Clipmarks | Mohir's 'health' clips

86 Percent Of Americans Could Be Overweight Or Obese By 2030

Tue, 29 Jul 2008 14:44:37 GMT

clipped by: Mohir
clipper's remarks: “The health care costs attributable to obesity and overweight are expected to more than double every decade. This would account for 15 to 17 percent of total health care costs spent,” Wang says. “Due to the assumptions we made and the limitations of the available data, these figures are likely an underestimation of the true financial impact.”

Clip Source: www.sciencedaily.com

Most adults in the U.S. will be overweight or obese by 2030, with related health care spending projected to be as much as $956.9 billion,

“National survey data show that the prevalence of overweight and obese adults in the U.S. has increased steadily over the past three decades,”

“If these trends continue, more than 86 percent of adults will be overweight or obese by 2030 with approximately 96 percent of non-Hispanic black women and 91 percent of Mexican-American men affected. This would result in 1 of every 6 health care dollars spent in total direct health care costs paying for overweight and obesity-related costs.”

The researchers conducted projection analyses based on data collected over the past three decades from nationally representative surveys. Their projections illustrate the potential burden of the U.S. obesity epidemic if current trends continue.

“Our analysis also shows that over time heavy Americans become heavier,”

Tags: obesity, usa, health

1998: Syphilis Genome Sequenced; 2008: Syphilis on the Rise

Sat, 19 Jul 2008 16:00:41 GMT

clipped by: Mohir
clipper's remarks: Incidence is up among women, African-Americans and, most prominently, gay men, who account for 64 percent of the more than 12,000 people diagnosed last year with either primary or secondary syphilis infections. Primary infections appear as ulcers or shankers on the genitals, anus or mouth; secondary infections result in rashes on the foot's sole or the palm of the hand as well as hair loss and lesions on or around the genitalia.

Clip Source: www.sciam.com

A decade ago, this week, scientists at the University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston and the Institute for Genomic Research announced they had decoded the genetic information inside Treponema pallidum, the bacterium that causes the sexually transmitted disease (STD) syphilis.

At the time, Penelope Hitchcock, the chief of the sexually transmitted disease branch of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), hailed the work as critical to developing better drugs. NIAID director Anthony Fauci added the genome would boost efforts to develop a preventative vaccine.

Syphilis wouldn't have us to kick around anymore. Right?

Flash forward one decade: There are no new wonder drugs—penicillin injections are still the primary treatment and cure of the rarely fatal illness. Meanwhile, the rate of reported cases of syphilis in the U.S. rose for the seventh consecutive year—up 12 percent between 2006 and 2007

Tags: health, dna, syphilis

The Role of Light on Human Health

Wed, 16 Jul 2008 16:07:47 GMT

clipped by: Mohir
clipper's remarks: Rea envisions "real-time light prescriptions" to help people receive or avoid light at the appropriate times. Simple measures to control when and how much circadian light we receive could help nightshift workers stay alert on the job and sleep more effectively during the day, help cure jet lag, decrease depression, and generally help everyone get a proper night's sleep.
The ability to modify circadian rhythm could potentially mitigate the negative health effects that some researchers believe are brought on by disruptions to the light-dark cycle. Recent studies have found a link between health and changes in the natural circadian rhythm. The Journal of the National Cancer Institute published a series of articles, for example, that showed night shift workers had a higher incidence of breast cancer; and, last year, the World Health Organization's International Agency for Research on Cancer cited night work as a potential breast cancer risk factor.

Clip Source: www.sciam.com

During a 24-hour period humans experience a rise and dip in the production of most hormones and neurotransmitters (the chemicals that relay signals between nerve cells). This daily cycle is referred to as the body's circadian rhythm and is regulated by both internal systems and external stimuli, the most powerful of which is visible light.

Small and ear-mounted—like a wireless cell phone headset—it has three sensors that measure head movement, bright light (or lux, a measurement of the light used for daytime vision), and blue visible light (also known as circadian light). Circadian light—radiated by the sun as well as computer and television screens—helps balance certain hormones and neurotransmitters in the body, but only in specific doses and at certain times of day. Too much of this light can throw off the body's internal clock, which researchers believe leads to problems such as fatigue and poor health.

