David Michael Green - Deep Maladies of the Body Politic

So.

It looks now like the regressive majority on the Supreme Court is poised to overturn Barack Obama’s signature legislative achievement, his health care bill.

That is so fitting.

More than that, it is also a reminder of just how sick this country truly is.  Imagine that the lab returned the results from your battery of blood work tests, and all the indicators were screaming out  “Danger!” and “Broken!”.  That’s us, baby.  Get this patient to the ER!

What a total disaster.

The first indicator of how unhealthy we are as a country – literally and figuratively – is the fact that we still don’t have universal health care here in the wealthiest place on Earth.  It’s been more than century since the welfare state – a system in which the national government assumes responsibility, as an agent of the national will, for guaranteeing certain benefits and protections to its citizenry – was invented, and, unlike every other developed country in the world, the richest one still doesn’t come close to having universal care for our public, including millions of children.  It’s a crime – there’s no other word for it – of astonishing proportions .  But it gets worse.  We pay more than half-again per capita above the cost of the next most expensive system in the world, and still one-sixth of our population remains completely uninsured, with many more poorly insured.  Nice.

Read More:

http://www.counterpunch.org/2012/04/02/a-very-sick-country/

ADHD is over-diagnosed

What experts and the public have already long suspected is now supported by representative data collected by researchers at Ruhr-Universität Bochum (RUB) and University of Basel: ADHD, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, is over-diagnosed. The study showed that child and adolescent psychotherapists and psychiatrists tend to give a diagnosis based on heuristics, unclear rules of thumb, rather than adhering to recognized diagnostic criteria. Boys in particular are substantially more often misdiagnosed compared to girls. These are the most important results of a study conducted by Prof. Dr. Silvia Schneider and Prof. Dr. Jürgen Margraf (both from RUB) and Dr. Katrin Bruchmüller (University of Basel) as reported in the American periodical "Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology".

Leon has ADHD, Lea doesn't

Read More:

http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2012-03/rb-aio033012.php

The link between fast food and depression has been confirmed

According to a recent study headed by scientists from the University of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria and the University of Granada, eating commercial baked goods (fairy cakes, croissants, doughnuts, etc.) and fast food (hamburgers, hotdogs and pizza) is linked to depression.

Published in the Public Health Nutrition journal, the results reveal that consumers of fast food, compared to those who eat little or none, are 51% more likely to develop depression.

Furthermore, a dose-response relationship was observed. In other words this means that "the more fast food you consume, the greater the risk of depression," explains Almudena Sánchez-Villegas, lead author of the study, to SINC.

The study demonstrates that those participants who eat the most fast food and commercial baked goods are more likely to be single, less active and have poor dietary habits, which include eating less fruit, nuts, fish, vegetables and olive oil. Smoking and working more than 45 hours per week are other prevalent characteristics of this group.

A long-term study

Read More:

http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2012-03/f-sf-tlb033012.php

Chip Ward - We Screwed Up

[Note: I became politically active and committed on the day 20 years ago when I realized I could stand on the front porch of my house and point to three homes where children were in wheelchairs, to a home where a child had just died of leukemia, to another where a child was born missing a kidney, and yet another where a child suffered from spina bifida.  All my parental alarms went off at once and I asked the obvious question: What’s going on here?  Did I inadvertently move my three children into harm’s way when we settled in this high desert valley in Utah?  A quest to find answers in Utah’s nuclear history and then seek solutions followed.  Politics for me was never motivated by ideology.  It was always about parenting.

Today my three kids are, thankfully, healthy adults.  But now that grandchildren are being added to our family, my blood runs cold whenever I project out 50 years and imagine what their world will be like at middle age -- assuming they get that far and that there is still a recognizable “world” to be part of.  I wrote the following letter to my granddaughter, Madeline, who is almost four years old.  Although she cannot read it today, I hope she will read it in a future that proves so much better than the one that is probable, and so terribly unfair.  I’m sharing this letter with other parents and grandparents in the hope that it may move them to embrace their roles as citizens and commit to the hard work of making the planet viable, the economy equitable, and our culture democratic for the many Madelines to come.]

Read More:

http://www.tomdispatch.com/blog/175521/

Can Fluoride Calcify Your Arteries?

New research reveals a startling new finding: fluoride is likely contributing to the epidemic of cardiovascular disease by stimulating calcification of the vascular system, including the coronary arteries.

In a study published in the journal Nuclear Medicine Communications this month (Jan. 2012), researchers assessed fluoride uptake and calcification in the major arteries of 61 patients who were administered sodium fluoride, the active ingredient in most fluoridated toothpastes. The study revealed:

"The coronary fluoride uptake value in patients with cardiovascular events was significantly higher than in patients without cardiovascular events." They also found that there was a signification correlation between fluoride uptake and calcification observed in most of the arterial walls, indicating that the fluoride itself likely stimulates the precipitation of calcium within the arteries.

