The International conservation Group Oceana has issued a report that they found high levels of mercury in tuna across the United States.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is think about filing a lawsuit that would take tuna sushi off the market in response to concerns about laboratory tests conducted from New York Times article.
Researchers found high level of mercury in raw tuna sushi that a regular diet of just 6 pieces a week could pose a health danger and exceed the levels considered acceptable by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).
Researchers at the University of Minnesota seeking new treatments for heart disease have grown a beating rat heart in the lab by using stem cells. VOA's Jessica Berman reports the research reported by the journal Nature Medicine is laying the groundwork for the transplant of what the scientists are calling bio-artificial organs in humans.
Experts say there are an estimated 100 million people around the world whose hearts do not work well enough to pump blood through their bodies. Many heart patients in need of a transplant will die waiting for a new organ to become available. But the researchers say if human hearts can be made from animal organs, they could save lives.
In their experiments, researchers removed the hearts of newborn lab rats and stripped them of their cells in a process called organ decellularization.
Source: http://www.voanews.com
Diet and exercise
The golden rule of good health can be summed up like this: Be good to your body so it will be good to you. That means eat a healthy diet and exercise regularly. Health problems are linked to weighing too much or too little before and during pregnancy. Your health is affected by what you eat and by your physical activity.
Here are a few important guidelines for healthy eating:
* Eat lots of vegetables, fruits and whole grains such as whole wheat, oats, barley and brown rice. These are excellent sources of the vitamins, minerals and dietary fiber you need every day to feel your best.
* Eat less of the foods that are high in saturated fat and cholesterol, such as meat, poultry and whole milk dairy foods (low-fat dairy is okay). Saturated fat and cholesterol are strongly linked to heart disease, cancer and obesity.
Regular physical activity helps control weight, strengthen your heart, and give you more energy. It also reduces depression and relieves stress. It's a good idea to exercise at least 3 times a week for at least 30 minutes.
Alcohol and drugs
Drinking alcohol or taking any type of legal or street drugs during the early weeks of pregnancy can badly hurt your unborn baby. That's when the brain and other organs are forming.
If you drink alcohol, so does your unborn baby. Alcohol abuse during pregnancy is a leading known cause of mental retardation. If you are considering a pregnancy, it's best to stop drinking alcohol before you conceive.
Cocaine, crack, heroin, amphetamines and other street drugs can badly hurt your baby if you use them while you are pregnant. Your baby could suffer lifelong health problems. Get help to stop using drugs before you become pregnant and stay clean.
Keep in Mind.....
* Walking, jogging, gardening, low-impact aerobics and swimming are good exercise.
* There is no safe level of alcohol during pregnancy. Women who drink heavily or binge drink may have babies with serious alcohol-related birth problems.
* If you need help to give up drinking or using drugs, talk with your doctor or other health care worker. They can help you find local resources.
* If you take any medicine for a medical condition, talk with your doctor before you become pregnant. Some prescription drugs and over-the-counter medicines can hurt your unborn baby.
Source: WQAD
More than three million 12- to 25-year-olds have tried to get high on over-the-counter cough medicines containing dextromethorphan at some point in their lives, a large survey found.
When taken in large amounts, dextromethorphan can produce hallucinations or dissociative, "out-of-body" experiences similar to those caused by the hallucinogens phencyclidine and ketamine, and can cause other adverse health effects, said the government report. The standard cough suppressant dose in adults is 20 mg.
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Source:MedPageToday.Com
A new Danish study has found that compared to non-drinkers, people who stay physically active and drink moderate amounts of alcohol have a lower risk of dying from heart disease and other causes.
The study was published today, Wednesday 9th January, in the European Heart Journal and was led by Professors Morten Grønbæk and Berit Heitmann. Grønbæk is Director of Research of the National Institute of Public Health at the University of Southern Denmark in Copenhagen, and Heitmann is Director for Research of the Institute of Preventive Medicine at Copenhagen University Hospitals.
The researchers found that people who don't drink alcohol and don't exercise had a 30 to 49 per cent elevated risk of heart disease compared to those who either exercise, drink, or both.
According to the researchers this was the first study to examine the combined effect of alcohol and exercise on fatal ischaemic heart disease (where the heart doesn't get enough blood) and death from all causes.
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Boston (dbTechno) - A new study has shown that older men who suffer from chronic anxiety have an increased risk of having a heart attack.
Stress has always been linked to an increased risk of heart problems, but this is the first time that chronic anxiety has also been linked as well.
There is no way to explain why there is a relationship between anxiety and heart attacks by looking at things like depression and hostility, they are completely different risk factors.
The study looked at 735 men who all took part in the Normative Aging Study. The men completed a psychological test in 1986 with no heart problems at all. They were then followed for 12 years and examined closely.
Researchers found that men with chronic anxiety had around a 40% increased risk of heart attack. The relationship was, the higher the level of anxiety, the higher the risk of heart attack.
The risk from anxiety was still prominent even after other factors such as health habits, personality traits, etc. were taken into effect.
Lead researcher Biing-Jiun Shen stated “There is an independent contribution of anxiety that can predict the onset of a heart attack among healthy older men.”
The study was published in the Jan. 15 issue of the Journal of the American College of Cardiology.
LONDON, Jan 7 (Reuters) - A little more sunshine might help you live longer, according to a study published on Monday suggesting that for some people health benefits from the sun outweigh the risk of skin cancer.
Sunlight spurs the body to produce vitamin D but fear of skin cancer is keeping many people in the shade and depriving them of an important protection from a range of diseases, researchers said.
"The skin cancer risk is there but the health benefits from some sun exposure is far larger than the risk," said Johan Moan, a researcher at the Institute for Cancer Research in Oslo, who led the study. "What we find is modest sun exposure gives enormous vitamin D benefits."
A number of studies have found protective effects from higher vitamin D intake for some cancers and ailments such as rickets, osteoporosis and diabetes, Moan said. Certain foods contain vitamin D but the body's main source comes from the sun.
The researchers calculated that given the same amount of time spent outside, people living just below the equator in Australia produced 3.4 times more vitamin D than people in Britain and 4.8 times more than Scandinavians.
This means even though rates of internal cancers such as colon cancer, lung cancer, breast cancer and prostate cancer rise from north to south, people in the sunnier latitudes were less likely to die from the diseases, the researchers said.
"The current data provide a further indication of the beneficial role of sun-induced vitamin D for cancer prognosis," said Richard Setlow of the U.S. Department of Energy's Brookhaven National Laboratory, who worked on the study.
Getting more vitamin D -- which helps the body's immune system work properly -- is also critical for people living in places like Scandinavia where long winters and short days during the year limit sun exposure, Moan added.
In Norway, Moan estimated that doubling the sun exposure for the general population would also double the number of annual skin cancer deaths to about 300 but that 3,000 fewer people would die from other cancers.
"The benefits could be significant for people in other countries as well," he said in a telephone interview. "I would be surprised if they were different."
Moan, whose findings were published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, recommended daily sun exposure for about half the time it takes a person to get sunburn.
Another way to get more vitamin D could be designing sunscreen that blocks long ultraviolet wavelengths that trigger the deadliest forms of skin cancer while letting through short ultraviolet wavelengths that produce the vitamin.
Source: Michael Kahn