Health & Wellness

Dangers of Microwave Popcorn

Terri Hall-Jackson
Yahoo News
Mon, 30 Aug 2010 19:39 UTC

When it's movie night at home and you're getting ready to break out the popcorn, using an air popper or jostling a pot of kernels in a heart-friendly oil on your stove top might be your best choices.

A report from the FDA indicates that a chemical coating used in microwave popcorn bags breaks down when heated into a substance called perfluorooctanoic (PFOA).

The Environmental Protection Agency has identified PFOA as a "likely carcinogen." Another study has found an acid that can be extracted from the chemical causes cancer in animals and is "likely to cause cancer in humans."

New Research Suggests: Non-stick Pans Can Affect Our Hormones

The Ecologist
Mon, 23 Aug 2010 19:07 UTC

Consumers should look for alternatives to non-stick pans to reduce their exposure to dangerous chemicals

Norwegian study highlights the effects of PFC and PCB chemicals on human health

A group of chemicals found in common household items may be having dangerous effects on our hormones, new research suggests.

A study on sheep and cells grown in the laboratory by Norwegian vets found that perfluorinated compounds (PFCs) found in water resistant clothes and non-stick frying pans can affect the body's steroid hormones including oestrogen, testosterone and cortisol.   These hormones are necessary for regulating a number of bodily functions in humans and animals, including our ability to reproduce.

The research also discovered similar effects caused by polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), a group of chemicals that have been banned since the 1970s but continue to persist in the environment.

Flawed Study, Bad Science - Outrageous Conclusion

Alliance for Natural Health
Tue, 31 Aug 2010 17:46 UTC

You may have read that eating more omega-3 fatty acids doesn't help heart patients. You absolutely will not believe what the researchers did to arrive at this result.

The researchers fed the poor human guinea pigs margarine - yes, margarine! - otherwise known as the extremely heart unhealthy form of fat called trans fat.

In the study, published in the New England Journal of Medicine, the researchers gave heart attack survivors between the ages of 60 and 80 one of four kinds of margarine: one that had additional omega-3s from fish, one that had plant-derived omega-3s, one that had both, and one without any added omega-3s (the control sample). The patients ate 4 tablespoons of it a day, on bread, for 3½ years. Researchers found no difference between the groups, no matter what kind of margarine they ate.

Psychologist Warns BP Oil Spill Will Have Long-Lasting Impact

NewsInferno
Tue, 31 Aug 2010 18:59 UTC

A prominent social psychologist says feelings of anger, depression, and helplessness are already apparent in many people whose lives were impacted by the BP oil spill. What's more, Deborah Du Nann Winter, PhD, told the peer-reviewed online journal Ecopsychology that those and other psychological impacts of the spill are expected to be long lasting.

According to the Ecopsychology article, Winter was a professor of psychology at Whitman College and has written extensively on the psychological dimensions of environmental damage, war, sense of place, and mindfulness. She recently co-authored the third edition of The Psychology of Environmental Problems.

While Winter predicted that symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) will surface in the wake of the spill, she also said that because the disaster has played out over several months, a bigger problem will be long-range, chronic widespread depression, which will build among the people impacted as the disaster progresses.

Canada bans BPA. Why haven't we?

Tom Philpott
Grist
Wed, 01 Sep 2010 19:50 UTC

Environment Canada - our northern neighbor's version of the EPA - has officially declared bisphenol A (BPA) toxic. The ubiquitous chemical, found in the lining of nearly all cans used by the food and beverage industry, will have to be phased out in Canada.

BPA is vile stuff. Here's how Scientific American recently described it:

"In recent years dozens of scientists around the globe have linked BPA to myriad health effects in rodents: mammary and prostate cancer, genital defects in males, early onset of puberty in females, obesity, and even behavior problems such as attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder."

The North American chemical industry is furious with Environment Canada's decision. The American Chemistry Council has vigorously defended BPA during Environment Canada's toxic review, declaring that the agency had "pandered to emotional zealots" by even considering the toxic designation, the Toronto Star reports. The industry group demanded that Environment Canada halt the review process; Environment Canada held firm.

