Diet Soda Now Linked to Heart Disease?????

Eating two or more servings a day of red meat increases your risk of metabolic syndrome by 25 percent, compared to those who have two servings of red meat each week, a new study found.

Drinking diet soda also increased the risk of metabolic syndrome.

Metabolic syndrome is a cluster of risk factors such as excessive fat around your waist, high cholesterol, high blood sugar and high blood pressure, all of which can raise your risk of heart disease and diabetes.

The researchers examined the diets of over 9,500 people between the ages of 45 and 64. They were categorized into two groups: a “western-pattern diet” that included processed meat, fried foods and red meat, or a “prudent-pattern diet” that included more fruits and vegetables, poultry and fish.

They concluded that lots of meat, fried foods and diet soda increase your risk of heart disease.

Sources:

• Reuters January 22, 2008

Vaccine Companies Investigated For Murder!

A formal investigation has been launched by French authorities against two managers from drug companies GlaxoSmithKline and Sanofi Pasteur. A second investigation for manslaughter has also been opened against Sanofi Pasteur MSD.

The investigations are in response to allegations that the companies failed to fully disclose side effects from an anti-hepatitis B drug used between 1994 and 1998.

During this time, close to two-thirds of the French population, and almost all newborn babies, received a hepatitis B vaccine. The vaccination campaign was halted after concerns rose over the shot’s side effects.

Thirty plaintiffs, including the families of five people who died after the vaccination, have launched a civil action in the case against the drug companies.

Sources:

• Reuters February 1, 2008

Urinary tract infections may come from pets

By David Douglas

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Picking up an E. coli bug from your pet might lead to a urinary tract infection, according to Minneapolis-based researchers.

"Sharing of E. coli strains among humans and pets within a household, including strains that can cause urinary tract infections, is extremely common," Dr. James R. Johnson told Reuters Health.

Harboring the same strain of the bug implies that it is passed from one person or animal to another.

Read More...........

Blood Red Beet Juice Brings Down Blood Pressure

by Patrick Totty

According to British researchers at Barts and the London School of Medicine, drinking 500 ml (about one pint) of beetroot juice every day can significantly reduce blood pressure. It's the nitrate contained in the juice that produces the effect.

Bacteria in saliva convert the nitrate into nitrite, which either circulates throughout the body or is converted into nitric acid in the stomach. In either case, the chemical lowers blood pressure.

The effects of the beetroot juice become evident about one hour after ingestion and peak in three or four hours. Researchers noted that in some cases the effect lasts up to 24 hours.

Interestingly, nitrate is also found in leafy green vegetables. Scientists had previously concluded that it was the anti-oxidant vitamins in those vegetables that made them valuable components of a healthy diet. Now it turns out that their nitrate content may be even more important.

The researchers say that their findings may offer a simple, inexpensive way for people worldwide to control their high blood pressure.

 

source: http://www.diabeteshealth.com

Cinnamon does not control blood sugar or fat levels

By Megan Rauscher

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Cinnamon does not appear to have any impact on blood sugar or cholesterol levels in people with diabetes, Connecticut-based researchers report in the journal Diabetes Care.

"The preponderance of evidence currently available does not suggest that cinnamon has the ability to decrease a person's risk of heart disease by helping them control their diabetes or lower their cholesterol," Dr. Craig I. Coleman, of Hartford Hospital, who was the principal investigator, told Reuters Health.

Several studies have looked at the impact of cinnamon on blood sugar and lipids (fats) in patients with diabetes but had only modest sample sizes and yielded mixed results, Coleman and colleagues note in their report.

This led them to perform a large review, or "meta-analysis," of five studies in which a total of 282 type 1 or type 2 diabetic patients were randomly assigned to receive cinnamon or a placebo and were followed for up to 16 weeks.

All five studies used cinnamon cassia, "the same cinnamon most people have in their spice racks at home," Coleman noted. Doses ranged from 1 to 6 grams daily.

As mentioned, the use of cinnamon did not significantly alter hemoglobin A1C -- a marker of blood sugar control.  It also had no effect on fasting blood sugar levels or lipid parameters.  Analyses by subgroup and sensitivity did not appreciably alter these results.

Coleman told Reuters Health that the inspiration for conducting this specific analysis came from one of his research fellows, Dr. William Baker.  "He works in a chain pharmacy as a pharmacist, now and then, and he was asked by a patient whether cinnamon was useful in treating diabetes."

"As pharmacists,we want to be able to provide patients ... with the best information about these over-the-counter treatments, which are often readily available but under researched," Coleman said.  Based on the current study, "we would not recommend its use to patients," he said.

E COLI Threat Could Be Biggest Killer!

The E.coli bug is becoming resistant to drugs and could be as big a problem as the superbug MRSA, scientists have warned.

E.coli bacteria can cause food poisoning. It can also be responsible for some urinary tract infections and stomach bugs.

Scientists have discovered that the bug is changing and increasingly becoming resistant to antibiotics.

Study links protracted cellphone use with tumors

Tumors of the parotid (salivary) glands are significantly more common in people who use cellular phones over a relatively long period, according to a retrospective study of nearly 500 Israelis who contracted such benign or malignant growths compared to more than twice as many healthy controls. This is reportedly the first study of the possible effects of cellphone use by Israelis, who are known to utilize them for many minutes per day and start at young ages.

Illustration.
Photo: Bloomberg [file]

The study, led by Sheba Medical Center physician and Tel Aviv University epidemiologist Dr. Siegal Sadetzki, was announced late last week on the Web site Science Daily (www.sciencedaily.com) and published recently in the American Journal of Epidemiology.

Sadetzki, who has appeared several times at Knesset committees about the possible risk of cellular phone usage, said that while the results needed to be confirmed by additional and longer studies, in the meantime precautions should be taken. These include limiting the use of cellphones by children and both kids and adults using earphones and other means to distance the cellphone from the head whenever possible.

She conducted her study as part of the international Interphone Study, which aimed to discover if cellphone use and several kinds of brain and salivary gland tumors were linked.

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Beef Industry Responds to Secret Video

Cattle Industry Denounces Mistreatment of Sick Animals; Says Nearly All US Cattle Treated Well DENVER (AP) -- Despite a secretly taped video showing workers at a Southern California slaughterhouse abusing sick or crippled animals, nearly all cattle bound for American dinner tables are treated humanely, a cattle industry spokesman said Monday.

Top psychiatrist concludes liberals clinically nuts

WASHINGTON – Just when liberals thought it was safe to start identifying themselves as such, an acclaimed, veteran psychiatrist is making the case that the ideology motivating them is actually a mental disorder. "Based on strikingly irrational beliefs and emotions, modern liberals relentlessly undermine the most important principles on which our freedoms were founded," says Dr. Lyle Rossiter, author of the new book, "The Liberal Mind: The Psychological Causes of Political Madness." "Like spoiled, angry children, they rebel against the normal responsibilities of adulthood and demand that a parental government meet their needs from cradle to grave."

An American Medical Study that you have to Learn about From Europe! WHY???

For decades, researchers believed that if people with diabetes lowered their blood sugar to normal levels, they would no longer be at high risk of dying from heart disease. But a major U.S. study of more than 10,000 middle-aged and older people with Type 2 diabetes has found that lowering blood sugar actually increased their risk of death, researchers reported. The researchers announced that they were abruptly halting that part of the study, whose surprising results call into question how the disease, which affects 21 million Americans alone, should be managed.