A Tulsa, Oklahoma teen went on a field trip, however, when she returned, her mother claims she was implanted with a birth control device. Her mother is now seeking answers after what she is calling a clear violation of her parental rights. Title X federal guidelines allow for children as young as 12 to receive birth control without parental consent.

Imagine a future where common infections and minor injuries such as small cuts could actually kill you. This is far from an apocalyptic fantasy made up by Hollywood scriptwriters, but a very real possibility for the 21st century according to a 2014 report by the World Health Organization (WHO). It argues that antibiotic resistance, the fact that bacteria and other microbes are becoming less and less sensitive to antimicrobial drugs, is amounting to a major global threat.

WHO recently followed up on this frightening assessment with a new report presenting 13 "global priority bacteria", including MRSA. It suggests we need to prioritise research on these bacteria because they cause major levels of disease and mortality.

So, what is being done? Well, the pharmaceutical industry has not discovered a major new class of antibiotics since 1987 and it has little incentive to spend hundreds of millions of dollars to develop novel drugs. This is because whatever drugs they come up with will most likely be shelved until no other drug can treat a specific infection. Also, most infections are not chronic in nature and treatment only lasts ten days or so, which drastically reduces sales and return on the investments. Finally, once the new drug is being used, we know from experience that bacteria are inevitably going to become resistant to it quickly, making the antibiotic useless. This drastically confines the market size and profitability of new antibiotics.

Thyroid cancer rates are rising faster than any other cancer in the United States, a new study found: Between 1975 and 2013, the number of thyroid cancer cases diagnosed yearly more than tripled.

The numbers have prompted many epidemiologists to caution in recent years that the increase in cases is really just a matter of doctors catching more cases. This includes cases that are slow-growing and that would be unlikely to cause symptoms that affect a person's life. Doctors refer to the diagnosis of cases like this as the "overdiagnosis" of a condition.

But in the new analysis, scientists argued that the alarming rise isn't just due to improvements in detecting thyroid cancer. [10 Do's and Don'ts to Reduce Your Risk of Cancer]

"While overdiagnosis may be an important component to this observed epidemic, it clearly does not explain the whole story," said Dr. Julie Sosa, one of the authors of the new study and the chief of endocrine surgery at Duke University in North Carolina.

Sosa, along with epidemiologists at the National Cancer Institute, acknowledged in their new study that better tools — from diagnostic ultrasound to fine-needle biopsies — have improved doctors' ability to detect thyroid cancers. But the study, published today (March 31) in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA), said that thyroid cancer is a real, growing threat, as shown by the increasing cases of a type of thyroid cancer called advanced stage papillary thyroid cancer, along with a steady rise in deaths from the disease.

Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt denied a petition Wednesday requesting that the agency ban the use of the chlorpyrifos on all United States food crops. Chlorpyrifos, a product of Dow Agrosciences, is an insecticide proved effective against mosquitoes, cockroaches and fire ants, which has been registered for use in the US since 1965.

The petition dates back to September 2007, when the Pesticide Action Network North America and the Natural Resources Defense Council requested a ban of the common pesticide based on concerns over its toxicity.The petitioners, some scientists and environmental groups claim that chlorpyrifos can harm children's developing brains and nervous systems. According to the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, exposure to chlorpyrifos can cause a range of symptoms including nausea, vomiting, headaches, dizziness, seizures and paralysis.

But some scientists and the US Department of Agriculture argue that chlorpyrifos is not harmful at exposure levels upheld by the EPA.

Breakfast is considered by most nutrition experts, including Public Health England, to be the most important meal of the day. It gets your brain and your metabolism going, and it suppresses the hunger hormone in your stomach so you won't overeat at lunch. But in our busy lives, it's easy to turn to what is quick, cheap, or what you can eat on the go. Cold cereal. Instant oatmeal. For those die-hard "I'm gonna serve something hot for breakfast" types, it's microwaveable breakfast sandwiches. Gotta get out the door now? Granola bars. Protein bars. Yoghurt smoothies.

Sadly, as the National Diet and Nutrition Survey found, what you're really doing is giving your children a huge sugar load while sending them on their way: half of their daily intake on average. There's a reason that the World Health Organisation and the United States Department of Agriculture have provided upper limits of sugar - because dietary sugar fries your kids' liver and brain; just like alcohol.

Alcohol provides calories (7kcal/g), but not nutrition. There's no biochemical reaction that requires it. When consumed chronically and in high dose, alcohol is toxic, unrelated to its calories or effects on weight. Not everyone who is exposed gets addicted, but enough do to warrant taxation and restriction of access, especially to children. Clearly, alcohol is not a food - it's a dangerous drug, because it's both toxic and abused.

For all the focus on hearts and arteries, brain tissue and muscle mass, we tend to neglect one critical part of the body with dramatic influence over how we fare in later decades. It's little surprise really. Feet don't exactly garner much attention, let alone media time. Yet, the stakes are big.

For example, research shows that foot conditions like hallux vagus (HV, a common forefoot deformity in older people commonly referred to as "bunions") was directly associated with marked decreases in quality of life. Foot pain, reduced foot function, lowered social capacity, and even degraded general health. That sort of thing.

But that's just one foot condition, right? Yes...and no. The picture of averages looks rather bleak.

