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A major cause of increasing obesity is certainly the campaign against it -- as dieting usually makes people FATTER. If there were any sincerity to the obesity warriors, they would ban all diet advertising and otherwise shut up about it. Re-authorizing now-banned school playground activities and school outings would help too. But it is so much easier to blame obesity on the evil "multinationals" than it is to blame it on your own restrictions on the natural activities of kids

NOTE: "No trial has ever demonstrated benefits from reducing dietary saturated fat".

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30 June, 2007

HRT CREEPING BACK INTO FAVOUR

The article below is very direct evidence of the benefits of estrogen therapy -- and estrogen is of course at least a major component of HRT. It shows that taking estrogen reduces calcification in your arteries quite a lot. And they've got the pictures to prove it! So does that mean that HRT has been officially rehabilitated as helpful with circulatory problems? It does but it would be too embarrassing to admit it straight out after the scare stories of recent years. So the authors note that estrogen has many other effects -- implying that there are "other risks" (e.g. stroke) with HRT. They caution, in other words that it may do harm as well as good. The evidence for the "other risks" is, however, as far as I can tell, almost wholly epidemiological -- which translates as "speculative". So I think that the direct evidence of improvement in the heart's circulatory system recorded below DOES warrant use of estrogen in women with circulatory or cardiac problems

Estrogen Therapy and Coronary-Artery Calcification

By JoAnn E. Manson et al.

ABSTRACT

Background: Calcified plaque in the coronary arteries is a marker for atheromatous-plaque burden and is predictive of future risk of cardiovascular events. We examined the relationship between estrogen therapy and coronary-artery calcium in the context of a randomized clinical trial.

Methods: In our ancillary substudy of the Women's Health Initiative trial of conjugated equine estrogens (0.625 mg per day) as compared with placebo in women who had undergone hysterectomy, we performed computed tomography of the heart in 1064 women aged 50 to 59 years at randomization. Imaging was conducted at 28 of 40 centers after a mean of 7.4 years of treatment and 1.3 years after the trial was completed (8.7 years after randomization). Coronary-artery calcium (or Agatston) scores were measured at a central reading center without knowledge of randomization status.

Results: The mean coronary-artery calcium score after trial completion was lower among women receiving estrogen (83.1) than among those receiving placebo (123.1) (P=0.02 by rank test). After adjustment for coronary risk factors, the multivariate odds ratios for coronary-artery calcium scores of more than 0, 10 or more, and 100 or more in the group receiving estrogen as compared with placebo were 0.78 (95% confidence interval, 0.58 to 1.04), 0.74 (0.55 to 0.99), and 0.69 (0.48 to 0.98), respectively. The corresponding odds ratios among women with at least 80% adherence to the study estrogen or placebo were 0.64 (P=0.01), 0.55 (P<0.001), and 0.46 (P=0.001). For coronary-artery calcium scores of more than 300 (vs. <10), the multivariate odds ratio was 0.58 (P=0.03) in an intention-to-treat analysis and 0.39 (P=0.004) among women with at least 80% adherence.

Conclusions: Among women 50 to 59 years old at enrollment, the calcified-plaque burden in the coronary arteries after trial completion was lower in women assigned to estrogen than in those assigned to placebo. However, estrogen has complex biologic effects and may influence the risk of cardiovascular events and other outcomes through multiple pathways.

NEJM, 2007, Volume 356:2591-2602




IQ AND BIRTH ORDER

The article Explaining the Relation Between Birth Order and Intelligence by Petter Kristensen and Tor Bjerkedal (appearing in the journal "Science") seems to have got quite an amazing amount of press so I thought I should say a few words about it. I did not make any comment initially because I thought that it raised no new issues and was not in any way surprising.

To recap briefly, the authors did some very clever statistics on data from Norwegian army recruits which show pretty clearly that being a firstborn raises your IQ by a few points.

I think the reason the article has got such a lot of attention is that the political Left seizes on environmental causes of intelligence like a thirsty man in a desert. All the evidence is of an overwhelming genetic influence on IQ so anything that appears to "undermine" that will be highlighted -- given the traditional but vastly counterfactual Leftist belief in the infinite plasticity of human characteristics.

But the Norwegian findings don't in fact undermine anything. Although IQ is one of the human attributes that is most strongly influenced by genes, nobody has ever claimed that genes alone do the trick. It has always been known and asserted that environmental factors have a subsidiary role -- and stimulation in early childhood has long been agreed to be one of those subsidiary factors.

And firstborns get more attention and hence most stimulation. So a small advantage from being a firstborn was always to be expected.

Perhaps the most amusing part of the coverage given to the findings is the way that old scientific fraud, Frank Sulloway, has managed to insert himself into the discussion. Sulloway is a great advocate of birth order as an influence on human behaviour so I suppose it had to happen but Sulloway's own theory is that birth order determines your politics and, among social scientists, I think it is only the credulous who believe that these days. Sulloway's sustained attempts to block publication of evidence contradicting his theory probably tell you all you need to know about that.

Just a footnote: Did you know that your politics are even more heavily determined by your genetics than is how tall you are? Some people (Leftists) are just born crybabies. See Eaves, L.J., Martin, N.G., Meyer, J.M. & Corey, L.A. (1999) Biological and cultural inheritance of stature and attitudes. In: Cloninger, C.R., Personality and psychopathology. Washington, D.C.: American Psychiatric Press. Pesky things, those genes!

****************

Just some problems with the "Obesity" war:

1). It tries to impose behavior change on everybody -- when most of those targeted are not obese and hence have no reason to change their behaviour. It is a form of punishing the innocent and the guilty alike. (It is also typical of Leftist thinking: Scorning the individual and capable of dealing with large groups only).

2). The longevity research all leads to the conclusion that it is people of MIDDLING weight who live longest -- not slim people. So the "epidemic" of obesity is in fact largely an "epidemic" of living longer.

3). It is total calorie intake that makes you fat -- not where you get your calories. Policies that attack only the source of the calories (e.g. "junk food") without addressing total calorie intake are hence pissing into the wind. People involuntarily deprived of their preferred calorie intake from one source are highly likely to seek and find their calories elsewhere.

4). So-called junk food is perfectly nutritious. A big Mac meal comprises meat, bread, salad and potatoes -- which is a mainstream Western diet. If that is bad then we are all in big trouble.

5). Food warriors demonize salt and fat. But we need a daily salt intake to counter salt-loss through perspiration and the research shows that people on salt-restricted diets die SOONER. And Eskimos eat huge amounts of fat with no apparent ill-effects. And the average home-cooked roast dinner has LOTS of fat. Will we ban roast dinners?

6). The foods restricted are often no more calorific than those permitted -- such as milk and fruit-juice drinks.

7). Tendency to weight is mostly genetic and is therefore not readily susceptible to voluntary behaviour change.

8). And when are we going to ban cheese? Cheese is a concentrated calorie bomb and has lots of that wicked animal fat in it too. Wouldn't we all be better off without it? And what about butter and margarine? They are just about pure fat. Surely they should be treated as contraband in kids' lunchboxes! [/sarcasm].

Trans fats:

For one summary of the weak science behind the "trans-fat" hysteria, see here. Trans fats have only a temporary effect on blood chemistry and the evidence of lasting harm from them is dubious. By taking extreme groups in trans fats intake, some weak association with coronary heart disease has at times been shown in some sub-populations but extreme group studies are inherently at risk of confounding with other factors and are intrinsically of little interest to the average person.

The use of extreme quintiles (fifths) to examine effects is in fact so common as to be almost universal but suggests to the experienced observer that the differences between the mean scores of the experimental and control groups were not statistically significant -- thus making the article concerned little more than an exercise in deception

*********************



29 June, 2007

DO MILD DIABETIC SYMPTOMS GIVE YOU HEART ATTACKS?

Since diabetes is a seriously life threatening disorder, it is reasonable enough to expect that those who have only a mild form of it might die sooner too -- but I am not convinced that the study below shows that. We are informed that 65% of the deaths from heart attacks in their sample (218 out of 298 people) were diabetics of all sorts -- including those with only some symptoms of diabetes. But the major group within those deaths would have been those with fully-blown diabetes, leaving very small numbers for those with only some symptoms of diabetes -- numbers that seem too small to permit much in the way of generalizations.

And the results found were rather contradictory anyway. It was found that those with "impaired fasting glucose" were more likely to die of heart disease but those with "impaired glucose tolerance" were not. So pick whichever one of those you like to conclude that pre-diabetic symptoms are or are not likely to lead to a heart attack! The conclusions of the paper are certainly more sweeeping and confident than the small numbers plus that inconsistency in results would warrant. Just another silly epidemiological study, I am afraid. If I had any pre-diabetic symptoms, I would certainly not let that study add to my worries. Fortunately, when I did have a glucose tolerance test a few years ago, my body was very well-behaved about it

Risk of Cardiovascular and All-Cause Mortality in Individuals With Diabetes Mellitus, Impaired Fasting Glucose, and Impaired Glucose Tolerance. The Australian Diabetes, Obesity, and Lifestyle Study (AusDiab)

Elizabeth L.M. Barr et al.

Background--Diabetes mellitus increases the risk of cardiovascular disease (CVD) and all-cause mortality. The relationship between milder elevations of blood glucose and mortality is less clear. This study investigated whether impaired fasting glucose and impaired glucose tolerance, as well as diabetes mellitus, increase the risk of all-cause and CVD mortality.

Methods and Results--In 1999 to 2000, glucose tolerance status was determined in 10 428 participants of the Australian Diabetes, Obesity, and Lifestyle Study (AusDiab). After a median follow-up of 5.2 years, 298 deaths occurred (88 CVD deaths). Compared with those with normal glucose tolerance, the adjusted all-cause mortality hazard ratios (HRs) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs) for known diabetes mellitus and newly diagnosed diabetes mellitus were 2.3 (1.6 to 3.2) and 1.3 (0.9 to 2.0), respectively. The risk of death was also increased in those with impaired fasting glucose (HR 1.6, 95% CI 1.0 to 2.4) and impaired glucose tolerance (HR 1.5, 95% CI 1.1 to 2.0). Sixty-five percent of all those who died of CVD had known diabetes mellitus, newly diagnosed diabetes mellitus, impaired fasting glucose, or impaired glucose tolerance at baseline. Known diabetes mellitus (HR 2.6, 95% CI 1.4 to 4.7) and impaired fasting glucose (HR 2.5, 95% CI 1.2 to 5.1) were independent predictors for CVD mortality after adjustment for age, sex, and other traditional CVD risk factors, but impaired glucose tolerance was not (HR 1.2, 95% CI 0.7 to 2.2).