Tags: light, health

5 Next-Gen Antibiotics That Could Save Your Life

Thu, 03 Jul 2008 18:02:57 GMT

clipped by: Mohir

Clip Source: discovermagazine.com

The threat of antibiotic resistance is nothing to scoff at: The World Health Organization predicts (pdf) that some diseases, including malaria, tuberculosis, and pneumonia, could have “no effective therapies within the next 10 years.” Indeed, 70 percent of hospital-acquired bacterial infections in the United States—which kill 90,000 Americans a year—are resistant to at least one drug, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. But scientists are working hard to find more potent antibiotics, and they are uncovering them in the strangest of places, from alligators’ veins to cholesterol drugs.

1. Gator Blood

Recent lab tests show that tiny amounts of alligator blood extract—some scientists call it alligacin—kill many microbes, including Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA), and help fight HIV.

2. Frog Skin

Clip Source: discovermagazine.com

3. Synthetic Molecules

4. Focused phages

5. Cholesterol Drugs

Tags: antibiotics, health

Sperm-powered Nanobots

Fri, 30 May 2008 11:20:58 GMT

clipped by: Mohir

Clip Source: discovermagazine.com

The next wave in health care may include a brigade of medical nanobots, devices tiny enough to ride the flow of blood through the body's arteries to a problem area. The bots might arrive at a clot, for example, and then using an internal power system, obliterate the clot with a precisely targeted drug or therapy. Designing a power source to accomplish such a task has been a challenge, but from the College of Veterinary Medicine at Cornell University comes a possible answer. The same molecular power packs that fuel sperm in their journey through the uterus and to a fallopian tube might be copied and used to keep the nanomachines running once they reach their targets.

Ordinarily the ATP provides sperm with enough energy to bend and flex their tails as they swim to the unfertilized egg. Travis’s plan is to copy the design of the sperm’s engine by slightly modifying a 10-enzyme glycolysis chain embedded in the sperm’s tail, and then to install it in nanobots.

Tags: nanotechnology, nanobots, health

Why Having Big Buttocks Is Good for Your Health

Wed, 07 May 2008 14:29:53 GMT

clipped by: Mohir
clipper's remarks: Working on mice, the team transplanted fat from one location of the animals' body to the other. Subcutaneous fat removed to the abdomen triggered body weight and fat mass losses, and a decrease in blood sugar levels. The rodents also got more responsive to insulin, the hormone controlling the way in which the body metabolizes sugar. Insulin resistance triggers the type 2 diabetes. When visceral fat was placed to other body regions, it induced no effect.

Clip Source: news.softpedia.com

We are told that an increased Body Mass Index (BMI) makes us prone to a large array of diseases. But, as it turns out, fat located under the skin, especially on the buttocks, seems to actually decrease the chances of developing type 2 diabetes, as signaled by a new research published in the Cell Metabolism journal and carried out at The Harvard Medical School.

Subcutaneous fat seems to have opposite effects to visceral fat,

the one wrapped around the organs and closely connected to increased risk of illness, by releasing adipokines, metabolism-boosting hormones.

Tags: health, fat

New Nanotechnology Products Hitting The Market At The Rate Of 3-4 Per Week

Sat, 26 Apr 2008 11:03:16 GMT

clipped by: Mohir
clipper's remarks: While polls show most Americans know little or nothing about nanotechnology, in 2006 nanotechnology was incorporated into more than $50 billion in manufactured goods. By 2014, Lux Research estimates $2.6 trillion in manufactured goods will incorporate nanotechnology--or about 15 percent of total global output. Despite a 2006 worldwide investment of $12.4 billion in nanotech R&D, comparatively little was spent on examining nanotechnology's potential environmental, health and safety risks.

Clip Source: www.sciencedaily.com

New nanotechnology consumer products are coming on the market at the rate of 3-4 per week, a finding based on the latest update to the nanotechnology consumer product inventory maintained by the Project on Emerging Nanotechnologies

The number of consumer products using nanotechnology has grown from 212 to 609 since PEN launched the world's first online inventory of manufacturer-identified nanotech goods in March 2006. Health and fitness items, which includes cosmetics and sunscreens, represent 60 percent of inventory products.

