Since direct-to-consumer drug advertising was legalized 13 years ago, Americans have become a nation of pill poppers -- choosing the type of drug they desire like a new toothpaste, sometimes whether or not they need it.

But if patients want the drugs, doctors and pharma executives want them to have them and media gets full page ads and huge TV flights (when many advertisers have dried up), is the national pillathon really a problem?

Yes, when you consider the cost of private and government insurance (Medicare's budget is bigger than the Pentagon's) and the health of patients who take dangerous drugs like these.

A landmark study has found there may be more to the western world's obesity epidemic than first thought.

The study, published in Proceedings of the Royal Society B, found that weight gain may be linked to a number of issues beyond diet and lifestyle; including the possibility that weight gain is related to chemicals in the human body, or of infectious-origin.

The scientists, from nine research centres around the globe, observed the weight gain trend in feral and domestic animals that were living in close proximity to humans.

More than 80,000 chemicals now in use have never been fully assessed for toxic impacts on human health and the environment. Many of these chemicals are linked to increased incidence of cancer. Watch this video by expert Linda Greer, the Director of the Health Program at NRDC, the Natural Resources Defense Council, one of the most effective environmental protection groups. She clearly states that there is a lack of government oversight by the, EPA, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency - the very department that is supposed to be protecting us.


The chemical industry should have to demonstrate that a chemical isn't dangerous before it's used in everyday products. But the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) has no such requirements. These regulations have not been updated since 1976. It's time to require that all chemicals be tested for safety and grant the EPA the authority to protect the public from toxic chemicals. But chemicals are innocent until proven guilty. This means chemicals are in use that have no proven safety record.

It looks like Mom's advice was right - to look your best, get a full night's rest, a new study shows.

People who get eight hours of sleep appear healthier, more rested and more attractive than those who stay up all night, said study researcher John Axelsson, of the Karolinska Institute in Sweden.

"The study suggests that your sleep, and how you sleep, affects how other people perceive you, and probably how they treat you," Axelsson told MyHealthNewsDaily.

People often resort to beauty treatments to make them look awake and refreshed, and to boost self-confidence. But in the long term, simply getting enough sleep could achieve the same aesthetic results, Axelsson said.

"Sleep is the best beauty treatment that we have," he said.

Researchers asked 23 people, ages 18 to 31, to get eight hours of sleep one night, and then photographed them the next day. The pictures were taken between 2 p.m. and 3 p.m. in a well-lit room, with a fixed distance between their faces and the camera.

On another night, those same people got five hours of sleep. Researchers then kept them awake for 31 hours, and took their pictures again at the same time of day.

During both photography sessions, the participants wore no makeup, wore their hair loose and combed back, and groomed themselves the same way. Their expressions in the photographs were required to be relaxed and neutral.

Sixty-five observers were then asked to rate the photographs, without knowing how much sleep the people in the pictures had gotten the night before.

The observers rated the photographs taken when people were sleep-deprived as 6 percent less healthy, 4 percent less attractive and 19 percent more tired-looking on average, than the photographs taken when they were well-rested.

The research is more and more clear that sugar-sweetened beverages (SSBs) cause health problems. When researchers look at this issue they don't include just soft drinks, such as sodas or colas, but they also look at sweetened fruit drinks like punch (not those that are 100 percent juice) as well as energy and vitamin water drinks.

In a recent analysis researchers looked at the health issues caused by SSBs. Their meta-analysis combined the results and data of several studies to yield results for evaluation as if they were all one study. The strength of this method lies in the fact of its aggregate size: The larger and longer a study is, the more reliable are its results. The drawback is that this is a grouping of studies, all performed by different people with different standards and methods.

This particular analysis, reported in Diabetes Care, grouped together 11 prospective studies that included over 310,000 people. The researchers looking at SSBs standardized the serving size of the sugar-sweetened beverage consumption measured in each of the 11 studies. They then standardized the various levels of intake into groups: from none or less than one serving per month up to more than one serving per day. The amount of soft drinks drunk by individuals who developed Type 2 diabetes or metabolic syndrome was then compared to the amount drunk by those who did not develop these conditions. (Metabolic syndrome is defined by those with a grouping of conditions: high blood pressure, central obesity, high blood sugars and cholesterol abnormalities.)

Kids viewed as 'picky eaters' consumer fewer fruits, vegetables.

As health professionals search for ways to combat the rise in obesity and promote healthy eating, new research reveals a mother's own eating habits - and whether she views her child as a 'picky eater' - has a huge impact on whether her child consumes enough fruits and vegetables.

A study by professor Mildred Horodynski of Michigan State University's College of Nursing looked at nearly 400 low-income women (black and non-Hispanic white) with children ages 1-3 enrolled in Early Head Start programs. Results show toddlers were less likely to consume fruits and vegetables four or more times a week if their mothers did not consume that amount or if their mothers viewed their children as picky eaters.

"What and how mothers eat is the most direct influence on what toddlers eat," Horodynski said. "Health professionals need to consider this when developing strategies to increase a child's consumption of healthy foods. Diets low in fruit and vegetables even at young ages pose increased risks for chronic diseases later in life."

The research was published recently in the journal Public Health Nursing.

It's the end of the traditional crib that has cradled millions of babies for generations.

The government outlawed drop-side cribs on Wednesday after the deaths of more than 30 infants and toddlers in the past decade and millions of recalls.

It was a unanimous vote by the Consumer Product Safety Commission to ban the manufacture, sale and resale of the cribs, which have a side rail that moves up and down, allowing parents to more easily lift their child from the crib.

The new standard requiring cribs to have fixed sides would take effect in June. The move by CPSC would also prohibit hotels and childcare centers from using drop-sides, though those facilities would have a year to purchase new cribs.

Dear Child In The Back Seat: Your days of whining for the Strawberry Shortcake Happy Meal toy you saw on TV may be numbered. At least in California.

The Center for Science in the Public Interest filed a lawsuit today against McDonald's in state court in California to stop the company from advertising toys with Happy Meals.

It's no sure thing that the consumer group will get its way in court, of course, but the lawsuit ups the pressure on the fast-food chain over the combination of food and toys that appeal to kids. McDonald's defends the meals.

As children across the world look forward to opening their presents, young Izabelle Evans has already received a precious gift - her sight.

Izabelle, four, had been blind since birth but she can now see thanks to ground-breaking stem cell treatment in China.

Parents James Evans and Hollie McHugh say they will never forget the way they felt when their daughter saw them for the first time and said "Mummy and Daddy".

Izabelle can now see things 3ft away after the treatment that cost the family £50,000.

Cancers may be wounds that never heal, suggest the first live images of tumours forming. It seems individual cancer cells send out the same distress signals as wounds, tricking immune cells into helping them grow into tumours. The finding suggests that anti-inflammatory drugs could help to combat or prevent cancer. "Lifelong, if you take a small quantity of something that suppresses inflammation, such as aspirin, it could reduce the risk of cancer," says Adam Hurlstone of the University of Manchester, UK.