Conclusions--This study emphasizes the strong association between abnormal glucose metabolism and mortality, and it suggests that this condition contributes to a large number of CVD deaths in the general population. CVD prevention may be warranted in people with all categories of abnormal glucose metabolism.

Circulation 2007, June 18, 2007




The perks and pitfalls of pride

Pride has perplexed philosophers and theologians for centuries, and it is a paradoxical emotion. Pride based on personal excellence is encouraged, but too much pride can easily tip the balance toward vanity, haughtiness and selflove. Scientists have also been perplexed by this complex emotion, because it is so unlike socalled primary emotions, those felt as a first response to a situation, like fear and disgust.

Psychologists have been exploring pride's origins and purpose, and whether pride is as universal as, say, joy or anger.

In the June issue of the research journal Current Directions in Psychological Science, Jessica Tracy of the University of British Columbia in Vancouver and Richard Robins of the University of California, Davis review several recent studies on the nature and function of pride.

In one experiment, researchers used photographs of models with varying facial expressions and body language, asking subjects to identify the nonverbal signs of pride.

They found what they called a prototypic prideful look, which was recognized by children as young as four and people of many different cultures, including members of an isolated, preliterate tribe in Burkina Faso, West Africa.

So pride seems to be universal, they said, but that still leaves the questions: What is it? What is its purpose? To explore this, Tracy and Robins first asked people to come up with words that they associated with pride. They found that either people link pride to such achievementoriented ideas as accomplishment and confidence"authentic" pride -- or to self-aggrandizement, arrogance and conceit -- "hubristic" pride.

People who tend to feel authentic pride were more likely to score high on tests of extroversion, agreeablen, genuine selfesteem and conscientiousness, the pair found; but people who tend to feel hubristic pride were narcissistic and prone to shame. Further, they found that people who felt positive, achievementoriented feelings of pride viewed hard work as the key to success in life, whereas hubristic people tended to view success as predetermined, due to their stable abilities.

Tracy and Robins argue that the primitive precursors of pride probably motivated our ancestors to act in altruistic and communitarian ways, for the good of the tribe. The physical display of pride both reinforced such behavior and signaled to the group that this person was worthy of respect. So individual pride, at least the good kind, contributed in important ways to the survival of the community.

But what about pride's dark side? Tracy and Robins speculate that hubris might have been a social "short cut," a way of tricking others into paying respect when it was not warranted. Those who could not earn respect the oldfashioned way figured out how to look and act accomplished in order to gain status. Social cheaters puffed themselves up because deep down they did not have what it took to succeed. Whatever respect they got would have been fleeting, of course, as it is today.

Source

****************

Just some problems with the "Obesity" war:

1). It tries to impose behavior change on everybody -- when most of those targeted are not obese and hence have no reason to change their behaviour. It is a form of punishing the innocent and the guilty alike. (It is also typical of Leftist thinking: Scorning the individual and capable of dealing with large groups only).

2). The longevity research all leads to the conclusion that it is people of MIDDLING weight who live longest -- not slim people. So the "epidemic" of obesity is in fact largely an "epidemic" of living longer.

3). It is total calorie intake that makes you fat -- not where you get your calories. Policies that attack only the source of the calories (e.g. "junk food") without addressing total calorie intake are hence pissing into the wind. People involuntarily deprived of their preferred calorie intake from one source are highly likely to seek and find their calories elsewhere.

4). So-called junk food is perfectly nutritious. A big Mac meal comprises meat, bread, salad and potatoes -- which is a mainstream Western diet. If that is bad then we are all in big trouble.

5). Food warriors demonize salt and fat. But we need a daily salt intake to counter salt-loss through perspiration and the research shows that people on salt-restricted diets die SOONER. And Eskimos eat huge amounts of fat with no apparent ill-effects. And the average home-cooked roast dinner has LOTS of fat. Will we ban roast dinners?

6). The foods restricted are often no more calorific than those permitted -- such as milk and fruit-juice drinks.

7). Tendency to weight is mostly genetic and is therefore not readily susceptible to voluntary behaviour change.

8). And when are we going to ban cheese? Cheese is a concentrated calorie bomb and has lots of that wicked animal fat in it too. Wouldn't we all be better off without it? And what about butter and margarine? They are just about pure fat. Surely they should be treated as contraband in kids' lunchboxes! [/sarcasm].

Trans fats:

For one summary of the weak science behind the "trans-fat" hysteria, see here. Trans fats have only a temporary effect on blood chemistry and the evidence of lasting harm from them is dubious. By taking extreme groups in trans fats intake, some weak association with coronary heart disease has at times been shown in some sub-populations but extreme group studies are inherently at risk of confounding with other factors and are intrinsically of little interest to the average person.

The use of extreme quintiles (fifths) to examine effects is in fact so common as to be almost universal but suggests to the experienced observer that the differences between the mean scores of the experimental and control groups were not statistically significant -- thus making the article concerned little more than an exercise in deception

*********************



28 June, 2007

PESTICIDES AND PARKINSON'S

Those wicked pesticides again! In yet another absurd epidemiological "study". Note that this study did NOT measure actual exposure to pesticides. It just recorded recollections that people had of their pesticide use. They found a slight tendency for people with Parkinson's disease to remember having used more pesticides in their lifetimes. That could be accounted for SOLELY as an outcome of the bad press that pesticides get. Some people with Parkinsons could well have thought: "It must be due to pesticides" -- and so have spent more time thinking about their pesticide use and magnifying in their minds how much they used.

The main effect that the authors noted was in fact that people who had been knocked on the head got more Parkinsons! So pesticides are less risky than knocks on the head! That finding too, however, may simply reflect hypotheses that sufferers had about their illness

Environmental risk factors for Parkinson's disease and parkinsonism: the Geoparkinson study

By Finlay D. Dick et al.

Objective

We investigated associations between Parkinson's disease and other degenerative parkinsonian syndromes and environmental factors in five European countries.

Methods

We undertook a case-control study of 959 prevalent cases of parkinsonism (767 with Parkinson's disease) and 1989 controls in Scotland, Italy, Sweden, Romania and Malta. We defined cases using the United Kingdom Parkinson's Disease Society Brain Bank criteria and excluded those with drug-induced or vascular parkinsonism or dementia. Subjects completed an interviewer-administered questionnaire regarding lifetime occupational and hobby exposure to solvents, pesticides, iron, copper and manganese. Lifetime and average annual exposures were estimated blind to disease status using a job-exposure matrix modified by subjective exposure modelling. Results were analysed using multiple logistic regression adjusting for age, sex, tobacco use, ever knocked unconscious and family history of Parkinson's disease.

Results

Adjusted logistic regression analyses showed significantly increased odds ratios for Parkinson's disease/parkinsonism with an exposure-response relationship for pesticides (low v no exposure, OR 1.13, 95% CI 0.82-1.57, high v no exposure, OR 1.41, 95% CI 1.06-1.88) and ever knocked unconscious (once v never, OR 1.35, 95% CI 1.09-1.68, more than once v never, OR 2.53, 95% CI 1.78-3.59). Hypnotic, anxiolytic or anti-depressant use for more than one year and a family history of Parkinson's disease showed significantly increased odds ratios. Tobacco use was protective (OR 0.50, 95%CI 0.42-0.60). Analyses confined to subjects with Parkinson's disease gave similar results.

Conclusions

The association of pesticide exposure with Parkinson's disease suggests a causative role. Repeated traumatic loss of consciousness is associated with increased risk.

Occup Environ Med., 1 March 2007




Diabetes drug in the gun

A safety row about a valuable diabetes drug (Avandia) based on tiny inter-group differences of only marginal statistical significance. Just attention-seeking behaviour on the part of one or two researchers. Just to put sensationalist medical statistics into perpective, let me look at the "43 per cent increase" reported below. An even greater 50% increase could have been arrived at if 3 out of a thousand Avandia uses got heart attacks versus 2 of of a thousand non-users getting heart attacks. In both cases the risk involved would be minor -- certainly no greater than crossing some streets. All findings reported in terms of "% increase" or other ratio statistics should be treated with grave suspicion -- but that accounts for most medical research reports. There are hordes of publication-hungry researchers and just not enough real findings to go around so mountains have to be made out of pimples

When he first saw the results of his study about the cardiovascular risks of the diabetes drug rosiglitazone - sold under the trade name Avandia - several weeks ago, Steven Nissen said that he felt sick and was unable to sleep. "It was very striking,'' he said after the publication of his report on the medicine that is GlaxoSmithKline's second best-selling drug. "When you see a signal this strong, I was truly frightened on behalf of our patients.''

The outcome of his meta-analysis of 42 previous clinicial trials was, indeed, troubling. It indicated a 43 per cent increase in the risk of heart attacks. It also showed a 64 per cent increase in the risk of death from cardiovascular causes, although this finding was said to be of borderline statistical significance, which means it may not be reliable. "I moved as quickly as humanly possible to publish the data,'' Nissen said.

Six days later, on May 22, the publication online of his report in the New England Journal of Medicine proved explosive. Within hours, shares in GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) had dropped 8 per cent amid fears that the drug, which generated $US3 billion in sales last year and is used by millions, could be pulled or could result in an expensive legal battle.

In Australia too the drug has proved a hit, reaching number 66 on the list of drugs that cost taxpayers the most money in 2005-06. In that year nearly 300,000 prescriptions for rosiglitazone were written, each of which cost just over $75 to fill - costing the federal Government's Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme nearly $20 million.

