Health & WellnessS


Red Flag

Color contrast is 'seen' by the brain early doors

Colour contrast is detected much earlier in the brain than previously thought, a new study shows.

Scientists at Durham University have confirmed that colour contrast is first detected by part of the brain called primary visual cortex, which is located at the very back of the head where visual information first enters the cortex of the brain. This was recently discovered to be the case in animals but has not been tested on human beings until now.

The research also confirms that the brain does most of the work in seeing the difference between colours, rather than the eye.

The team of neuropsychologists identified a patient with damage to this specific part of the brain. They showed the patient visual illusions in which the contrast between the coloured spots in the foreground and their background colour affected the way the spots looked. People with this part of the brain intact would see the spots as different as they look different on varying backgrounds. The patient was not able to detect that difference.

Bulb

We ban smoking yet allow our children to be poisoned with food additives

Well, what a surprise. An authoritative new report published in medical journal The Lancet has confirmed that artificial colouring in children's foods can cause physical and mental damage, leading to hyperactivity, poor behaviour and allergic reactions.

The study, carried out by the Food Standards Agency, only confirms what all too many parents have known for years, that excessive additives do a great deal of harm to vulnerable youngsters.

Comment: The author of this article falls for the common lie that the government regulations are driven by altruistic motives. Apart from that, it is useful as a reminder of our ever more poisoned food supply.

Unfortunately, it does not at all discuss the reasons why our food has become poisoned: that society has fallen under the iron grip of rule by pathological greed and self-interest, a pathocracy, in which giant corporations corrupt the very air we breath and food we eat, in the end destroying the planet we inhabit, for the sake of personal short-term profit.


Health

Killer mosquito virus arrives in Europe

A tropical virus that has caused severe illness and widespread panic on the islands of the Indian Ocean has become established in Europe for the first time.

The Ministry of Health in Italy has confirmed a* outbreak of Chikungunya virus near Ravenna in the region of Emilia Romagna, 200 miles north of Rome. A total of 151 cases were reported in two villages near the town of Cervia between 4 July and 3 September. Eleven patients were taken to hospital; one died.

Health

China: RH negative citizens asked to donate blood for Olympics

Beijing's health authority has issued a plea to healthy citizens with the rhesus negative blood type to make donations to build up supplies for overseas athletes at next year's Olympic Games.

The health authorities face a shortage of the blood type as only three out of 10,000 Han Chinese are RH negative, according to official figures.

"Beijing will welcome more than 500,000 foreign guests during the Games and we need to reinforce our blood banks," said Deng Xiaohong, deputy director of the Beijing Municipal Health Administration.

A pressing job between now and the Games' opening ceremony next August is to expand storage of the RH negative blood, which is found in 15 percent of the western people, she said.

Magic Wand

Adult brain can change, study confirms

It is well established that a child's brain has a remarkable capacity for change, but controversy continues about the extent to which such plasticity exists in the adult human primary sensory cortex.

Now, neuroscientists from MIT and Johns Hopkins University have used converging evidence from brain imaging and behavioral studies to show that the adult visual cortex does indeed reorganize--and that the change affects visual perception. The study appears online Sept. 5 in an advance publication of the Journal of Neuroscience.

The authors believe that as scientists find ways to use this adaptive ability, the work could have relevance to topics ranging from learning to designing interventions for improving recovery following stroke, brain injury, or visual disorders.

Attention

Vocal cord dysfunction may be caused by work

Researchers from the UAB and the Vall d'Hebron Hospital have diagnosed two patients affected with vocal cord dysfunction, which causes coughing and difficulty in breathing due to irritating agents that are breathed in at the workplace. Until now, medical literature had only described two cases of patients with occupational vocal dysfunction.

Vocal cord dysfunction is an illness produced by a closure in the vocal cords when inhaling. Under normal conditions, the vocal cords would be open. It is a relatively frequent illness that is often mistaken for bronchial asthma given patients' symptoms, such as coughing, sensation of choking, wheezing, hoarseness and difficulties in breathing. Sometimes the conditions are so severe that patients must be intubated or even admitted to an intensive care unit. The diagnosis of this dysfunction is based on observing the flattening of the inspiratory limb in the flow-volume curve and observing the closure of the vocal cords with a laryngoscope.

Attention

New Study Says Women's Health Much More at Risk from Sleep Deprivation

New research led by researchers at Warwick Medical School at the University of Warwick reveals that women's health is much more at risk from sleep deprivation than men's.

The researchers looked at men and women sleeping less than or equal 5 hours a night to see if their risk of having hypertension was any higher than men and women getting the recommended 7 hours or more of sleep a night. Among other problems increased hypertension does increase the risk of cardiovascular problems.

Some previous studies have indicated that sleep deprivation is also associated with an increased risk of hypertension. However that research was based on self-reported diagnosis of hypertension, and had no gender-specific analysis.

Cut

Shocking! Chinese doctors plan to operate on human pin-cushion

Doctors have discovered 26 needles embedded in the body of a woman in China, believed to have been inserted not long after she was born by grandparents upset she was not a boy, state media said Friday.

The sewing needles were found in an X-ray after the 29-year-old, Luo Cuifen, went to a hospital in Yunnan province complaining of blood in her urine, the Beijing Morning Post reported.

Doctors plan to operate to remove as many of the needles as they can, it said, but face "great difficulties" as the images show several had penetrated vital organs including her lungs, liver, bladder, small intestine and kidneys.

Red Flag

CDC: Suicide Rate Among U.S. Girls Soars

ATLANTA - The suicide rate among preteen and young teen girls spiked 76 percent, a disturbing sign that federal health officials say they can't fully explain.

Red Flag

Chickens culled in southern Russia after bird flu outbreak

About 22,000 birds have been culled at a poultry farm in south Russia's Krasnodar Territory following a bird flu outbreak, local emergency services said Wednesday.

Specialists from the local veterinary watchdog have launched a set of measures to contain the spread in the Bryukhovetsky District, including health checks, thermal processing of seeds, and scaring wild birds away from farms. Revaccination of domestic birds in the region is underway.