Health & WellnessS


Health

A Healthy Poke: Demystifying the Science Behind Acupuncture

Alice G. Walton, Ph.D.
The Atlantic
Thu, 29 Sep 2011 14:55 UTC
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© The AtlanticAcupuncture is a "retrospective science, going on for 3,000 years. We know it works, we just don't know why."
Many of us have started to embrace the use of alternative medicine, but acupuncture, with its qi, yin, and meridians, still raises eyebrows.

While many practices in alternative medicine are slowly but surely making their way into the mainstream, acupuncture is one that still produces skeptical eyebrow raises. This phenomenon is partly due to linguistics. Scientists have worked to elucidate the mechanisms by which yoga, meditation, and various dietary interventions may work on the cells of the body, but there is something fundamentally more ancient-feeling about the language of acupuncture. Go to the NIH's website on complementary and alternative medicine (NCCAM), and even here you'll find a discussion that involves qi, yin, yang, and meridians.

Is it possible to discuss acupuncture in a way that makes sense to even the most Westernized brains? The short answer is yes - but with the caveat there there is no single unifying explanation for how it works. While acupuncture has been demonstrated to be useful in pain management and in treating the nausea and vomiting associated with chemotherapy, other uses have had more mixed results when studied scientifically.
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Cow Skull

Many 'Natural' Foods are Loaded with GMOs

S. D. Wells
Natural News
Wed, 05 Oct 2011 14:22 UTC
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© food-based-nutrition.com
Weed killer is thriving biologically inside most conventional crops as they grow in the fields of America, only to be sprayed with more heavy doses of Roundup, and then shipped to the world's supermarkets as "all natural," with absolutely no GMO disclaimer or warning. Even vegetarian products have been infiltrated by this cancer-causing "Trojan horse."

Corn and soy based products infiltrate the American "norm" for daily general consumption, and the healthcare industry loves the results. Hundreds of thousands of Americans are suffering from infections, serious gluten allergy reactions, headaches, dizzy spells, kidney stones, bowel irregularities, and worst of all, mutagenic cell production leading to cancer. Monsanto's GMO farm land has increased from just 4 million acres in 1997 to over 330 million acres now, most of which is United States soil. Brazil and India are now popular GMO breeding grounds also.
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Attention

Propaganda Alert: New York Post - The City's New Psychosis: Gluten!

Sheila McClear & Carla Spartos
New York Post
Wed, 05 Oct 2011 16:28 UTC
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© New York Times Post
Attack of the killer bread loaves! More New Yorkers than ever are running scared from wheat - but are their fears founded?

It's a Saturday afternoon at Tu-Lu's Gluten Free Bakery in the East Village, and a steady stream of customers is flowing through the small pink-and-white shop. Most are fashionably dressed women in their 20s and 30s who pause to admire a vast array of baked goods - from pumpkin cupcakes made with a blend of rice, tapioca and potato flour to loaves of wheat-free, whole-grain sunflower bread.

"I was one of [its] first customers," says Brystal Rosensweig, 21, a student who started visiting the shop when it opened in 2010 and has been gluten-free for 3 1/2 years.
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Heart - Black

Depression Affects Brain Hate Circuit


Press TV
Wed, 05 Oct 2011 09:12 UTC
brain
© unknownFunctional Brain MRI
Brain imaging of depressed individuals shows that they have abnormalities in their brains' hate circuit, pathways that normally control the feeling of dislike.

In healthy people the circuit that connects the brain's superior frontal gyrus, insula and putamen regions usually controls the feeling of hatred. A new study, however, say the wiring may weaken when a person is suffering from depression.

Researchers in the UK and China used fMRI scans for comparing brain functions of 15 people with untreated depression, 24 people whose depression had not responded to multiple antidepressants and 37 healthy controls.

Findings showed that depressed people had weakened connections between the superior and inferior orbitofrontal cortex (OFC) on the left side of the brain, but stronger connections on the right side of the brain, researchers wrote in the journal Molecular Psychiatry.
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Ambulance

Stress 'is top cause of workplace sickness' and is so widespread it's dubbed the 'Black Death of the 21st century'

Becky Barrow
MailOnline
Wed, 05 Oct 2011 09:43 UTC
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© UnknownPressure: Stress has become the commonest cause of absence from work

Stress has become the most common reason for a worker being signed off long-term sick, a report reveals today.

Experts said the psychological condition had become so widespread that it was the '21st century equivalent of the Black Death'.

Jill Miller, an adviser to the institute, says the report 'highlights the heightened pressure many people feel under in the workplace as a result of the prolonged economic downturn'.

Stress was found to be especially common at firms that have announced redundancies.