The publication of Nissen's findings sparked a furore in both the medical profession and the media, a furore that was further stoked by the online publication of more data by the New England Journal of Medicine recently. The new data were interim findings from an ongoing trial that was set up with the aim of showing that Avandia was no worse than existing treatments in terms of its effect of cardiovascular events, including heart attack. Unfortunately for GSK, the new findings failed to deliver the longed-for exoneration.

Nor do they condemn the drug, and like Nissen's original meta-analysis, the latest findings have divided experts - with some still strongly attacking suggestions the drug is unsafe. Nissen, cardiology chief of the Cleveland Clinic, Ohio, is not to be dismissed lightly. One of the most respected medical researchers in the US, he was among the first to find a link between Vioxx, the anti-inflammatory drug, and an increased risk of heart attacks. The scandal that followed forced the drug's withdrawal in 2004 and thrust Merck, Vioxx's manufacturer and one of the world's biggest pharmaceutical companies, into a bruising legal battle that is still continuing.

Speaking before the latest interim results were released, Nissen made no effort to avoid comparison between Avandia and Vioxx - a parallel that Glaxo has been keen to downplay. "I hope that GSK does not go the same way as Merck did,'' he said. "They (GSK) have been marketing a drug with very serious problems. In my view, a lot of people have been harmed.''

When asked for his views on just how many, Nissen pointed to comments made by US Senator Charles Grassley, an Iowa Republican. He claimed that an evaluation by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) had suggested that between 60,000 and 100,000 heart attacks could be linked to the drug since its launch in 1999 - more than 20 per day. "I feel pretty strongly that our findings are conclusive,'' Nissen said. "There is something odd about this drug that increases the risk of cardiovascular problems and death.''

However, GSK is not the only party that disagrees with Nissen. While Nissen's analysis conceded it had flaws, many independent experts say these are so fundamental that its hypothesis, that Avandia causes heart attacks, has little weight. The flaws they point out include the fact that many of the 42 studies Nissen reviewed to reach his conclusions were small and short-term, and dealt with such small numbers of heart attacks that the findings were open to statistical doubt. Another was that few of the studies were designed to assess effect on heart attacks, and so did not establish that the events recorded as heart attacks were not in fact something less serious, such as acute angina.

Within days of the release of Nissen's work The Lancet, the British medical journal, urged caution about the findings. In an editorial published online, it gave warning of the dangers of "alarmist headlines and confident declarations that help nobody''. In Australia, many experts have also been sceptical. Associate Professor Shane Hamblin, director of diabetes at Melbourne's Western Health, told a recent edition of the GP weekly Medical Observer there were "a lot of holes in this (Nissen's) meta-analysis'', while Professor Nikolai Petrovsky, director of the diabetes and endocrinology department at Flinders Medical Centre in Adelaide, was reported in Australian Doctor as saying he was "amazed'' the NEJM had published Nissen's study. All the Australian experts asked for their views said patients already taking Avandia should not stop, although some said doctors should not prescribe it to new patients who had "major cardiovascular conditions''.

But the picture was complicated further by the NEJM's publication of the second study - an interim analysis of data from a long-term trial involving over 4400 patients that has been specifically designed to demonstrate Avandia's cardiovascular safety. These interim findings found that patients treated with rosiglitazone had double the risk of heart failure - in which the heart beats too weakly. While this is a previously recognised side-effect, the study sheds light on how commonly treated patients will experience it.

The interim results also found a trend towards more heart attacks among patients treated with rosiglitazone as opposed to patients on alternative drugs. But these results were not so stark that the study's authors could confidently say they were not the play of chance. This lack of statistical significance has been interpreted by GSK and some experts as evidence that Avandia is safe, and by others - including the authors of three NEJM editorials - that serious safety questions remain.

But as in the US - where the Food and Drug Administration is coming under pressure over a growing perception that it has been too slow to act over safety fears - some experts say the Avandia case raises questions about how effectively in Australia we regulate medicines. David Henry, professor of clinical pharmacology at the University of Newcastle, said following the latest interim trial results, it "doesn't look good for rosiglitazone'' in terms of the drug's safety. "You can be fairly confident from the latest results that rosiglitazone is no better - and it may be worse than existing therapies,'' Professor Henry said.

"The whole purpose of the drug is to improve diabetic control and reduce complications - and here we are several years down the track since the drug's launch, beginning to question whether the drug is safe. "We shouldn't be asking these questions so long after these drugs have been introduced. It's a failure of drug development, and a failure of drug regulatory processes.'' Henry says that just as critics are using the Avandia controversy to argue for more power for the FDA, the Therapeutic Goods Administration should have power to force drug companies to conduct properly designed studies to answer safety questions much earlier.

Previous studies on Avandia established that it was effective at controlling blood sugar levels - but the longstanding assumption that patients would automatically be healthier as a result has been rocked by the findings about increased cardiovascular risk. However, Henry is not hopeful of this being workable under current funding arrangements. "It's hard when these agencies rely on fees raised from the drug companies to pay their staff, and it's hard when they don't have strong support from politicians,'' he says.

Source

****************

Just some problems with the "Obesity" war:

1). It tries to impose behavior change on everybody -- when most of those targeted are not obese and hence have no reason to change their behaviour. It is a form of punishing the innocent and the guilty alike. (It is also typical of Leftist thinking: Scorning the individual and capable of dealing with large groups only).

2). The longevity research all leads to the conclusion that it is people of MIDDLING weight who live longest -- not slim people. So the "epidemic" of obesity is in fact largely an "epidemic" of living longer.

3). It is total calorie intake that makes you fat -- not where you get your calories. Policies that attack only the source of the calories (e.g. "junk food") without addressing total calorie intake are hence pissing into the wind. People involuntarily deprived of their preferred calorie intake from one source are highly likely to seek and find their calories elsewhere.

4). So-called junk food is perfectly nutritious. A big Mac meal comprises meat, bread, salad and potatoes -- which is a mainstream Western diet. If that is bad then we are all in big trouble.

5). Food warriors demonize salt and fat. But we need a daily salt intake to counter salt-loss through perspiration and the research shows that people on salt-restricted diets die SOONER. And Eskimos eat huge amounts of fat with no apparent ill-effects. And the average home-cooked roast dinner has LOTS of fat. Will we ban roast dinners?

6). The foods restricted are often no more calorific than those permitted -- such as milk and fruit-juice drinks.

7). Tendency to weight is mostly genetic and is therefore not readily susceptible to voluntary behaviour change.

8). And when are we going to ban cheese? Cheese is a concentrated calorie bomb and has lots of that wicked animal fat in it too. Wouldn't we all be better off without it? And what about butter and margarine? They are just about pure fat. Surely they should be treated as contraband in kids' lunchboxes! [/sarcasm].

Trans fats:

For one summary of the weak science behind the "trans-fat" hysteria, see here. Trans fats have only a temporary effect on blood chemistry and the evidence of lasting harm from them is dubious. By taking extreme groups in trans fats intake, some weak association with coronary heart disease has at times been shown in some sub-populations but extreme group studies are inherently at risk of confounding with other factors and are intrinsically of little interest to the average person.

The use of extreme quintiles (fifths) to examine effects is in fact so common as to be almost universal but suggests to the experienced observer that the differences between the mean scores of the experimental and control groups were not statistically significant -- thus making the article concerned little more than an exercise in deception

*********************



27 June, 2007

Fat Diabetics get less heart disease

Researchers at the University of Pittsburgh Schools of the Health Sciences studying links between an early sign of heart disease called coronary artery calcification and body fat have found that, paradoxically, more fat may have some advantages, at least for people -- particularly women -- who have type 1 diabetes. Cardiovascular complications, including heart disease, are a leading cause of death for people with diabetes, who tend to suffer cardiovascular disease decades earlier than non-diabetics.

"Gaining weight may reflect good or better treatment with insulin therapy, which may partly explain why participants who gained weight over time had lower mortality rates," said Trevor Orchard, M.D., professor of epidemiology at the University of Pittsburgh Graduate School of Public Health (GSPH), who is presenting the findings during the 67th annual meeting of the American Diabetes Association.

For this particular report, Dr. Orchard and his colleagues focused on 315 patients with type 1 diabetes participating in the Pittsburgh Epidemiology of Diabetes Complications Study, an 18-year prospective study of childhood onset type 1 diabetes, which began in 1986. As part of the study, the patients recently received a special computed tomography scan (CT) to assess coronary artery calcification.

The participants' mean age was 42, and mean duration of diabetes was 34 years. In addition to the CT scan, patients were evaluated for fat underneath the skin and in the abdominal region, body mass index (BMI) and waist circumference. Although investigators noted a positive association for all measures of fatness and having any coronary artery calcification, in the two-thirds of patients who had calcification, the relationship reversed so that people with more fat had less severe calcification.

This association also varied by gender. Women with less fat under the skin had more evidence of coronary artery calcification than those with more fat. Thinner men also had more evidence of coronary artery calcification than men with a higher BMI.

"What it comes down to is a kind of double-edged relationship," said Baqiyyah Conway, M.P.H., lead author of the abstract, adding that these associations of less severe artery calcification with greater fat persisted even when controlling for standard cardiovascular disease risk factors such as increased levels of LDL, or bad cholesterol, triglycerides, high blood pressure and lower levels of HDL, or good cholesterol. Controlling for kidney disease, another common complication of diabetes, weakened the association in men but not in women.

"This is not a firm recommendation to people with type 1 diabetes to put on weight, but it does raise the possibility that weight recommendations in type 1 diabetes may be somewhat different than those for the general population, and emphasizes the complex relationship between body fat and cardiovascular risk in diabetes," said Dr. Orchard, who also is professor of medicine and pediatrics at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine.

Source




ADHD: Amazing government decision in Australia

The drug may harm more than help. And there is a growing consensus that drug solutions for ADHD are much overdone anyway. Such drugs are very often just a substitute for school discipline

A CONTROVERSIAL treatment for attention deficit hyperactivity disorder will be added to the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme, despite its potential to cause suicidal thoughts and stunt growth. Health Minister Tony Abbott announced in April that Strattera would be added to the scheme from July 1 for the treatment of ADHD in children aged six to 18 who could not take stimulant treatments such as methylphenidate, known as Ritalin, or dexamphetamine.