It is already well-known that vascular calcification is highly correlated with cardiovascular disease mortality. The hardening of the arteries associated with atherosclerosis is in part due to the calcification of plaque which subsequently becomes brittle and susceptible to breaking off into an artery-obstructing clot.

Read More:

http://greenmedinfo.com/blog/can-fluoride-calcify-your-arteries

Anne Gordon - Morgellons Disease, The Mysterious Skin Disease

Why would tens of thousands suffer from odd symptoms of fibers, and worm like debris sprouting from skin sores, and other symptoms, without knowing the cause? Unexplained constellations of symptoms from general fatigue, concentration difficulties, fibromyalgia, neurocognitive disorders, and skin lesions seem are continuously reported. This disturbing trend prompted a research project.

Researchers, from the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) in combination with Kaiser Permanente Health System in Northern California studied the accelerating numbers of cases between 2006 and 2008. After $360,000, and 115 people studied, Morgellons is still described as ‘unexplained dermopathy’.

It is also strange that the largest clusters of cases appear to be in regions of California, Texas, and Florida, although all 50 states have experienced complaints, according to: (http://www.healthsciences.okstate.edu/morgellons/index.cfm)

Read More:

http://www.greenmedinfo.com/blog/morgellons-disease-mysterious-skin-disease?utm_source=www.GreenMedInfo.com&utm_campaign=380abfb4cd-Greenmedinfo&utm_medium=email

Dietary cadmium may be linked with breast cancer risk

Dietary cadmium, a toxic metal widely dispersed in the environment and found in many farm fertilizers, may lead to an increased risk of breast cancer, according to a study published in Cancer Research, a journal of the American Association for Cancer Research.

Cadmium occurs at low concentrations naturally, but scientists are concerned because contamination of farmland mainly due to atmospheric deposition and use of fertilizers leads to higher uptake in plants.

"Because of a high accumulation in agricultural crops, the main sources of dietary cadmium are bread and other cereals, potatoes, root crops and vegetables," said Agneta Åkesson, Ph.D., associate professor at Karolinska Institutet in Sweden. "In general, these foods are also considered healthy."

Read More:

http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2012-03/aafc-dcm030712.php

Kathy Freston - Does Meat Kill More Americans Than Cigarettes Do?

For many years, tobacco companies were able to maintain a strong pro-tobacco façade. Smoking focuses the mind. It's good for you (doctors smoke!). It's great for weight loss. It's sexy. It's cool. The tobacco industry spent big bucks to keep these ideas in the mind of the public for as long as it could.

And for many years after the lethal effects were universally known and undeniable, some of our nation's smartest and most successful businessmen continued to believe, because it was in their interest to believe, that "nicotine is not addictive." (Watch the seven most powerful tobacco executives of 1994 make exactly that statement, under oath, to Congress -- not even two decades ago.)

I was reminded of how far tobacco has fallen reading the New York Times magazine interview with perhaps the most successful screenplay writer in history, Joe Eszterhas, who has lost 80 percent of his larynx to tobacco, and has apologized for his glamorization of smoking in such films as  Basic Instinct.

Read More:

http://www.alternet.org/story/154532/does_meat_kill_more_americans_than_cigarettes_do

No Antibodies Required For Immunity Against Some Viruses

A new study turns the well established theory that antibodies are required for antiviral immunity upside down and reveals that an unexpected partnership between the specific and non-specific divisions of the immune system is critical for fighting some types of viral infections. The research, published online in the journal Immunity by Cell Press, may lead to a new understanding of the best way to help protect those exposed to potentially lethal viruses, such as the rabies virus. 

The immune system has two main branches, innate immunity and adaptive immunity. Innate immunity is a first line of defense that relies on cells and mechanisms that provide non-specific immunity. The more sophisticated adaptive immunity, which counts antibody-producing B cells as part of its arsenal, is thought to play a major role in the specific response to viral infections in mammals. However, adaptive immune responses require time to become fully mobilized. 

"Mice infected with vesicular stomatitis virus (VSV) can suffer fatal invasion of the central nervous system even when they have a high concentration of anti-VSV antibodies in their system," explains senior study author, Dr. Ulrich H. von Andrian, from Harvard Medical School. "This observation led us to revisit the contribution of adaptive immune responses to survival following VSV infection." 

Read More:

http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/releases/242403.php

BPA Could Affect Reproductive Capabilities, Cause Infection of the Uterus

Researchers at the University of Cincinnati have found evidence that, in addition to affecting the heart, brain and nervous system, bisphenol A (BPA), could affect a mammal’s ability to reproduce by altering the structure of the uterus in ways that can progress to a potentially fatal infection.

These findings are published in March 9, 2012, advance online edition of the Journal of Reproductive Toxicology.

Infection and inflammation of the uterus, or pyometra, is most commonly seen in animals like dogs and cats but can also affect humans. It is a result of hormonal and structural changes in the uterus lining and can be deadly if left untreated.

Read More:

http://www.healthnews.uc.edu/news/?/15611/