There are 35 automotive products in the PEN inventory, including the Hummer H2. General Motors Corporation bills the H2 as having a cargo bed that "uses about seven pounds of molded in color nanocomposite parts for its trim, center bridge, sail panel and box rail protector."

Tags: nanotechnology, consumer

Vitamin supplements may increase risk of death

Wed, 16 Apr 2008 17:54:51 GMT

clipped by: Mohir
clipper's remarks: Never a dull moment

Clip Source: www.guardian.co.uk

Vitamin supplements taken by millions of people do not increase life expectancy and may raise the risk of a premature death , according to a review of 67 studies with more than 230,000 subjects.

The review, by the Cochrane Collaboration which regularly pools data from trials to evaluate drugs and treatments, found supplements vitamin A, vitamin E and beta-carotene are detrimental to health. In 47 trials with 180,938 people and a low risk of bias, the "antioxidant supplements significantly increased mortality", the authors wrote. When the antioxidants were assessed separately and low risk of bias trials were included and selenium excluded, vitamin A was linked to a 16% increased risk of dying, beta-carotene to a 7% increased risk and vitamin E to a 4% increased risk.

Evidence for vitamin C and selenium was more equivocal, suggesting there was no benefit to taking these pills compared with a placebo.

Tags: vitamin, health

Academics find formula for 14 extra years of life

Tue, 08 Jan 2008 13:42:17 GMT

clipped by: Mohir

Clip Source: www.guardian.co.uk

People who adopt four principles for a healthy lifestyle can add as much as 14 years to their lives, a study revealed today.

Researchers found that not smoking, taking exercise, drinking in moderation and eating five servings of fruit and vegetables a day can have a huge impact on life expectancy.

Academics at Cambridge University monitored the health of 20,000 men and women aged between 45 and 79 from Norfolk between 1993 and 2006.

The study concluded: "The results strongly suggest that these four achievable lifestyle changes could have a marked improvement on the health of middle-aged and older people, which is particularly important given the ageing population in the UK and other European countries."

The research showed that a person's social class or body mass index (BMI) had no role to play in life expectancy.

The study, published in the journal The Public Library of Science Medicine, is one of the first to look at the combined impact of the four factors on life expectancy.

Tags: health, longevity

World's Most Powerful MRI Ready To Scan Human Brai

Wed, 02 Jan 2008 12:43:16 GMT

clipped by: Mohir

Clip Source: www.sciencedaily.com

ScienceDaily (Jan. 2, 2008) — The world's most powerful medical magnetic resonance imaging machine, the 9.4 Tesla at the University of Illinois at Chicago, has successfully completed safety trials and may soon offer physicians a real-time view of biological processes in the human brain.

Researchers and physicians hope that the 9.4T will usher in a new era of brain imaging in which they will be able to observe metabolic processes and customize health care.

Oncologists, for example, may one day be able to tailor radiation therapy based on a brain tumor's real-time response to treatment. Currently, physicians often must wait weeks to see if a tumor is shrinking in response to therapy. With the 9.4T, it will be possible to see if individual cells within the tumor are dying long before the tumor has begun to shrink.

Tags: mri, brain, health

10 Minutes Of Staring at Boobs Daily Prolongs Man's Life by 5 Years...

Sun, 02 Dec 2007 16:00:37 GMT

clipped by: Mohir
clipper's remarks: "Sexual excitement gets the heart pumping and improves blood circulation. There's no question: Gazing at large breasts makes men healthier. Our study indicates that engaging in this activity a few minutes daily cuts the risk of stroke and heart attack in half." said Weatherby, who even recommended that men aged over 40 should spend at least 10 minutes daily admiring breasts sized "D-cup" or larger.

She said that this was as healthy as going to the gym for 30 minutes daily and prolonged a man's life by five years.

Clip Source: news.softpedia.com

10 Minutes Of Staring at Boobs Daily Prolongs Man's Life by 5 Years...

A German research published in New England Journal of Medicine said that men staring at women's breasts in fact prolong their lives with years.

"Just 10 minutes of staring at the charms of a well-endowed female such as Baywatch actress Pamela Lee is equivalent to a 30-minute aerobics work-out," said author Dr. Karen Weatherby, a gerontologist.