Under the PBS, the drug's price will drop from more than $100 for a month's supply to just $30.70, or $4.90 for concession-card holders. Mr Abbott said about 18,000 people would take Strattera during its first full financial year of listing, adding about $101.2million to PBS expenditure between 2007-08 and 2010-11.

The move comes after a Therapeutic Goods Administration assessment of Strattera last year, which identified suicidal thoughts, agitation, weight loss, chest pain and swollen testicles as potential side effects of the drug.

A spokeswoman for Strattera manufacturer Eli Lilly said drug regulation agencies in the US, Europe, Britain and Australia had all recently reviewed the safety of the drug and had reaffirmed the drug's benefits justified the risks. "There are benefits and risks associated with every medication," she said. "Strattera is the most extensively studied psychiatric drug in children with the most comprehensive clinical-trials database compared to any other ADHD medication."

The head of psychological medicine at Adelaide's Women's and Children's Hospital, Jon Jureidini, said he was concerned that doctors would not exhaust other treatment options before using Strattera. "Although it's not supported to be a first-line drug, I think we'll find that it will be used as a first-line drug, which is not what the PBAC (Pharmaceutical Benefits Advisory Committee) intended," Dr Jureidini said. "The concerns about this drug are that it's very expensive and it's not proven to be any better than the cheaper drugs that are around and that's reflected in the determination by the PBAC, who will only financially support its use if other stimulant drugs have been tried."

University of NSW ADHD specialist Florence Levy said stimulant drugs such as Ritalin were not suitable for about 10 to 20 per cent of children with the disorder because of side effects. Professor Levy said she had not seen any of the serious psychiatric side effects reported in the US. "They apply more to adolescents and at higher dosage levels. The children I see are younger children and I haven't experienced those sorts of problems," she said. Australian Medical Association vice-president Choong-Siew Yong, who specialises in child and adolescent mental health issues, said Strattera's side effects were "fairly rare" but recommended doctors and families discuss ways to monitor potential reactions in children taking the drug.

Source

****************

Just some problems with the "Obesity" war:

1). It tries to impose behavior change on everybody -- when most of those targeted are not obese and hence have no reason to change their behaviour. It is a form of punishing the innocent and the guilty alike. (It is also typical of Leftist thinking: Scorning the individual and capable of dealing with large groups only).

2). The longevity research all leads to the conclusion that it is people of MIDDLING weight who live longest -- not slim people. So the "epidemic" of obesity is in fact largely an "epidemic" of living longer.

3). It is total calorie intake that makes you fat -- not where you get your calories. Policies that attack only the source of the calories (e.g. "junk food") without addressing total calorie intake are hence pissing into the wind. People involuntarily deprived of their preferred calorie intake from one source are highly likely to seek and find their calories elsewhere.

4). So-called junk food is perfectly nutritious. A big Mac meal comprises meat, bread, salad and potatoes -- which is a mainstream Western diet. If that is bad then we are all in big trouble.

5). Food warriors demonize salt and fat. But we need a daily salt intake to counter salt-loss through perspiration and the research shows that people on salt-restricted diets die SOONER. And Eskimos eat huge amounts of fat with no apparent ill-effects. And the average home-cooked roast dinner has LOTS of fat. Will we ban roast dinners?

6). The foods restricted are often no more calorific than those permitted -- such as milk and fruit-juice drinks.

7). Tendency to weight is mostly genetic and is therefore not readily susceptible to voluntary behaviour change.

8). And when are we going to ban cheese? Cheese is a concentrated calorie bomb and has lots of that wicked animal fat in it too. Wouldn't we all be better off without it? And what about butter and margarine? They are just about pure fat. Surely they should be treated as contraband in kids' lunchboxes! [/sarcasm].

Trans fats:

For one summary of the weak science behind the "trans-fat" hysteria, see here. Trans fats have only a temporary effect on blood chemistry and the evidence of lasting harm from them is dubious. By taking extreme groups in trans fats intake, some weak association with coronary heart disease has at times been shown in some sub-populations but extreme group studies are inherently at risk of confounding with other factors and are intrinsically of little interest to the average person.

The use of extreme quintiles (fifths) to examine effects is in fact so common as to be almost universal but suggests to the experienced observer that the differences between the mean scores of the experimental and control groups were not statistically significant -- thus making the article concerned little more than an exercise in deception

*********************



26 June, 2007

THE OMEGA 3 PHOENIX RISES FROM THE ASHES ONCE AGAIN

Despite many big studies showing it to have no beneficial effects on cancer etc., there still seems to be a compulsion to find that fish oil is good for you. A recent abstract below:

Modulation of prostate cancer genetic risk by omega-3 and omega-6 fatty acids

By Isabelle M. Berquin et al.

Although a causal role of genetic alterations in human cancer is well established, it is still unclear whether dietary fat can modulate cancer risk in a predisposed population. Epidemiological studies suggest that diets rich in omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids reduce cancer incidence. To determine the influence of fatty acids on prostate cancer risk in animals with a defined genetic lesion, we used prostate-specific Pten-knockout mice, an immune-competent, orthotopic prostate cancer model, and diets with defined polyunsaturated fatty acid levels. We found that omega-3 fatty acids reduced prostate tumor growth, slowed histopathological progression, and increased survival, whereas omega-6 fatty acids had opposite effects. Introducing an omega-3 desaturase, which converts omega-6 to omega-3 fatty acids, into the Pten-knockout mice reduced tumor growth similarly to the omega-3 diet. Tumors from mice on the omega-3 diet had lower proportions of phosphorylated Bad and higher apoptotic indexes compared with those from mice on omega-6 diet. Knockdown of Bad eliminated omega-3-induced cell death, and introduction of exogenous Bad restored the sensitivity to omega-3 fatty acids. Our data suggest that modulation of prostate cancer development by polyunsaturated fatty acids is mediated in part through Bad-dependent apoptosis. This study highlights the importance of gene-diet interactions in prostate cancer.

J. Clin. Investigations, June 21, 2007. So it works in speciallly prepared mice. Ho Hum!




A jab to halt Alzheimer's could be available within a few years

Vaccine will save patients from worst symptoms of illness



A revolutionary drug that stops Alzheimer's disease in its tracks could be available within a few years. It could prevent people from reaching the devastating final stages of the illness, in which sufferers lose the ability to walk, talk and even swallow, and end up totally dependent on others. The jab, which is now being tested on patients, could be in widespread use in as little as six years. The most common cause of dementia, Alzheimer's affects around 500,000 Britons, with about 500 new cases diagnosed every day as people live longer.

Treatment costs the NHS up to 14billion a year - more than it spends on strokes, heart disease and cancer combined. Existing drugs can delay the progress of the symptoms, but their effect wears off relatively quickly, allowing the disease to take its devastating course. In contrast, the new vaccine may be able to hold the disease at bay indefinitely. Professor Clive Ballard, of the Alzheimer's Society, said: "A successful vaccine would be a groundbreaking treatment advance for the 25million people with Alzheimer's disease worldwide."

Vaccines are typically used to provide immunity to a disease as a preventive measure before it can develop, but this is an example of a therapeutic vaccine, used to treat a disease which has already developed. Known as CAD106, it is the brainchild of scientists at Zurich-based biotechnology firm Cytos, which is also developing anti-smoking, obesity and flu vaccines. Cytos chief executive Dr Wolfgang Renner said: "If it could prevent the progression of Alzheimer's, it would be fantastic."

Early tests showed the vaccine is highly effective at breaking up the sticky protein that clogs the brain in Alzheimer's, destroying vital connections between brain cells. When the jab was given to mice suffering from a disease similar to Alzheimer's, 80 per cent of the patches of amyloid protein were broken up. The vaccine is now being tried out on 60 elderly Swedish patients in the early and middle stages of Alzheimer's. Half of the men and women are being given the vaccine while half are being given dummy jabs. Although the year-long trial is designed to show that the treatment is safe, the researchers will also look at its effect on the patients' symptoms.

While the results are not due until early next year, the initial findings are promising. Dr Renner told a Zurich conference earlier this week: "I am glad to report that the vaccine is very well tolerated." If the trial is successful, larger-scale trials will follow, in which researchers will work out the best dose to give and how often it should be given. The finished product is six to eight years from the market. The vaccine uses a tiny section of the amyloid protein attached to an empty virus shell to trick the immune system into attacking and breaking up deposits of protein clogging the brain.

Scientists at Cytos, who have sold the rights to the vaccine to Swiss pharmaceutical giant Novartis, say the vaccine is likely to be given to those in the early stages of Alzheimer's, to stop the disease from progressing. The development of tests capable of detecting the disease in its earliest stages would allow the jab to be given at the first possible opportunity. It could also be used to keep the disease at bay in those with a strong family history of the illness, and even for the mass vaccination of people in late middle age. However, while the jab may stop the disease in its tracks, it is not expected to repair dead tissue, and so will not be a cure. Nevertheless, preventing the disease's progression would have an enormous impact on sufferers' lives.

Source

****************

Just some problems with the "Obesity" war:

1). It tries to impose behavior change on everybody -- when most of those targeted are not obese and hence have no reason to change their behaviour. It is a form of punishing the innocent and the guilty alike. (It is also typical of Leftist thinking: Scorning the individual and capable of dealing with large groups only).

2). The longevity research all leads to the conclusion that it is people of MIDDLING weight who live longest -- not slim people. So the "epidemic" of obesity is in fact largely an "epidemic" of living longer.

3). It is total calorie intake that makes you fat -- not where you get your calories. Policies that attack only the source of the calories (e.g. "junk food") without addressing total calorie intake are hence pissing into the wind. People involuntarily deprived of their preferred calorie intake from one source are highly likely to seek and find their calories elsewhere.

4). So-called junk food is perfectly nutritious. A big Mac meal comprises meat, bread, salad and potatoes -- which is a mainstream Western diet. If that is bad then we are all in big trouble.

5). Food warriors demonize salt and fat. But we need a daily salt intake to counter salt-loss through perspiration and the research shows that people on salt-restricted diets die SOONER. And Eskimos eat huge amounts of fat with no apparent ill-effects. And the average home-cooked roast dinner has LOTS of fat. Will we ban roast dinners?

