More than 7,000 children under the age of twelve end up in the emergency room each year after taking over-the-counter cough and cold drugs. Most are there for overdoses.
In two-thirds of the cases, children took the drugs without supervision, but around 26 percent were children who experienced side effects after a parent gave them the recommended dose.
Cough suppressants, antihistamines and decongestants have never been shown to benefit young children.
Regular exposure to safe, low level infrared light can improve learning performance and jump-start the cognitive functions of the brain.
These results are being called a scientific breakthrough, since previous medical treatments for dementia and Alzheimer’s disease only offered the possibility of slowing down brain deterioration. This one, if it works in human trials scheduled to start this summer, could potentially provide a cure.
The levels of infrared light used are completely safe and occur naturally in sunlight. They are currently being used to treat cold sores.
Experts claim that early stage dementia patients could see an improvement in their cognitive function within only four weeks, if they wear a special lightweight helmet in their home for just ten minutes a day. The process uses infrared light to boost the self-repair capability of brain cells.
A Hawaiian state senate bill will soon be introduced that will propose to ban aspartame from the State of Hawaii.
A previous bill introduced into the New Mexico senate failed. That attempt was notable for the response of the state senators who opposed the bill; they sipped Diet Coke as they listened to the arguments.
Stephen Fox, the Managing Editor of the Santa Fe Sun News and a backer of the New Mexico effort, said of the Hawaiian bills: “This is wonderful news coming from Hawaii ... [the] bills were overwhelmed and eviscerated in New Mexico by some of the most vicious corporate lobbyists I have ever encountered, representing Ajinomoto of Japan, the world's largest aspartame and MSG manufacturer, as well as their duped American corporate henchmen ... like Coca Cola, Pepsi, Altria/Kraft Corporate services, and others. The same lobbyists will show up in Honolulu, make no mistake ...
“These corporations have everything to lose if such bills advance and ultimately lead to the inevitable product liability and personal injury suits from those damaged by aspartame, which number in the hundreds of millions ...”
47 Members of the UK Parliament have also asked for an aspartame ban, and efforts in New Zealand continue with a circulating petition for ban.
Drug companies have been understating the risks and overstating the benefits of prescribing bone-strengthening drugs for women who do not yet have osteoporosis.
Drug makers have argued that similar treatments should be used for both osteoporosis and pre-osteoporosis (osteopenia). However, drugs such as raloxifene, alendronate and risedronate provide almost no benefit for women with pre-osteoporosis.
Four drug company studies that examined the effects of osteoporosis drugs on women with osteopenia exaggerated the benefits and downplayed the potentially harmful side effects; for example, studies on raloxifene made no mention of the increased risk for blood clots.
This article in the New York Times reflects the rapid disintegration of the medical orthodoxy that states cholesterol is a key cause of heart disease. In the wake of drug trials that show the drug Vytorin lowers cholesterol levels but not heart risks, an increasing number of doctors are examining the evidence and finding it lacking.
The very language used to discuss heart disease confuses the cholesterol carried in the bloodstream with the particles, known as lipoproteins, that actually carry it. Some of these lipoproteins may pose dangers, but whether or not the cholesterol itself does is much more questionable.
In fact, studies have shown that total cholesterol levels are not a risk factor for coronary heart disease at all, and the cholesterol in low-density lipoproteins is a “marginal risk factor”. A large percentage of people who suffer heart attacks have low levels of low-density lipoproteins.
The main reason cholesterol is assumed to be bad actually comes from circular logic: saturated fat was assumed to be bad because it raises LDL cholesterol, and LDL cholesterol was assumed to be bad because it is the thing that saturated fat raises. But researchers have been unable to generate compelling evidence that saturated fat in the diet causes heart disease.
New research shows that a high dietary intake of acrylamide can increase the risk of breast cancer. The study was the first epidemiological study using biological markers for measuring acrylamide exposure, and also the first to report an acrylamide/breast cancer link.
Pizza Hut’s cheese supplier, Leprino Foods, uses the silicone-industrial chemical Polymethylsiloxane in their “Pizza Cheese”. It is not approved by the FDA as a food ingredient; it is intended for use as an anti-foaming agent for boiler water.
In its patented manufacturing process, Leprino Foods sprays “cheese granules” with Polymethylsiloxane, resulting in a concentration of the chemical 90 times higher even than is permitted in boiler water.
The Polymethylsiloxane is used to avoid a normal seven-day aging process for cheese, and allows for a higher food starch content. Without the aging process, cheese can form bubbles during cooking, which blacken and burst. A high starch content also normally causes bubbles. Since Polymethylsiloxane is an anti-foaming agent, it prevents the bubbles from forming.
Traces of cancer and psychiatric drugs have been detected in samples of British tap water, according to a report commissioned by the drinking water watchdog group Drinking Water Inspectorate.
Despite extensive purification treatments used by water companies, trace levels of bleomycin, a cancer chemotherapy drug, and diazepam, a sedative, have both been found.
Doctors have expressed concern that exposing pregnant women to these drugs could harm their unborn children, even at the very low levels detected.
Taking antihistamines can help fight off an allergic attack. But there is new research suggesting that it also might make the next attack even stronger.
Researchers studied 50 mice that were injected with bee venom, a substance that causes nearly all organisms to develop an allergy upon exposure. Half of the mice were also given doses of the antihistamine Clemastine.