Long-term absence is defined as taking four weeks or more off at one time because of sickness.
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Ambulance

Birth Defects in China Jump 70 Percent in 15 Years

Hong Ning
The Epoch Times
Tue, 04 Oct 2011 09:26 UTC
Chinese pollution
© Mark Henley—Impact Photos/Heritage-ImagesAir pollution in Liaoning province, China.
In China the birth defect rate has jumped from 8.77 per 1,000 in 1996, to 15 per 1,000 in 2010, according to Report on Women and Children's Health Development published on Sept. 21. Experts attributed the 70.9 percent surge to environmental pollution.

According to the Jinghua Times, the top five inborn defects in hospital tests in 2010 were congenital heart disease, extra toes or fingers, cleft lip, congenital hydrocephalus ("water in the brain"), and neural tube defect (exposure of the brain or spinal cord at birth); congenital heart disease was ranked number one.

Li Senkai, former deputy director of Cosmetic Surgery of the Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences, said food pollution is the primary cause of cleft lips and penile hypospadias (an unnatural development of the penis).

When manufacturers of animal feed add estrogen, the ultimate victims are newborns.
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Ambulance

Genes change message after newborn rats given BPA

Brandon Moore and Wendy Hessler
Environmental Health News
Wed, 05 Oct 2011 09:18 UTC
BPA
© stevendepolo/flickrThe lining inside most food and beverage cans contains bisphenol A that is is a source of exposure for people of all ages.
Doshi, T, SS Mehta, V Dighe, N Balasinor and G Vanage. 2011. "Hypermethylation of estrogen receptor promoter region in adult testis of rats exposed neonatally to bisphenol A." Toxicology

Bisphenol A (BPA) can alter the way genes are read in male rats exposed to the chemical as newborns. The so-called epigenetic changes had lasting effects on reproductive hormone signals into adulthood that may partially explain reported effects of the chemical on male fertility.

The findings add to a growing body of research showing that BPA can impact the way genes are coded and then interpreted later in life during sexual maturity. Such changes have been documented in the brain, prostate and uterus.

The early-life exposures added chemical groups to two important genes on the DNA in the testes and increased the levels of enzymes that control these epigenetic additions. Due to the broader impact on these enzyme levels, newborn BPA exposure may affect more genes and levels of control than identified in the current study.
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Syringe

Parents Distrust, Delay Vaccines, Survey Finds

Lauren Cox
Live Science
Mon, 03 Oct 2011 00:00 UTC
Doctor Needle
© Dreamstime
Parents are increasingly skipping or delaying vaccines for their young children, despite doctors' concerns that doing so will leave their children and community at risk for preventable diseases.

A nationwide survey found that more than 1 in 10 parents vaccinated their children outside of the recommended schedule developed by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Only 2 percent of parents in the study refused all vaccines for their children. But many showed distrust of the official recommended vaccination schedule, and 13 percent reported using an alternative vaccine schedule, meaning they skipped or delayed vaccines, according to the paper published today (Oct. 3) in the journal Pediatrics.

Comment: Readers are encouraged to read the following articles for informed decision.

Vaccination Myths and Truths

The Vaccine Firestorm

Vaccinated Children Two and a Half Times More Likely to Have Neurological Disorders Like ADHD and Autism, New Survey in California and Oregon Finds

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Question

Could BPA Predispose Girls to Breast Cancer?

Susanne Rust
californiawatch.org
Tue, 04 Oct 2011 16:53 UTC
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© foodsafetynews.com
A new study suggests that early exposure to a chemical found in hard, clear plastics and the linings of cans may cause changes in breast tissue, predisposing laboratory animals to breast cancer.

The study, released yesterday in the journal Molecular Endocrinology, adds to a growing body of evidence showing that small amounts of the chemical bisphenol A, or BPA, can cause irreparable damage to developing animals.

"I want it to be clear that we do not provide evidence that BPA exposure causes breast cancer per se," said Cathrin Brisken of the Swiss Institute for Experimental Cancer Research, co-author of the study. "We do provide evidence that BPA exposure alters mammary gland development and that this may increase the predisposition of the breast to breast cancer."
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Video

Healthful Foods You Should Never, Ever Eat

Dr. Mercola
Mercola.com
Tue, 04 Oct 2011 14:50 UTC

RIGGED RESEARCH from NO GMO on Vimeo.

There are two types of research regarding GM (genetically modified) food - independent science and corporate science. It's not hard to decide which one to trust.

Jeffrey Smith, featured in the video above, is the executive director of the Institute for Responsible Technology, whose Campaign for Healthier Eating in America is designed to create the tipping point of consumer rejection of GMOs (genetically modified organisms) to rid them from our food supply. In this short but important video, he points out some of the most glaring problems with scientific research, and that is the discrepancies you get depending on the source of the funding.
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