6). The foods restricted are often no more calorific than those permitted -- such as milk and fruit-juice drinks.

7). Tendency to weight is mostly genetic and is therefore not readily susceptible to voluntary behaviour change.

8). And when are we going to ban cheese? Cheese is a concentrated calorie bomb and has lots of that wicked animal fat in it too. Wouldn't we all be better off without it? And what about butter and margarine? They are just about pure fat. Surely they should be treated as contraband in kids' lunchboxes! [/sarcasm].

Trans fats:

For one summary of the weak science behind the "trans-fat" hysteria, see here. Trans fats have only a temporary effect on blood chemistry and the evidence of lasting harm from them is dubious. By taking extreme groups in trans fats intake, some weak association with coronary heart disease has at times been shown in some sub-populations but extreme group studies are inherently at risk of confounding with other factors and are intrinsically of little interest to the average person.

The use of extreme quintiles (fifths) to examine effects is in fact so common as to be almost universal but suggests to the experienced observer that the differences between the mean scores of the experimental and control groups were not statistically significant -- thus making the article concerned little more than an exercise in deception

*********************



25 June, 2007

Warning on drugs to cut post-surgical heart attacks

The journal article is here

DOCTORS are routinely giving drugs to patients in the belief they reduce post-surgical heart attacks when there is little or no evidence that they do any good - and in fact can cause significant harm. Tens of thousands of surgery patients every year in Australia alone are given beta-blockers, which slow the heartbeat, and cholesterol-lowering drugs called statins, just before or after non-cardiac surgery.

About 100 million patients are given the drugs each year worldwide, in the belief they reduce cardiac complications such as heart attack that affect between 0.5 and 1 per cent of patients. But an editorial by Australian experts published in the British Medical Journal says the basis for this practice is flawed and no patient should be given the drugs for this purpose.

Co-author Stephen Bolsin, director of anaesthesia at Victoria's Geelong Hospital and associate professor of patient safety, said the most recent and reliable studies suggested that contrary to earlier beliefs, the drugs had no effect on reducing complications. But patients were still exposed to their side-effects, which in the case of beta-blockers could include causing blood pressure to plunge dangerously, or the heartbeat to slow too much.

Statins are associated with liver and muscle toxicity. While Associate Professor Bolsin said these effects were rare when used after surgery, these drugs were more expensive than beta-blockers and cost health systems vast amounts for no patient benefit. "We suggest that patients already receiving beta-blockers or statins before surgery should continue with treatment," Associate Professor Bolsin wrote in the editorial.

Source




Military suicide hoax

By Steven Milloy

Researchers and the media did their best this week to scare military personnel and their families with the widely reported headline, "Military Service Doubles Suicide risk". "Male veterans are twice as likely as their civilian counterparts to die by suicide," Portland State University professor Mark Kaplan told the Atlanta Journal Constitution. "We don't know why. But this finding may foreshadow what is going to come with the current cohort of military personnel who have served in Afghanistan and Iraq," he added.

Published in the Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health (July 2007), Kaplan's study consisted of 320,890 men who were followed for 12 years. As it is a statistical correlation study - rather than an investigation into whether an actual cause-and-effect relationship exists between military service and suicide - I naturally was skeptical. From the very beginning, the study didn't disappoint me.

The study summary stated that the veterans' suicide rate was 2.04 times that of non-veterans. When I read the study to see how the 2.04 figure was derived, I found no explanation. Mysteriously, the 2.04 figure did not even appear in the study itself - that's pretty unusual. I did, however, find a bar graph in the study that presented 2.13 as the difference in suicide rate between veterans and non-veterans.

You might think that this solved the mystery. A typographical or editorial foul-up must have inadvertently led to the 2.04-figure, rather than the 2.13 figure, being spotlighted in the study summary, right? We'll get to that later. In the meantime, my discovery of the 2.13-figure only deepened the mystery. Kaplan wrote in his study that the 2.13-figure represented the difference in suicide rates between veterans and non-veterans after statistical adjustment to account for other potential risk factors for suicide, including age, marital status, living arrangement, race, education, family income, employment status, geographic region, interval since last visit to a doctor, self-rated health and body mass index.

This list seemed impressively comprehensive and ostensibly strengthened the case for his claimed result - until, that is, I discovered that a key potential suicide risk factor apparently was omitted from his statistical adjustment. There's a table in Kaplan's study in which he presents the difference in veteran suicide rates by individual risk factors, including age, race, marital status, living arrangement, education, employment status, region of residence, urban/rural locality, self-rated health, body mass index, psychiatric conditions and activity limitation.

With the exception of race, education and activity limitation, none of these risk factors were statistically significantly associated with increased suicide rates. But since race, education and activity limitation were associated with increased suicide risk, all three should have been among the potential risk factors Kaplan considered when he did his statistical adjustments to produce the 2.13-figure. If you compare the above-mentioned lists of suicide risk factors, however, you'll note that while activity limitation was identified as a significant risk factor for suicide, it apparently was not included in the statistical adjustment that produced the 2.13-figure. And of the three statistically significant risk factors for suicide, activity limitation was by far the greatest - veterans with activity limitations had a 4.44 times greater rate of suicide than veterans with no activity limitations, as compared to race (3.23) and education (2.67).

Is the omission of the activity limitation factor another study typo? Was it inadvertently omitted from the statistical adjustment? Or was it omitted from the analysis because it would produce a non-result that rendered the study non-publishable and non-newsworthy? It certainly cannot be said that Kaplan was ignorant of the significance of the activity limitation risk factor. "According to Kaplan, the risk of suicide was highest among men whose activities were limited by health problems," reported the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

Kaplan also published a study earlier this year entitled, "Physical illness, functional limitations and suicide risk: A population-based study" in the American Journal of Orthopsychiatry (Jan. 2007) in which he stated, "After controlling for potential [confounding risk factors], functional limitations were shown to be a significant predictor of suicide."

When I contacted Kaplan about these issues, he immediately acknowledged that the 2.04-figure was a typo and that the 2.13-figure was correct. Interestingly, he also provided me with a dubious error bar for the 2.13 figure. When I asked him about that, another acknowledgment of error was made. These may seem like small errors, but they certainly build no confidence.

As to the crucial omission of activity limitation as a risk factor, Kaplan deferred responding, writing that he needed to consult with one of his statistician co-authors. As of the time of this column, I had not heard back from Kaplan on that point. But you might think that a lead study author who gave many media interviews this week would be readily familiar with such a key component of his analysis. Of all the researchers I've interviewed over the years about their results, none has ever failed to immediately provide an answer to such a basic question.

I don't know whether Kaplan ultimately will produce a satisfactory explanation for the activity limitation omission - the study's remaining mystery. In some ways it doesn't matter. The study's other shortcomings - particularly that veteran suicide rates weren't higher across the vast majority of demographic groups examined, which indicates that military service itself isn't a causative factor in suicide - are alone enough to debunk it and the scary headlines it spawned.

But the wide reporting of a paper with such major and easily discoverable problems - as well as Kaplan's questionable effort to foment concern about suicide risk among veterans of Afghanistan and Iraq - reflects poorly on him and his co-authors, the publishing journal and the media.

Source

****************

Just some problems with the "Obesity" war:

1). It tries to impose behavior change on everybody -- when most of those targeted are not obese and hence have no reason to change their behaviour. It is a form of punishing the innocent and the guilty alike. (It is also typical of Leftist thinking: Scorning the individual and capable of dealing with large groups only).

2). The longevity research all leads to the conclusion that it is people of MIDDLING weight who live longest -- not slim people. So the "epidemic" of obesity is in fact largely an "epidemic" of living longer.

3). It is total calorie intake that makes you fat -- not where you get your calories. Policies that attack only the source of the calories (e.g. "junk food") without addressing total calorie intake are hence pissing into the wind. People involuntarily deprived of their preferred calorie intake from one source are highly likely to seek and find their calories elsewhere.

4). So-called junk food is perfectly nutritious. A big Mac meal comprises meat, bread, salad and potatoes -- which is a mainstream Western diet. If that is bad then we are all in big trouble.

5). Food warriors demonize salt and fat. But we need a daily salt intake to counter salt-loss through perspiration and the research shows that people on salt-restricted diets die SOONER. And Eskimos eat huge amounts of fat with no apparent ill-effects. And the average home-cooked roast dinner has LOTS of fat. Will we ban roast dinners?

6). The foods restricted are often no more calorific than those permitted -- such as milk and fruit-juice drinks.

7). Tendency to weight is mostly genetic and is therefore not readily susceptible to voluntary behaviour change.

8). And when are we going to ban cheese? Cheese is a concentrated calorie bomb and has lots of that wicked animal fat in it too. Wouldn't we all be better off without it? And what about butter and margarine? They are just about pure fat. Surely they should be treated as contraband in kids' lunchboxes! [/sarcasm].

Trans fats:

For one summary of the weak science behind the "trans-fat" hysteria, see here. Trans fats have only a temporary effect on blood chemistry and the evidence of lasting harm from them is dubious. By taking extreme groups in trans fats intake, some weak association with coronary heart disease has at times been shown in some sub-populations but extreme group studies are inherently at risk of confounding with other factors and are intrinsically of little interest to the average person.

The use of extreme quintiles (fifths) to examine effects is in fact so common as to be almost universal but suggests to the experienced observer that the differences between the mean scores of the experimental and control groups were not statistically significant -- thus making the article concerned little more than an exercise in deception

*********************



24 June, 2007

'Golden bullet' may be cancer hunter and killer

A "GOLDEN bullet" treatment for cancer which tracks down tumours before wiping them out with a blast of heat is to be tested on patients within weeks, it was revealed yesterday. The "seek and destroy" technique uses an injection of microscopic glass spheres, coated in gold, which seek out potentially deadly cancers in the body. Once enough spheres have flocked to the tumour, doctors "activate" them using a low energy beam of light. In tests, tumours have been totally destroyed.

