Health & WellnessS


Attention

Baby born with birth defects every 30 seconds in China

Birth defects in China have increased by nearly 40 percent since 2001, according to statistics from the country's birth deformity monitoring center.

The figure was cited in a recent report by Jiang Fan, deputy head of the National Population and Family Planning Commission, at a conference in Chengdu, capital city of Southwest China's Sichuan Province.

Health

UV light may offer "double whammy" for cancer

Using ultraviolet light may one day offer a "double whammy" to kill cancer cells by better focusing antibody-based drugs and triggering the body's own defenses to eliminate tumors, researchers said on Tuesday.

In two studies with mice, a British team cloaked antibodies -- the immune system proteins that tag germs and cancer cells for elimination -- with an organic oil that blocked them from reacting until illuminated with ultraviolet light.

Question

AIDS virus invaded U.S. from Haiti: study alleges

The AIDS virus invaded the United States in about 1969 from Haiti, carried most likely by a single infected immigrant who set the stage for it to sweep the world in a tragic epidemic, scientists said on Monday.

Michael Worobey, a University of Arizona evolutionary biologist, said the 1969 U.S. entry date is earlier than some experts had believed.

The timeline laid out in the study led by Worobey indicates that HIV infections were occurring in the United States for roughly 12 years before AIDS was first recognized by scientists as a disease in 1981. Many people had died by that point.

Ambulance

TV raises blood pressure in obese kids: study

Watching too much television may not only help make children fat, it may also raise their blood pressure, U.S. researchers said on Tuesday.

They found obese children who watched four or more hours of TV a day were three times more likely to have high blood pressure than children who watched less than two hours a day.

"There is a significant association between hours of television watched and both the severity of obesity and the presence of hypertension in obese children," Dr. Jeffrey Schwimmer of the University of California, San Diego and colleagues wrote in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine.

Better Earth

Green Schools Offer Healthier Classrooms -- and Might Boost Test Scores

Green classrooms not only produce happier and better students, but they can save school districts thousands in energy costs.

Every day, 20 percent of Americans wake up, eat breakfast, and walk, bike, or drive to school. Once there, many students and teachers spend their days in classrooms with walls covered in toxic paint, breathing congested air, and squinting from inadequate lighting.

Evil Rays

Study reveals 'huffing' household chemicals connected to teen suicide

With suicide as the third leading cause of death among adolescents in the United States, a new University of Denver (DU) study reveals inhaling or "huffing" vapors of common household goods, such as glue or nail polish, are associated with increased suicidal thoughts and attempts.

Magic Hat

How and Why We Lie to Ourselves: Cognitive Dissonance

A classic 1959 social psychology experiment demonstrates how and why we lie to ourselves. Understanding this experiment sheds a brilliant light on the dark world of our inner motivations.

The ground-breaking social psychological experiment of Festinger and Carlsmith (1959) provides a central insight into the stories we tell ourselves about why we think and behave the way we do. The experiment is filled with ingenious deception so the best way to understand it is to imagine you are taking part. So sit back, relax and travel back. The time is 1959 and you are an undergraduate student at Stanford University...

Syringe

Children more susceptible to avian flu than adults

Children are more susceptible to avian (bird) flu than adults, a new study suggests.

Arrow Down

Ban on leaded petrol 'has cut crime rates around the world'

Banning lead in petrol is responsible for declining crime rates in Britain, the United States and other countries, startling new research suggests.

Attention

Bird Flu May Be on 'Silent' March in Europe, UN Agency Warns

Avian influenza, the virus that has led to the deaths of millions of birds and more than 200 people since 2003, may be more prevalent than previously thought in Europe as it goes undetected in waterfowl.

Germany's discovery of the fatal H5N1 strain in healthy ducks and geese two months ago may be a sign that domestic animals are harboring bird flu without getting sick, increasing the threat to human health, the Rome-based Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations said in an e-mailed release.