Health & WellnessS


Health

Medics Continue To Push Psychotropic Drugs Like There Is No Tomorrow

Elizabeth Cohen
CNN
Wed, 11 Jul 2007 05:49 UTC
Dr. Ronald Dworkin tells the story of a woman who didn't like the way her husband was handling the family finances. She wanted to start keeping the books herself but didn't want to insult her husband.

The doctor suggested she try an antidepressant to make herself feel better.

Comment: And that was supposed to SOLVE the problem!? Whatever happened to the Hippocratic oath?

She got the antidepressant, and she did feel better, said Dr. Dworkin, a Maryland anesthesiologist and senior fellow at Washington's Hudson Institute, who told the story in his book "Artificial Unhappiness: The Dark Side of the New Happy Class." But in the meantime, Dworkin says, the woman's husband led the family into financial ruin.

"Doctors are now medicating unhappiness," said Dworkin. "Too many people take drugs when they really need to be making changes in their lives."

Antidepressants are America's most-prescribed drugs.

Comment: It should be obvious to anyone with any shred of conscience or empathy combined with a competent understanding of human psychology, that the reactions of discomfort, unhappiness and depression are normal healthy responses to the traumatic stimuli provided by the ponerized world that surrounds us.

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Coffee

Joke comprehension may decrease with age

BETSY TAYLOR
AP
Wed, 11 Jul 2007 02:45 UTC
It's no laughing matter: a new study suggests older adults have a harder time getting jokes as they age. The research indicates that because older adults may have greater difficulty with cognitive flexibility, abstract reasoning and short-term memory, they also have greater difficulty with tests of humor comprehension.
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Evil Rays

Female Circumcision a Problem in Britain

By D'ARCY DORAN
Associated Press
Tue, 10 Jul 2007 20:25 UTC
LONDON - Female genital mutilation, commonly associated with parts of Africa and the Middle East, is becoming a growing problem in Britain despite efforts to stamp it out. London's Metropolitan Police, Britain's largest police force, hopes a campaign beginning on Wednesday will highlight that the practice is a crime here.
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USA

Being born in the USA may not be good for Hispanic health


EurekAlert / University of Southern California
Tue, 10 Jul 2007 11:34 UTC
Mexicans-Americans born and raised in the United States are more likely to suffer from conditions such as diabetes, high blood pressure and high cholesterol than those who emigrate from Mexico, according to a new study from the University of Southern California.

The difference may be due to poor nutrition and less physical activity among native-born Mexican-Americans. Also individuals who leave Mexico for the United States may be fitter than the ones who stay behind.

"One possible explanation is that people who immigrate are healthy to begin with and they may also have come here with better health habits," said Eileen Crimmins, lead author of the study and professor of gerontology at USC. "The generation born here has adopted American traits such as smoking and eating at fast food restaurants that were not as accessible in more traditional parts of Mexico."

In a comparison of risk factors across ethnic groups, researchers from the USC Davis School of Gerontology and the UCLA School of Medicine found that U.S. born Mexican-Americans are significantly worse off not just than whites but also Mexican-born immigrants. The only group at greater risk for disease than the U.S.-born Mexican-American community is the black population.

The research appears in the current issue of the American Journal of Public Health and addresses a contradiction found in other studies known as the "Hispanic Paradox" - a claim that Hispanics in the United States are healthier than whites despite being poorer and less educated.
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Red Flag

Singapore, Dengue cases hit 432 last week, a record for the year

Liaw Wy-Cin
straitstimes.com
Mon, 09 Jul 2007 22:30 UTC
The number of dengue victims in Singapore last week hit a record 432 for the year - well into epidemic levels - and the infection shows no signs of letting up.

With this new peak, the number of cases of the viral infection now stands at 4,029 for the year.

This is the third time this year that the disease, spread through the bite of the Aedes mosquito, has hit epidemic levels.
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Health

Flashback Parkinson's Disease: Nicotine Could Help; Pesticides Harm


Science Daily
Fri, 06 Apr 2007 18:13 UTC
The Parkinson's Institute recently announced new findings concerning the role of environmental factors in the development of Parkinson's disease.

Highlights of the research include:

The role of pesticides (eg. Paraquat and Dieldrin) as potential risk factors for Parkinson's disease, a role suggested by both epidemiological statistics and laboratory evidence.

The threat of toxic agents to damage neurons by causing the accumulation of harmful proteins.

Intraneuronal protein aggregates as markers of Parkinson's pathology, based on work carried out at The Parkinson's Institute indicating that these aggregates could be formed as a consequence of toxic exposure.

The importance of targeting a specific protein, alpha-synuclein, in order to achieve neuroprotection in Parkinson's
The role of inflammation in the development of Parkinson's disease and the possibility that anti-inflammatory drugs could be beneficial to patients.

The possibility that nicotine may act as a neuroprotective agent.
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Wine

Flashback Researchers Light Up for Nicotine, the Wonder Drug

Marty Graham
Wired
Thu, 21 Jun 2007 08:07 UTC
Smoking may be bad for you, but researchers and biotech companies are quietly developing pharmaceuticals that are decidedly good for brains, bowels, blood vessels and even immune systems -- and they're inspired by tobacco's deadly active ingredient: nicotine.
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Bulb

Study finds smoking wards off Parkinson's disease


Reuters
Mon, 09 Jul 2007 17:43 UTC
There is more evidence to back up a long-standing theory that smokers are less likely to develop Parkinson's disease than people who do not use tobacco products, researchers reported on Monday.

Comment: For more information on why smoking can be good for certain people, go here.

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Health

Pioneering treatment for brain cancer gets Swiss approval


AFP
Mon, 09 Jul 2007 13:58 UTC
LONDON - An experimental treatment for brain cancer has won approval for commercial use in Switzerland, its London-listed US maker, Northwest Biotherapeutics, Inc., announced on Monday.
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Light Saber

Pumpkin: A fairytale end to insulin injections?


EurekAlert
Mon, 09 Jul 2007 10:01 UTC
Compounds found in pumpkin could potentially replace or at least drastically reduce the daily insulin injections that so many diabetics currently have to endure. Recent research reveals that pumpkin extract promotes regeneration of damaged pancreatic cells in diabetic rats, boosting levels of insulin-producing beta cells and insulin in the blood, reports Lisa Richards in Chemistry & Industry, the magazine of the SCI.

A group, led by Tao Xia of the East China Normal University, found that diabetic rats fed the extract had only 5% less plasma insulin and 8% fewer insulin-positive (beta) cells compared to normal healthy rats (Journal of the Science of Food and Agriculture, 87(9) 1753-7 2007).

Xia says: 'pumpkin extract is potentially a very good product for pre-diabetic persons, as well as those who have already developed diabetes.' He adds that although insulin injections will probably always be necessary for these patients, pumpkin extract could drastically reduce the amount of insulin they need to take.
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