Unlike conventional cancer treatments, the golden bullet approach uses no toxic chemicals and no radiation, reducing the risk of unpleasant side effects. It could also be far cheaper than existing treatments. Cancer scientists have predicted that it could help tackle a range of potentially deadly diseases, from skin cancers to cancers of the cervix, breast, brain and neck.

Tests on mice found that the treatment worked exceptionally well, New Scientist magazine reported yesterday. When it was tried on nine mice with colon cancer, the tumours were destroyed. Rice University (Texas) professor Jennifer West, who helped develop the treatment, said clinical trials on cancer patients were expected to begin in the US within weeks.

The first phase will find out whether the treatment successfully kills off tumours. A second stage, due to start in a couple of years, will test the particles' ability to identify tumours. "From the work we have done so far, we believe that this therapy will work on any soft-tissue tumours, such as the breast, prostate, brain, skin, head, neck and cervix," Professor West said.

Cancer Council Queensland director of community services and research programs Associate Professor Suzanne Steginga said the emergence of nanotechnology as a potential area for cancer treatment emphasised the critical importance of research. "The question, of course, will be how this work transfers from animal to human models, and this will take some years to answer," she said. "We wait with great interest for the outcomes of these trials."

The golden bullet treatment is not the first to use "nanoparticles" . Past studies have shown that microscopic capsules injected into the bloodstream can deliver drugs directly to tumours.

Source




In Defense of Andrew Speaker

Now that the initial shock and outrage over the case of Andrew Speaker - who flew to Europe and back despite having a drug-resistant strain of TB - have died down, we're hearing the predictable cries for more government power and money. Dr. Julie Gerberding, head of the CDC, told lawmakers in early June, "If we believe the patient has a strong intent to put others at risk, we need to have confidence we can take action absent documentation of intent to cause harm." And just this Sunday, a typical editorial in The Republican concludes:

Speaker is now in medical isolation in Denver. His close call must serve as a wake-up call. Specialists have been sounding the alarm. They want more federal money for research, education and outreach. And they want the authority to forcibly quarantine someone with a drug-resistant form of tuberculosis. They should get all of that - and soon.

Cases of medical quarantine are classic examples of situations where the rights of the individual are supposedly trumped by the safety of the community. After all, when people's decisions have consequences beyond their private lives, the government should and must intervene.

In contrast to this conventional wisdom, permit me to make a case for the exact opposite conclusion. I claim that the Andrew Speaker case beautifully illustrates the incompetence of government programs, and proves that the free market is the best system to referee complicated situations like this.

First some background that may change your opinion of Speaker: Based on what you've heard, he must be a very selfish guy, right? Well maybe, but one theory is that Speaker might have contracted TB when he was doing charity work for sick people in Vietnam.

Speaker has said time and again that health officials told him he wasn't a threat to anybody. Before he left for Europe, he was walking around freely, practicing law, interacting with his fianc‚e and her young daughter, and so forth. Anyone who's planned a wedding knows it's a logistical nightmare. Is it so shocking that Speaker decided to go ahead with his travel plans, rather than canceling his international tickets and other arrangements, so that he could stay in the US and continue to walk around freely with his TB that wasn't contagious?

When the scandal first broke, various health officials pooh-poohed Speaker's claims that he had been repeatedly told that he posed no threat to anyone. Yet Speaker's father surreptitiously taped one of the conversations, in which Dr. Eric Benning, medical director of the Fulton County health department, clearly tells Speaker "because of the fact that you actually are not contagious, there's no reason for you to be sequestered," and "As far as we can tell, you are not a threat to anybody right now."

Further proof that Speaker honestly believed he wasn't putting anyone in danger: Both sets of parents were present at the wedding, and he kissed his new bride on the mouth! And it's not just that these were six woefully ignorant people. In an ironic twist, Speaker's new father-in-law has a Ph.D. in microbiology and is a CDC expert in.drumroll please.tuberculosis! (You couldn't have made this stuff up.)

Now at this point in the saga, the CDC got a hold of Speaker and told him his strain of TB was more drug resistant than previously thought, and that he needed to either book a $100,000 private jet home (at his expense) or check himself into an Italian facility "indefinitely." Again, he wasn't told he was contagious; they advised him to take a walk and go to dinner before turning himself in.

Yes, at this point Speaker and his new bride definitely flouted their orders, and booked a flight to Canada (to avoid the US "no-fly" list), and then drove a rental car through border security without (they claim) lying about their identities. Before his trip, Speaker had been told that treatment in Denver was his one shot for survival, and he was afraid being detained in Italy would be a death sentence.

Now I ask, how in the world does this sordid tale justify more money and power for the CDC and other health officials? Suppose things had gone the opposite way, and that the feds had successfully coordinated with the airlines to prevent Speaker from flying to or from Europe. Surely newspaper editorialists would've congratulated the government on a job well done, and thanked their lucky stars that our society places limits on people's individual liberties.

So then why is it that when the government botches the job, again the conclusion is the same - to wit, we need the government to take away more liberties? If the government is so incompetent that it didn't even catch the newlyweds as they crossed the border from Canada through a regular checkpoint, why should we trust it to protect us from future outbreaks of contagious diseases?

Make no mistake, if the government didn't arrogate to itself the right to handle these life-or-death issues, the free market would fill the void. In a purely capitalist setup, it would be horrible for business if an airline allowed infectious passengers to fly internationally. Yet in today's world, airlines won't be punished for this carelessness, since travelers will assume "the government takes care of that type of thing." How many readers even know which airline Andrew Speaker used?

Some readers might object and say, "Wait a minute! Yes, the government fumbled the ball on this one, but so did the private airline. Neither agency prevented Speaker from putting people in danger."

But this isn't true. Suppose airline carriers instituted their own passenger rating system, and declined service to those it deemed infectious (or terrorist risks, for that matter). If these people were A-OK according to the government's list, then they could easily sue for baseless discrimination. So we see, the way the system works right now, if the government gets involved in something, it doesn't just supplement - it takes over.

The government botches just about everything it touches, whether it's schools, housing projects, reconstructing Iraq, or keeping the public safe from TB. Maybe it's time we quarantined the CDC and let the free market take a shot.

Source

****************

Just some problems with the "Obesity" war:

1). It tries to impose behavior change on everybody -- when most of those targeted are not obese and hence have no reason to change their behaviour. It is a form of punishing the innocent and the guilty alike. (It is also typical of Leftist thinking: Scorning the individual and capable of dealing with large groups only).

2). The longevity research all leads to the conclusion that it is people of MIDDLING weight who live longest -- not slim people. So the "epidemic" of obesity is in fact largely an "epidemic" of living longer.

3). It is total calorie intake that makes you fat -- not where you get your calories. Policies that attack only the source of the calories (e.g. "junk food") without addressing total calorie intake are hence pissing into the wind. People involuntarily deprived of their preferred calorie intake from one source are highly likely to seek and find their calories elsewhere.

4). So-called junk food is perfectly nutritious. A big Mac meal comprises meat, bread, salad and potatoes -- which is a mainstream Western diet. If that is bad then we are all in big trouble.

5). Food warriors demonize salt and fat. But we need a daily salt intake to counter salt-loss through perspiration and the research shows that people on salt-restricted diets die SOONER. And Eskimos eat huge amounts of fat with no apparent ill-effects. And the average home-cooked roast dinner has LOTS of fat. Will we ban roast dinners?

6). The foods restricted are often no more calorific than those permitted -- such as milk and fruit-juice drinks.

7). Tendency to weight is mostly genetic and is therefore not readily susceptible to voluntary behaviour change.

8). And when are we going to ban cheese? Cheese is a concentrated calorie bomb and has lots of that wicked animal fat in it too. Wouldn't we all be better off without it? And what about butter and margarine? They are just about pure fat. Surely they should be treated as contraband in kids' lunchboxes! [/sarcasm].

Trans fats:

For one summary of the weak science behind the "trans-fat" hysteria, see here. Trans fats have only a temporary effect on blood chemistry and the evidence of lasting harm from them is dubious. By taking extreme groups in trans fats intake, some weak association with coronary heart disease has at times been shown in some sub-populations but extreme group studies are inherently at risk of confounding with other factors and are intrinsically of little interest to the average person.

The use of extreme quintiles (fifths) to examine effects is in fact so common as to be almost universal but suggests to the experienced observer that the differences between the mean scores of the experimental and control groups were not statistically significant -- thus making the article concerned little more than an exercise in deception

*********************



23 June, 2007

HRT: On again, off again, on again

I condemned the scare stories from the beginning. Most of the health claims both for and against HRT are very flimsily based. Its usefulness in alleviating menopausal symptoms and limiting osteoporosis are the only considerations that should matter in decisions to use it or not. I said more about HRT on this blog on April 21

DOCTORS who alarmed millions of menopausal women by linking hormone replacement therapy with increased risk of heart attack or stroke, now say the drugs can lower the chance of heart disease. An American study published yesterday in The New England Journal of Medicine found that taking oestrogen for seven years or more soon after menopause can reduce calcification of the arteries, a major cause of heart attacks, by up to 60 per cent. Researchers say only older women who delay taking the drugs for at least 10 years are at risk.

The findings are a continuation of the Women's Health Initiative Study that caused a worldwide health scare in 2002 by controversially warning women that oestrogen replacement was potentially dangerous. This caused millions of women to stop using HRT. But the new research, which looked at 1100 women aged 50 to 59 who had undergone a surgically induced menopause through hysterectomy, could put many minds at rest. The lead author of the original study and the latest findings, Dr JoAnn Manson, of Boston's Brigham and Women's Hospital, said the new research would give women considering HRT reassurance that it was "unlikely to have an adverse effect on the risk of coronary events among women who have recently undergone menopause".

The results concur with a study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association in April that found the 2002 research fundamentally flawed. The JAMA study found there was a 30 per cent drop in deaths among women taking oestrogen.

But two international studies published about the same time showed hormone therapies could increase the risk of ovarian and breast cancer. Doctors at the time told Australian women the risks were low and to continue their hormone treatment. Melbourne's Baker Heart Research Institute director, Professor Garry Jennings, said yesterday that conflicting messages on HRT were confusing.

