Society.
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Family

Omega-3 Flounders as Cancer Protection

Neil Osterweil
MedPage Today
Wed, 25 Jan 2006 12:00 UTC
Santa Monica - Eating fish and other foods high in omega-3 fatty acids doesn't have the wondrous effect on preventing malignancies that it seems to have in warding off heart disease.

As a cancer preventive strategy, omega-3 was left high and dry, reported Catherine H. MacLean, M.D., Ph.D., and colleagues at Rand Health in the Jan. 25 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association.
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