California Rejects BPA Ban for Baby Bottles, Sippy Cups

Helena Bottemiller
Foodsafetynews.com
Thu, 02 Sep 2010 07:49 UTC

The California Senate defeated a bill Tuesday that would have banned the use of bisphenol-A, or BPA, in baby bottles, sippy cups, and infant formula packaging intended for use by children 3 and younger.

State Democratic Senator Fran Pavley, sponsor of SB797, believes scientific studies prove the chemical can harm the development of young children. Her legislation would have banned the chemical from baby bottles and sippy cups by the beginning of 2012, and in infant formula packaging by July 2012.

Connecticut, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Vermont, Wisconsin, and Washington have enacted laws limiting BPA in products used by small children. Over a dozen states and local governments are considering similar restrictions.

The decision comes just as an international group of researchers, led by the Peninsula Medical School and the University of Exeter, in the United Kingdom, reported a correlation between higher BPA exposure and a small increase in levels of testosterone in the blood.

"The results are important because they provide a first report in a large-scale human population of associations between elevated exposure to BPA and alterations in circulating hormone levels," the authors wrote. "They also illustrate that the extent of exposure to BPA is similar in this European mixed urban and rural population to exposures seen in the general adult population of the USA."

Federal Government Wants Michigan Dairy Shut Down

Dan Flynn
Foodsafetynews.com
Thu, 02 Sep 2010 07:46 UTC

Michigan's Scenic View Dairy, with farms at Fennville, Freeport, and Gowen, should be shut down for selling cows for human consumption with antibiotic levels that exceed tolerable limits.

So argues Adam B. Townshend, assistant U.S. Attorney, in a 25-page complaint filed Aug. 31 in U.S. District Court for Western Michigan against Scenic View Dairy LLC, its president, and three of its managers.

Abuse of antibiotics in animals is believed by many experts to lessen the effectiveness of antibiotics used to treat humans, including those infected by foodborne diseases.

A court date has not yet been set for the request by the government for a permanent injunction against Hamilton-based Scenic View, but the case has been assigned to U.S. District Court Judge Gordon J. Quist.

In the complaint, Townshend alleges that Scenic View Dairy, its president, Michael D. Geerlings, and managers, Mark A. Lucas, Michael J. Van Dam, and Jeremy A. Portell sold for slaughter dairy cows that were treated with drugs contrary to the drugs' FDA-approved labeling and without a veterinary prescription authorizing such use.

The Over-Prescribing of Psychoactive Drugs to Children: A Scourge of Our Times

Dr. Ronald Ricker & Dr. Venus Nicolino
Huffington Post
Wed, 01 Sep 2010 18:13 UTC

Today, the administration of psychoactive drugs to children (6-17) is all too common and growing at an alarming rate. These drugs often cause the opposite of the intended effect, often condemning children to a life of misery and ill health. The prescription of these drugs is said to treat "chemical imbalances" which were said to cause ADHD, Depression and Bi-polar disorder. It turns out, however, that what we were calling "disease-causing chemical imbalances," is simply incorrect . The sad irony is, the inappropriate use of these medications is in fact creating different chemical imbalances, which do cause mental disorders, many of which are both life-long and debilitating.

Comment: To learn more about the growing trend of 'treating' young children with prescription drugs read the following articles carried on SOTT:

A Better Prescription for Generation Rx

Poor Children More Likely To Be Put On Antipsychotic Drugs

Government is daring to keep kids on drugs

Two-Year-Old Toddlers Being Dosed Up with Antipsychotic Drugs:

Children between the ages of two and five are being treated with antipsychotics at twice the rate they were ten years ago, according to a study conducted by researchers from Columbia University and published in the journal Health Affairs.

"It is a worrisome trend, partly because very little is known about the short-term, let alone the long-term, safety of these drugs in this age group," researchers Mark Olfson said.