The latest research showed hormone treatment could be beneficial. "We like to think of something as black or white, good or bad, and it becomes a little complicated if it's good under this circumstance and not so good under others," he said. "What this study does is lend support to what has been the more recent practice, that is to still consider them (HRT) in younger women but to not really push them unless there are really disabling symptoms in older women."

Source




Crooked Chiropractors in California home free

When prominent chiropractors claim fake degrees, it does not need others to give chiropractic a bad name. But I guess that false health claims are endemic in California so nobody really cares

The board that oversees chiropractors now says it has no authority to discipline practitioners who claim advanced degrees from unaccredited universities, a reversal of an earlier policy that ensnared current board member Franco Columbu. The board has no regulation that spells out what kinds of claims about Ph.D.s might be misleading to consumers, said interim Executive Director Brian Stiger. As a result, the board can't send out letters to chiropractors who make those claims telling them to prove that the university is legitimate or stop advertising the degree, Stiger said. Some other professional licensing boards do restrict what licensees can claim about other degrees and credentials, Stiger and others say.

The board's new stance fails to protect consumers against misleading claims, said a legislator who has been investigating the Board of Chiropractic Examiners. "It's just another example of how out of control this board is ...," said Sen. Mark Ridley-Thomas, D-Los Angeles. "It goes directly to the issues of integrity and credibility. This drives me nuts."

For years, the board had been challenging chiropractors who claimed Ph.D.s from unaccredited institutions. The board investigates about five to 10 such cases each year, Stiger said. One was Columbu, a chiropractor appointed to the board by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger in February 2006. Columbu and Schwarzenegger are longtime friends from bodybuilding days, with Columbu, known as the Sardinian Strongman, standing as best man in Schwarzenegger's wedding. Two years before Columbu's appointment, the board sent him a "cease and desist" letter, telling him that he was in violation of a regulation on false and misleading advertising. The letter demanded that Columbu show proof that the issuer of his Ph.D., Donsbach University, was an accredited institution, or remove the Ph.D. claim from his advertising. The case was closed when Columbu furnished proof that he was no longer advertising the Ph.D.

But as of April of this year, Columbu still included a reference to a "Ph.D. in nutrition" on his Web site in a sales pitch for a $200 nutrition and training program. Columbu's Web site was not accessible Wednesday. After The Bee reported Columbu's situation in April, a lawyer wrote on Columbu's behalf that he had complied with the cease-and-desist letter but "due to an oversight" left one reference to the Ph.D. at the bottom of the Web page. The attorney, Wilkie Cheong, also questioned the board's authority to determine whether or not an institution conferring a Ph.D. was accredited. Columbu did not respond to a voice mail Wednesday.

Stiger said that he did not talk to Columbu about the change. He said it came up as part of his review of a number of board practices since taking over as interim director in March. Two lawyers agreed that the board doesn't have the authority to discipline chiropractors who claim Ph.D.s from unaccredited institutions, he said. Stiger sent out an e-mail Wednesday to the board staff so they would all be aware of the change.

Julie D'Angelo Fellmeth, administrative director at the Center for Public Interest Law at the University of San Diego, said the Columbu situation puts the board staff in an awkward position. "I understand the board staff is between a rock and a hard place," she said. "How would you like to go after one of your own board members?" Another board member, Frederick Lerner, also claims a Ph.D., this one in electromedical sciences from City University Los Angeles. The university is unaccredited and is no longer approved by the state Bureau for Private Postsecondary and Vocational Education. But Lerner said that when he did course work and a dissertation in 1985, the school was legitimate.

Stiger said that in the absence of enforcement, the board would rely on public education, informing consumers about how to check out chiropractors' credentials. The board could also choose to pass a regulation to detail the kinds of claims that chiropractors are prohibited from making. But that option could be costly and time consuming.

Ridley-Thomas said the reversal is "Exhibit A" for why the Legislature should pass a bill asking voters to put the Board of Chiropractic Examiners under the control of the Department of Consumer Affairs. The board is more autonomous than other professional licensing bodies because it was set up by a 1922 initiative governing the chiropractic profession. With the board under tighter control, the Legislature would be able to review appointees like Columbu, he said, and would be more likely to pursue a regulation barring certain advertising claims. "The public deserves better, much better," he said.

Source

****************

Just some problems with the "Obesity" war:

1). It tries to impose behavior change on everybody -- when most of those targeted are not obese and hence have no reason to change their behaviour. It is a form of punishing the innocent and the guilty alike. (It is also typical of Leftist thinking: Scorning the individual and capable of dealing with large groups only).

2). The longevity research all leads to the conclusion that it is people of MIDDLING weight who live longest -- not slim people. So the "epidemic" of obesity is in fact largely an "epidemic" of living longer.

3). It is total calorie intake that makes you fat -- not where you get your calories. Policies that attack only the source of the calories (e.g. "junk food") without addressing total calorie intake are hence pissing into the wind. People involuntarily deprived of their preferred calorie intake from one source are highly likely to seek and find their calories elsewhere.

4). So-called junk food is perfectly nutritious. A big Mac meal comprises meat, bread, salad and potatoes -- which is a mainstream Western diet. If that is bad then we are all in big trouble.

5). Food warriors demonize salt and fat. But we need a daily salt intake to counter salt-loss through perspiration and the research shows that people on salt-restricted diets die SOONER. And Eskimos eat huge amounts of fat with no apparent ill-effects. And the average home-cooked roast dinner has LOTS of fat. Will we ban roast dinners?

6). The foods restricted are often no more calorific than those permitted -- such as milk and fruit-juice drinks.

7). Tendency to weight is mostly genetic and is therefore not readily susceptible to voluntary behaviour change.

8). And when are we going to ban cheese? Cheese is a concentrated calorie bomb and has lots of that wicked animal fat in it too. Wouldn't we all be better off without it? And what about butter and margarine? They are just about pure fat. Surely they should be treated as contraband in kids' lunchboxes! [/sarcasm].

Trans fats:

For one summary of the weak science behind the "trans-fat" hysteria, see here. Trans fats have only a temporary effect on blood chemistry and the evidence of lasting harm from them is dubious. By taking extreme groups in trans fats intake, some weak association with coronary heart disease has at times been shown in some sub-populations but extreme group studies are inherently at risk of confounding with other factors and are intrinsically of little interest to the average person.

The use of extreme quintiles (fifths) to examine effects is in fact so common as to be almost universal but suggests to the experienced observer that the differences between the mean scores of the experimental and control groups were not statistically significant -- thus making the article concerned little more than an exercise in deception

*********************



22 June, 2007

Ban all sand!

Given the do-gooder obsession with banning anything even remotely harmful (and sometimes not harmful at all), why not? Surely people should at least be kept away from beaches!

Waves and sharks aren't the only dangers at the beach. More than two dozen young people have been killed over the last decade when sand holes collapsed on them, report father-and-son doctors who have made warning of the risk their personal campaign. Since 1985, at least 20 children and young adults in the United States have died in beach or backyard sand submersions. And at least eight others died in Australia, New Zealand and the United Kingdom, according to a letter from the doctors published in this week's issue of The New England Journal of Medicine.

Among them was Matthew Gauruder, who died from a collapse at an after-prom beach party in Westerly, R.I., in May 2001. The 17-year-old was playing football with friends when he jumped for a pass and fell backward into an eight-foot-deep hole someone had dug earlier. Would-be rescuers made the problem worse by caving in more sand as they tried to approach him. People at the scene said he may have been buried 15 minutes, said his mother, Mavis. "People have no conception of how dangerous this is," she said, in an interview this week.

Sand hole collapses occur horrifyingly fast, said Dr. Bradley Maron of Harvard Medical School, the report's lead author. "Typically, victims became completely submerged in the sand when the walls of the hole unexpectedly collapsed, leaving virtually no evidence of the hole or location of the victim," wrote Maron, an internal medicine resident.

Maron, a former lifeguard, became interested in the topic in the summer of 1998. He was vacationing with his family on Martha's Vineyard when he and his father, Minnesota cardiologist Dr. Barry Maron, saw a lifeguard responding to a collapse that engulfed an 8-year-old girl. The girl survived, thanks to a dramatic rescue. But it left a big impression on Maron, who's spent years tracking - and writing about - similar incidents. "It's been almost like a vendetta for him," said Dennis Arnold, who runs the beach patrol in the Martha's Vineyard community of Edgartown and was Maron's boss that summer.

People naturally worry about splashier threats, like shark attacks. However, the Marons' research found there were 16 sand hole or tunnel deaths in the U.S. from 1990-2006 compared with 12 fatal shark for the same period, according to University of Florida statistics. And Bradley Maron thinks the sand-related deaths are less well-documented than shark attacks.....

On Martha's Vineyard, lifeguards are instructed to order children and adults out of any hole deeper than a child's waist, and to kick sand in to fill them, Arnold said. Occasionally, some parents protest. "They'll say 'You're ruining my kids day!' I say 'I don't care,'" Arnold said. Mavis Gauruder, who lives in Fort Mill, S.C., said she's tried to issue similar warnings, like the time she came upon a father digging a hole with a garden shovel for his young son. She went up to the pair and warned them of the dangers. The man seemed unmoved, so she finally told him she'd had a tragedy in her family involving a hole collapse. "I asked them to fill in the hole. They did, but they looked at me like I was interfering," she said.

Source




Stroke drug may also help with frostbite

An anti-clotting drug used to treat strokes and heart attacks can also restore blood flow to frostbitten fingers and limbs, greatly reducing the need for amputation, according to a new study. Doctors at the University of Utah who conducted the research on a small sample of patients hope it marks the start of a move beyond the traditional - and limited - treatment for frostbite. "What it does is help to rescue that tissue that is damaged but not yet dead," said Dr. Stephen Morris, one of the authors of the study, which was released Monday in the Archives of Surgery medical journal.

Patients who received the thrombolytic therapy at the university's burn center were more likely to keep their frostbitten fingers and toes than patients who went without the drug. All patients had similar degrees of frostbite.