The team led by Weatherby was made up of researchers at three hospitals in Frankfurt, Germany, and found this results after monitoring for 5 years the health of 200 male subjects, half of whom were asked to look at busty females daily, while the other half had to abstain from doing so.

For five years, the boob oglers presented a lower blood pressure, slower resting pulse rates and decreased risk of coronary artery disease.

Tags: man, health

How schizophrenia develops: Major clues discovered

Wed, 17 Oct 2007 17:42:00 GMT

clipped by: Mohir

Clip Source: www.physorg.com

How schizophrenia develops: Major clues discovered

Schizophrenia may occur, in part, because of a problem in an intermittent on/off switch for a gene involved in making a key chemical messenger in the brain, scientists have found in a study of human brain tissue. The researchers found that the gene is turned on at increasingly high rates during normal development of the prefrontal cortex, the part of the brain involved in higher functions like thinking and decision-making – but that this normal increase may not occur in people with schizophrenia.

The gene, GAD1, makes an enzyme essential for production of the chemical messenger, called GABA. The more the gene is turned on, the more GABA synthesis can occur, under normal circumstances. GABA helps regulate the flow of electrical traffic that enables brain cells to communicate with each other. It is among the major neurotransmitters in the brain.

Tags: schizophrenia, health, psychology, mental health

Abortion laws don't stop abortions

Sun, 14 Oct 2007 13:28:49 GMT

clipped by: Mohir

Clip Source: www.physorg.com

Report: Abortion laws don't stop abortions

An international study reported in the British journal Lancet said abortion laws do not necessarily influence a woman's decision to have an abortion.

Researchers from the World Health Organization in Geneva and the Guttmacher Institute, a reproductive rights group in New York, said 13 percent of women's deaths during pregnancy and childbirth are caused by abortion, The New York Times said Friday.

The study found about 20 million abortions that would be considered unsafe are performed each year, and 67,000 women die as a result of complications.

"Generally, where abortion is legal it will be provided in a safe manner," Dr. Paul Van Look, director of the WHO Department of Reproductive Health and Research, told the newspaper. "And the opposite is also true: where it is illegal, it is likely to be unsafe, performed under unsafe conditions by poorly trained providers."

Tags: abortion, law

6 Die From Brain-Eating Amoeba in Lakes

Sun, 30 Sep 2007 16:19:29 GMT

clipped by: Mohir

Clip Source: www.physorg.com

6 Die From Brain-Eating Amoeba in Lakes

(AP) -- It sounds like science fiction but it's true: A killer amoeba living in lakes enters the body through the nose and attacks the brain where it feeds until you die.

Even though encounters with the microscopic bug are extraordinarily rare, it's killed six boys and young men this year. The spike in cases has health officials concerned, and they are predicting more cases in the future.

"This is definitely something we need to track," said Michael Beach, a specialist in recreational waterborne illnesses for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

"This is a heat-loving amoeba. As water temperatures go up, it does better," Beach said. "In future decades, as temperatures rise, we'd expect to see more cases."

The amoeba destroys tissue as it makes its way up into the brain, where it continues the damage, "basically feeding on the brain cells," Beach said.

Tags: health, brain, biology

Infectious diseases spreading faster than ever

Fri, 24 Aug 2007 14:51:54 GMT

clipped by: Mohir

Clip Source: www.reuters.com

Infectious diseases spreading faster than ever: U.N.

GENEVA (Reuters) - Infectious diseases are emerging more quickly and spreading faster around the globe than ever and becoming increasingly difficult to treat, the World Health Organization (WHO) said on Thursday.

With billions of people moving around the planet every year, the U.N. agency said in its annual World Health Report: "An outbreak or epidemic in one part of the world is only a few hours away from becoming an imminent threat somewhere else."

WHO director-general Margaret Chan said mass travel could facilitate the rapid spread of infectious diseases.

"No country can shield itself from invasion by a pathogen incubating in an airline passenger or an insect hiding in a cargo hold," Chan told reporters.

The U.N. agency warned that there was a good possibility of another major scourge like AIDS, SARS or Ebola fever with the potential of killing millions appearing in the coming years.

Tags: health, who, disease