Were we surprised or even disappointed that the California EPA just ruled that the plastic hardener bisphenol-A (BPA) would be subject to warning labels according to their Prop 65 law, or that the Natural Resources Defense Council would be jumping with joy over it?
Not really given the chemophobia of both of those groups, the surprise is that it took Cal-EPA this long; and that the NRDC is so happy about it is as surprising as the sun rising in the east.
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Britain s senior medical advisor is warning about the rise of antibiotic-resistant bacteria, describing what she calls an "apocalyptic scenario" where, in 20 years time, people going to the hospital for a simple operation die of infections because we have run out of antibiotics.
A few weeks ago, we covered a story about how obesity rates are actually declining among children in New York and California. Now we might have an explanation. A new federal analysis found that American children consumed fewer calories in 2010 than they did a decade before. And although obesity rates have remained flat in many other places, this may an indication of changes to come in the future.
The Super Bowl is over but the NFL and General Electric are just getting started with a four-year partnership to better detect and study concussions, which have been found to lead to brain injuries that accumulate over time and cause depression and dementia all too often.
Emergency contraception isn t a secret anymore. An estimated 11 percent of sexually active girls and women aged 15 to 44 have used the morning-after pill at least once, a new federal report says.
That comes to 5.8 million women, about half of whom said they used the pill because they had unprotected sex. The other half worried that their birth control method had failed.
In other public health news, the CDC s Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, has shown an incredible decline in motor vehicle fatalities among persons aged 15-24 years.
Well, Mayor Bloomberg is at it again. As we have recently learned, along with his ban on big sodas taking effect in March eateries are also to be prohibited from serving or selling sugary drinks in containers larger than 16 ounces.
What does that mean? No more 2-liter sodas with your pizza delivery, pitchers of soft drinks at your kid s birthday party and some bottle-service mixers at your favorite nightclub.
Atrial fibrillation (AF), which is the most common arrhythmia and an independent risk factor for ischemic stroke, is independently associated with increased mortality. Furthermore, nonvalvular AF (that is, AF that doesn t stem from a problem with heart valves) is associated with a nearly five-fold higher risk of ischemic stroke, a risk that progressively increases with age.
A new study links caffeine consumption by pregnant women with reduced birth weight in their offspring. For each 100 milligrams of caffeine consumed daily, as recorded in daily food diaries, the newborn on average had a birth weight between three quarters to an ounce lower than women who ingested no caffeine. (A 16 oz. cup of Starbucks Pike Place Roast has 330 mgs of caffeine, according to Starbucks website).
Metastatic breast cancer which has already spread on initial presentation was found to have increased slightly among young women, ages 25 to 39, a 34-year analysis suggests. More research is needed to verify the finding, and scientists are not sure what may have caused the apparent increase.
A little over a month ago, we reported a swine flu vaccine scare suggesting a link with narcolepsy in children. The scare cited 795 reported narcolepsy cases in 30 million vaccine recipients, to which ACSH s Dr. Gilbert Ross said Incidence of narcolepsy in the general population is estimated to be between 200-500 cases per million. Meaning that the incidence of narcolepsy in vaccine recipients appears to be less than the general population.
Home blood pressure monitoring programs demonstrated superiority to usual care for keeping hypertension in check, a randomized controlled trial found.
Led by Dr. David Magid from Kaiser Permanente Colorado, a team of researchers followed 348 hypertensive patients, half of whom used the American Heart Association s Heart 360 Program a free, online tool for tracking heart health. Users can upload blood pressure data from their home blood pressure machines and send it to their health care providers.
U.S. life expectancy at birth is among the lowest of all high-income countries. While analysis of the reasons for this unpleasant reality are complex, one example of the recent research into possible explanations showed that the lower life expectancy was largely due to premature deaths of those age 50 and younger compared to their counterparts in other industrialized nations.
We don t often agree with The New York Times editorial board but they were spot-on Friday with an editorial questioning why genetically engineered food should be labeled.
We would like to acknowledge McGill s Dr. Joe Schwarcz for his recent column The Funny Business of Selling Water, in which he discusses the Molecule Café in New York City s Greenwich Village.
Two Canadian researchers are arguing against mandatory flu shots for health care workers, saying the vaccine isn t effective enough to merit such a mandate.
Drs. Michael Gardam and Camille Lemieux of the Infection Prevention and Control Unit at Toronto s University Health say a review of recent literature shows the flu shot is only around 60 percent effective in healthy adults.
Researchers involved in a vast, international study of potential genetic cancer markers have found risk markers for breast, ovarian and prostate cancer before, but this new analysis doubles the known list of markers, one expert says.
Vaping is catching on. The number of American smokers who have tried e-cigarettes doubled in just a year, from 10 percent in 2010 to about 21 percent in 2011, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says.
Among former smokers, the number grew from 2.5 percent to 7.4 percent, according to the report in the journal Nicotine & Tobacco Research.
E-cigarette use is growing rapidly, says CDC Director Thomas Frieden. There is still a lot we don t know about these products, including whether they will decrease or increase use of traditional cigarettes.
Thinking about quitting smoking? You can t use I might gain weight as an excuse, according to a new study.
Recent quitters do tend to gain weight, but even if they put on a few extra pounds, they still have a lower chance of suffering a heart attack or stroke than they would have if they continued to smoke.
Counterfeit medicine isn t just a problem in America. In Nigeria, two medical practitioners are asking a regulatory agency to check on the importation of fake anti-malaria drugs into the country. They say that more than two-thirds of malaria drugs in the country are fake or substandard.
There s depressing news about aging in America. As many as 1 in 3 seniors die with Alzheimer s disease or other forms of dementia, according to a new report from the Alzheimer s Association.
Former ACSH trustee Betsy McCaughey has an important message for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention: Stop playing politics with infection control. McCaughey, founder of the Committee to Reduce Infection Deaths and the former lieutenant governor of New York, says the CDC s current infection guidelines are no match for CRE, the so-called nightmare bacteria that s raging through hospitals, killing up to half of all patients it infects.
In the "nothing new under the sun" department, Bendectin - now called Diclegis - a drug that was long ago used to treat morning sickness, is going back on pharmacy shelves after a 30 year absence.
Along with the increased prevalence of obesity, Americans have seen a coincident surge in the incidence of type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM). While there are numerous pharmaceutical treatments available, weight loss is seen as perhaps the most effective means of both preventing and treating the condition. As anyone who has tried to shed even a few pounds knows well, substantial weight loss is often difficult to attain and maintain.
If there is one area that has been clouded by confusion in recent years, it is the detection and treatment of prostate cancer.
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