Six weeks later, the mice were injected with more bee venom. The mice that had been given antihistamines reacted more violently to the second venom injection. The researchers theorized that the mice given allergy medication had no chance to build up a tolerance to the allergen.
enables magnetic control of events at the cellular level. This could lead to finely-tuned but noninvasive treatments for disease.
The method involves using tiny beads, only 30 nanometers in diameter, to bind to receptor molecules on the cells’ surfaces (one nanometer is to a meter as one blueberry is to the diameter of the Earth.) The beads have a crystal geometry that makes them "superparamagnetic" -- able to be magnetized and demagnetized over and over.
When exposed to a magnetic field, the beads pull together, dragging the receptors into large clusters in a manner that mimics the effects of drugs and bodily biochemicals. This clustering activates the receptors, triggering a cascade of biochemical signals that influence different cell functions.
This could lead to non-invasive ways of controlling drug release or physiologic processes such as heart rhythms and muscle contractions.
Doctors in Britain will soon be told to stop prescribing antibiotics for coughs, colds and sore throats. Overuse of the drugs is fuelling the spread of deadly antibiotic-resistant superbugs. A new government program aims to diminish the use of the drugs.
Most colds, coughs and flu are caused by viruses, which cannot be treated with antibiotics anyway.
Overuse of antibiotics has been blamed for the rise of drug-resistant tuberculosis. If antibiotic use is not curbed, doctors could run out of effective treatment for some diseases.
A large European study has found that increased levels of the vitamin C can significantly cut stroke risks.
According to a survey by the University of Chicago, 48 percent of doctors said "they have given at least one treatment when there was no evidence it would work."
One of the most common placebo treatments was the prescription of antibiotics for viral infections that do not respond to antibiotics.
The reasons the doctors gave for their actions included calming a patient down, responding to demands for medication that the doctor felt was unnecessary, or simply trying to do something after all other clinical treatment options had failed.
Ninety-six percent of the physicians surveyed believe that dummy pills can have real therapeutic effects. However, 12 percent thought placebos should be banned completely from regular clinical practice, and 20 percent admitted to outright lying to patients by claiming a placebo was an active medication.
People with low vitamin D levels face an increased risk of heart attack, heart failure and stroke. The danger is particularly acute among those with high blood pressure.
Researchers examined more than 1700 people over a period of 5 years, taking periodic blood samples to gauge vitamin D levels. Those with low levels had a 60 percent higher risk of suffering from a cardiovascular event such as a heart attack, heart failure or stroke.
The risk was doubled among in people with both high blood pressure and vitamin D deficiency.
In new rankings looking at preventable deaths due to treatable conditions in 19 industrialized nations, France, Japan and Australia were rated the best and the United States was rated the worst.
Preventable deaths accounted for 23 percent of overall deaths in men and 32 percent of deaths in women. If the U.S. health care system performed as well as the top three, there would be 101,000 fewer deaths in the U.S. each year.
The large number of Americans who lack any type of health insurance -- about 47 million, according to U.S. government estimates -- was likely a key factor in the U.S.’s poor ranking.
This Austrian article examines criticisms of cell phones by the Vienna Medical Association and other European groups.
Walter Dorner, president of the Vienna Medical Association, has long demanded that cell phones be labeled with their SAR value (SAR is specific absorption rate, or how much of the emitted radiation is absorbed by the user’s head). Thanks in part to his efforts, the European Environment Agency (EEA) has recently warned about the health risks associated with mobile phones, based on what seems to be clear evidence of increased brain tumor risk.
The EEA, however, has also found that mobile phones are being used longer and more frequently by children and adolescents. “Children under the age of 16 should never use a mobile phone,” says Erik Huber, environment advisor of the Vienna Medical Association. For children the health effects are far more serious. because their skull bones are much thinner. Says Huber, “When an 8-year-old child starts using a mobile phone, by the age of 30 or 40 his or her head will be exposed to an unprecedented level of RF radiation stress.”
Huber has argued that a ban on advertising targeted at children and adolescents, low-emission mobile phones, and SAR labeling for mobile phones is called for. “Scientists do not argue anymore whether mobile phones are harmful, but how harmful they are,” adds Huber.
The article also offers the following practical tips for keeping yourself safe:
Nine percent of 199 beverage samples analyzed in a recent study still had benzene levels above the U. S. EPA drinking water limit of 5 parts per billion (ppb).
Many manufacturers have reformulated their products to minimize or eliminate benzene. In these reformulated products, benzene levels were 1.1 ppb or less.
Benzene can form in beverages that contain the preservative benzoate salt and ascorbic acid (vitamin C). Beverages were reformulated in the early 1990’s to avoid benzene formation, but it has recurred in recent years because new manufacturers were unaware of the problem and added vitamin C to drinks.
The health benefits of moderate sun exposure could outweigh any skin cancer risks for people who are deficient in Vitamin D. This is especially true for those who live in colder northern latitudes.
More sun exposure was linked to better survival rates for cancer victims. People in sunnier, southern latitudes were significantly less likely to die from their cancers than those in northern latitudes.
Vitamin D has been called "sunshine vitamin" because it is produced when skin is hit by ultraviolet rays. It has been shown to have a powerful protective effect against cancer.
A prominent UK medical journal has argued that since many manufacturers remove the healthy element of dark chocolate during processing, it is actually much less healthy than some advertising seeks to imply. While the chocolate industry has never denied that processing removes nutrients from cocoa, The Lancet states that consumers are often misled about how healthy a chocolate product is.