A clinical assessment of 166 Hong Kong hospital outpatients over the age of 65 found that 70% of those patients had some sort of foot condition. In the U.S., things aren't much better. While surveys have shown extensive variability in reports of foot problems (anywhere between 30% and 95%), other research points to more dramatic prevalence of what I'd consider significant problems. Large-scale, random epidemiological studies aren't available without confounding factors that muddy the waters. Still, one extensive European study found that 78% of people over 65 suffered from kind of diagnosed foot issue. Even at the most conservative of estimates, that means a minimum of one third of all Americans over 65 will have some form of debilitating foot disorder. And the worst part? Many of the studies discovered that only a small percentage of these people actually report or complain about their foot problems. Apparently, for them it's just a fact of life.

But most of us here choose differently for ourselves. We prefer to challenge that fatalist "come what may" approach to aging. Feet shouldn't be an exception. In fact, given the statistics, they might well be a smart priority.

Nicolas Daniel's documentary Fillet-Oh-Fish takes a critical look at the fish industry, featuring exclusive footage from fish farms and factories across the globe. Many still have a rather romanticized view of fishing, but when it comes to large-scale food production, the picture is actually rather grim.

Today's fisheries are faced with a range of severe problems, from overfishing to chemical pollution and genetic mutation from toxic exposures. As noted by the producers of the film, "through intensive farming and global pollution, the flesh of the fish we eat has turned into a deadly chemical cocktail."¹

Despite that, the fish business is booming, in part due to efforts to keep the dirty underbelly of modern fisheries from public sight.

Aquaculture promotes itself as a sustainable solution to overfishing. But in reality, fish farms actually cause more problems than they solve. There's really little difference, in terms of environmental pollution, between land-based feedlots and water-based ones.

Remember those milk commercials you used to see as a kid, claiming that milk "does the body good"? It turns out that might not be true at all. In fact, it could be the complete opposite. New evidence continues to emerge suggesting that drinking milk from a cow is not really natural, and not really good nor necessary for us at all. It's not a coincidence that approximately 65 to 75 percent of the total human population on our planet have a reduced ability to digest lactose after infancy. In some countries, more than 90 percent of the adult population is lactose intolerant.

It makes sense if you think about it, because every other species weans and then never drinks milk again for the rest of their lives. This is because they don't have the enzyme to break down sugar in milk. In this video, Katherine S. Pollard, PhD., from the University of California shares how during human evolution, some humans experienced a mutation in the LTC gene, the lactose gene, and that these are the mutations that allow us to process lactose as adults. We weren't born with this gene, we had to develop it.

Not only that, the animal industry alone kills billions of animals every single year, and that's just in America alone. Factory farming is causing extreme environmental degradation and excess of greenhouses gases. Another factor to consider is animal cruelty. This is a great little video done by Erin Janus, an animal and environmental activist who is raising awareness about multiple issues. In her video she brings up some great points about the modern day dairy industry.

New FDA Warning About Fluoroquinolone Antibiotics
When IC patient Naomi* was prescribed Cipro for a bladder infection several years ago, she had no idea that it would lead to a life threatening aortic aneurysm. She, and others, found both both answers and outrage in an FDA safety alert released in May which required a stronger black box warning for fluoroquinolone medications (aka Levaquin, Cipro and Avelox) and urged that it only be used when no other therapy is available.(1)

Naomi shared,

"We've spent years trying to figure out why this happened to me. I had no risk factors, no family connection with aneurysms. But I did take Cipro several times including one months long prescription. It was often prescribed by my physicians."

Introduced in 1987, Cipro is a fluroquinolone antibiotic used to treat a wide variety of infections, including UTI and chronic prostatitis, some skin infections, respiratory tract, ear and joint infections. But it has a long record of serious side effects.

In 2008, the FDA issued a Black Box warning about an increased risk of tendinitis and tendon rupture, especially in the elderly. In 2013, the FDA warned about possible seizures and irreversible peripheral neuropathy. Headache, dizziness, and insomnia, tremor, anxiety, hallucination and suicide attempts were also reported.

Tea is actually the most consumed beverage worldwide after water so it's quite likely you may be acquiring black tea benefits already on a regular basis. But is black tea good for you? Loaded with antioxidants called polyphenols that protect human cells from hazardous free radical damage, black tea definitely makes the list of one of my top anti-aging foods. Plus, black tea has been linked with improved mental alertness, lower ovarian cancer risk, and a possible decreased likelihood of developing Parkinson's disease, diabetes and heart disease. ⁽¹⁾

While it's typically consumed "black" and hot in the East, in the West it's often consumed cold with lemon as iced tea or hot with milk and a sweetener like sugar or honey. Some varieties of black tea that may ring a bell include "English Breakfast" and "Irish Breakfast." You may also be familiar with "Early Grey," which is a black tea with bergamot essential oil, or chai tea, which combines a variety of spices with black tea. Any of these varieties come with black tea benefits so you can choose whichever one you prefer.

Today, black tea is by far the most popular of the tea varieties, and it's commonly consumed daily in Western as well as South Asian countries like Sri Lanka and India. So we definitely know it has a lot of fans, but how healthy is black tea? Let's take a look at exactly how black tea benefits your health whether you're already a long-time devotee or you're considering making it your new go-to caffeine of choice.