As stated in the article, 'Long-term use of new anti-psychotics may lead to even greater problems than the initial disease.' Read the linked articles below to get a better idea of how drug companies make a profit from pills that can kill:

Pfizer: The Drug Giant That Makes Bank from Drugs That Can Kill You

100,000 Americans Die Each Year from Prescription Drugs, While Pharma Companies Get Rich

The Hidden Damage of Psychiatric Drugs

Drug Side Effects "Neglected, Restricted, Distorted and Silenced" by Drug Companies

America's Mental Illness Epidemic: It Turns Out That the Drugs Are the Problem:

Tens of millions of innocent, unsuspecting Americans, who are mired deeply in the mental "health" system, have actually been made crazy by the use of or the withdrawal from commonly-prescribed, brain-altering, brain-disabling, indeed brain-damaging psychiatric drugs that have been, for many decades, cavalierly handed out like candy - often in untested and therefore unapproved combinations of drugs - to trusting and unaware patients by equally unaware but well-intentioned physicians who have been under the mesmerizing influence of slick and obscenely profitable psychopharmaceutical drug companies, a.k.a. BigPharma.

That is the conclusion of two books by investigative journalist and health science writer Robert Whitaker. His first book, entitled Mad in America: Bad Science, Bad Medicine and the Enduring Mistreatment of the Mentally Ill noted that there has been a 600 percent increase (since Thorazine was introduced in the US in the mid-1950s) in the total and permanent disabilities of millions of psychiatric drug-takers. This uniquely First World mental ill health epidemic has resulted in the life-long taxpayer-supported disabilities of rapidly increasing numbers of psychiatric patients who are now unable to be happy, productive, taxpaying members of society.

Psychologist tells EU Politicians 'Ban TV to Protect Children's Health'

Daily Mail
Tue, 31 Aug 2010 17:27 UTC

Ban: Toddlers should not be allowed to watch TV, according to expert Aric Sigman, and viewing should be limited for older children as well to protect their health.

TV should be banned for toddlers and severely rationed for other youngsters to protect their health and family life, a leading psychologist will tell MEPs today.

Dr Aric Sigman claims that millions of children spending hours slumped in front of TVs and computers is 'the greatest unacknowledged health scandal of our time'.

He says it is linked to ills ranging from obesity and heart disease to poor grades and lack of empathy.

Silver Nanoparticles Stop Sperm Stem Cell Growth

Jennifer F. Nyland
Environmental News Science
Wed, 01 Sep 2010 17:03 UTC

A new study has identified exactly how silver nanoparticles cause male reproductive cells to stop growing.

Minute materials used in a number of consumer products such as antimicrobial agents can interrupt important cell signaling within male reproductive sperm cells, causing them to stop growing, according to a new study that builds on previous work by the same research group.

In prior studies, the scientists reported how smaller-sized silver nanoparticles - in the 10 - 25 nanometer range - decreased the growth of male stem cells when they were exposed at concentrations greater than 10 micrograms per milliliter (ug/ml).

The new study is the first to identify how the silver nanoparticles stop the sperm stem cells from growing. The biggest effects were caused by the smallest-sized nanoparticles tested.

This study raises important questions about potential effects on male fertility, because silver nanoparticles are currently used in a wide range of products.

Comment: For more information about nanotechnology read the following:

Big Risk for Nanotechnology as Some Carbon Nanotubes May Cause Asbestos Related Diseases

Scientists Scared as Nanotechnology and Nanoparticles Become Common in Consumer Products:

"Valued for it's antibacterial and odor-fighting properties, nanoparticle silver is becoming the star attraction in a range of products from socks to bandages to washing machines. But as silver's benefits propel it to the forefront of consumer nanomaterials, scientists are recommending a closer examination of the unforeseen environmental and health consequences of nanosilver."

"The general public needs to be aware that there are unknown risks associated with the products they buy containing nanomaterials," researchers Paul Westerhoff and Troy M. Benn said in a report scheduled for the 235th national meeting of the American Chemical Society (ACS).