Thrombolytic therapy is not new, but has been difficult to study because not every frostbite victim is a candidate. For instance, people already on blood thinners or someone who has suffered a head injury would be at risk for serious complications from the anti-clotting drug. Dr. John Twomey, burn director at the Hennepin County Medical Center in Minneapolis, first tried the therapy on a patient about 20 years ago and has treated 18 other patients with it since. Twomey, whose early findings are mentioned in the Utah study, said the treatment for frostbite has been limited to warming the affected tissue and waiting to see how much would survive.

"We saw all these frostbitten patients come in, and there was absolutely nothing we could do to alter their disease," Twomey said. "That was pretty discouraging and disheartening to see that happening, and it happened repeatedly."

In the Utah study, six patients who were treated with a drug called tissue plasminogen activator, or tPA, within 24 hours of injury were compared with 25 other patients who did not receive the drug, and one patient who got the anti-clotting drug later than the 24-hour window. Among the patients who received tPA within 24 hours, only six of 59 frostbitten fingers or toes were removed, or about 10 percent. In the other group, 97 of 234 affected digits were amputated, or about 41 percent.

The sample used for the study was small and taken only from one geographic area. The study was also based only on the one anti-clotting drug. Those are just a few of the variables that leave questions to be answered by future research. But for some, the findings may offer a chance at avoiding amputation. "For the injured tissue, there's still hope," said Dr. Amalia Cochran, another of the University of Utah authors.

Source

****************

Just some problems with the "Obesity" war:

1). It tries to impose behavior change on everybody -- when most of those targeted are not obese and hence have no reason to change their behaviour. It is a form of punishing the innocent and the guilty alike. (It is also typical of Leftist thinking: Scorning the individual and capable of dealing with large groups only).

2). The longevity research all leads to the conclusion that it is people of MIDDLING weight who live longest -- not slim people. So the "epidemic" of obesity is in fact largely an "epidemic" of living longer.

3). It is total calorie intake that makes you fat -- not where you get your calories. Policies that attack only the source of the calories (e.g. "junk food") without addressing total calorie intake are hence pissing into the wind. People involuntarily deprived of their preferred calorie intake from one source are highly likely to seek and find their calories elsewhere.

4). So-called junk food is perfectly nutritious. A big Mac meal comprises meat, bread, salad and potatoes -- which is a mainstream Western diet. If that is bad then we are all in big trouble.

5). Food warriors demonize salt and fat. But we need a daily salt intake to counter salt-loss through perspiration and the research shows that people on salt-restricted diets die SOONER. And Eskimos eat huge amounts of fat with no apparent ill-effects. And the average home-cooked roast dinner has LOTS of fat. Will we ban roast dinners?

6). The foods restricted are often no more calorific than those permitted -- such as milk and fruit-juice drinks.

7). Tendency to weight is mostly genetic and is therefore not readily susceptible to voluntary behaviour change.

8). And when are we going to ban cheese? Cheese is a concentrated calorie bomb and has lots of that wicked animal fat in it too. Wouldn't we all be better off without it? And what about butter and margarine? They are just about pure fat. Surely they should be treated as contraband in kids' lunchboxes! [/sarcasm].

Trans fats:

For one summary of the weak science behind the "trans-fat" hysteria, see here. Trans fats have only a temporary effect on blood chemistry and the evidence of lasting harm from them is dubious. By taking extreme groups in trans fats intake, some weak association with coronary heart disease has at times been shown in some sub-populations but extreme group studies are inherently at risk of confounding with other factors and are intrinsically of little interest to the average person.

The use of extreme quintiles (fifths) to examine effects is in fact so common as to be almost universal but suggests to the experienced observer that the differences between the mean scores of the experimental and control groups were not statistically significant -- thus making the article concerned little more than an exercise in deception

*********************



21 June, 2007

Fatty foods counter stress

And stress can lead to depression, which is a serious illness, with anxious depression sometimes leading to suicide. The study below was with rats only but it is a warning to look at both sides of the coin

GORGING on fatty comfort food really can make a stressed person feel better, tests on rats have shown. Stressed rodents were able to experience pleasure more easily if they ate high-fat foods, research from the University of NSW found.

This could explain why some people over-eat when under stress, and may even partially explain the obesity epidemic, said researcher Prof Margaret Morris. "If it's true that societal levels of stress are increasing, and if people are turning to food in response to that stress, then it may be a small component of why we're experiencing more obesity," she said.

Prof Morris tested the theory by separating baby rats from their mothers soon after birth. Tests using a sugar drink showed that these stressed rats were less able to sense pleasure than rats who hadn't been separated. These unhappy rats were then placed on either a regular rat diet or an unhealthy Western diet with 30 per cent fat. "It appears that the fatty diet almost counters the traumatic experience of the separation," Prof Morris said.

Source




Blood transfusions may do more harm than good

Contrary to their benign image, blood transfusions are overused and often harm patients, expert say. Jehovah's Witnesses have been laughing ever since blood-borne AIDS and Hepatitis problems surfaced but they have even more reason to laugh now. The Old Testament warnings (e.g. Leviticus 17:11-14) about the forbidden status of blood appear to have had some surprising wisdom in them. No doubt there were blood-borne diseases in ancient times too. It seems likely that on balance JWs have avoided more problems than they incurred by their stand against transfusions

REFUSE at your own risk: for years that's the message doctors have relayed to Jehovah's Witnesses and others who've declined blood transfusions. But transfusions are not the wonder procedure of popular, or even medical profession, imagination. Mounting evidence shows they significantly increase the risk of post-operative complications - including infections, kidney failure, lung injury and death.

Yet instead of being saved as a last resort, they are still being performed when other safer options could be used instead. In fact, more than 25 per cent of blood transfusions currently performed are unnecessary, according to a visiting US expert who spoke at the annual scientific meeting of the Australian and New Zealand College of Anaesthetists (ANZCA) two weeks ago. Internationally renowned emergency medicine and anaesthiology professor Bruce Spiess told the conference that while blood transfusions have long been "believed to be helpful and a pillar of modern medicine'', there was now relatively little evidence to support such claims.

"Drug options are carefully tested and regulated through prospective, randomised double-blind testing, but blood transfusion stands apart,'' Spiess says. "It has never been safety or efficacy tested.'' It's a point that has been echoed by several Australian experts, including anaesthesists associate professor Larry McNicol and doctor Peter McCall at Austin Health in Melbourne.

"From the point of view of the risk of transmitting infections, blood transfusions are safer than they have ever been,'' McCall says. "However, there is an ever-increasing body of research about adverse outcomes in association with them. Still there is a tendency to think that blood transfusions are mystical and lifesaving, and it is better to give them than to withhold them.'' The reasons not to make blood transfusion routine are becoming increasingly apparent: a person who has had a blood transfusion after surgery has up to four times the risk of wound infections. People who have blood transfusions during cancer surgery face up to twice the risk of the cancer recurring.

In his conference presentation, Spiess discussed Swedish research on cardiac patients that compared Jehovah's Witnesses who refused blood transfusions to patients with similar disease progression during open-heart surgery. The research found those who refused transfusions had noticeably better survival rates.

There are a few major reasons complications arise following transfusion. For one thing, immune response is impaired as the body responds to the blood as a foreign body, much in the same way it responds to a transplant, experts say. The properties of red blood cells also become altered when blood is stored, reducing their ability to distribute oxygen through the body. Yet at least 25 per cent of transfusions that are done could be avoided, Spiess says.

A 2005-2006 audit of the use of fresh frozen plasma in hospitals in Tasmania and Victoria found that one-third of the transfusions performed were inappropriate under underguidelines issued by the National Health and Medical Research Council, says associate professor Larry McNicol, who also chairs the Better Safer Transfusion program run by the Victorian Government. "Essentially these patients really perhaps didn't need it and there might not have been therapeutic benefits,'' McNicol says.

But there are still circumstances when blood transfusion is necessary, and the patient would probably die if they did not receive one, says University of Sydney professor James Isbister, a consultant on haemotology and blood transfusion who chairs the Red Cross advisory board. Isbister says blood transfusion can be vital for patients undergoing major surgery after experiencing major trauma or shock when there is major bleeding that is difficult to control quickly. It can also be instrumental in managing hemophilia, where blood does not clot, as well as acute hemorrhages. "A lot of major surgery would never have developed without the possibility for blood transfusion either - for instance, open heart surgery,'' Isbister says.

But many of the cases in the Better Safer Transfusion audit involved transfusions that could have been avoided. For example, it was once thought that blood transfusions should be performed any time a patient's hemoglobin level dipped below 10 grams of hemoglobin per decilitre of blood - but now guidelines in varying countries put that between 6 and 8g. "It used to be that 10g was the acceptable minimum, but now we know that patients are at no detriment by a running a lower count and we can avoid these additional risks,'' McCall says. "When the blood count is lower, the heart is able to beat more strongly - so it can actually pump more efficiently to distribute the blood better.''

The audit also uncovered a tendency for some doctors to use transfusions as a precaution in patients who were at risk of bleeding, but not yet bleeding - for example, they might have had abnormal test results. In those cases the guidelines recommend doctors wait until bleeding starts. Other studies have also shown that the likelihood of receiving a transfusion during elective orthopaedic surgery or cardiac surgery can vary enormously between hospitals, despite there being little difference between the patients, Isbister says. "There's huge variation between hospitals and surgeons depending on where you have your operation - in one hospital you can have an 80 per cent chance of being transfused, and in another hospital 10 per cent chance.'' "Most patients undergoing hip and knee surgery should only have a 10 to 20 per cent chance of needing a transfusion - but there's evidence it can be much higher.''

There are a number of ways to avoid transfusions, including drugs that minimise blood loss and others that stop clots from being dissolved, as well as anesthetic and surgical techniques to minimise blood loss. "You don't always have to bring a person's blood pressure up to normal - you can keep it low and that minimises bleeding,'' he says.

In surgery where there's a risk of major blood loss, doctors frequently use a technique called "red cells salvage'', which allows them to reuse the patient's own blood rather than transfusing someone else's. The patient's blood is collected in a machine where it is then washed in a saline solution before being given back to the patient.

But the battle to reduce unnecessary transfusions often begins before surgery. "One of the ways to minimise transfusions is to prepare patients better before surgery - for example you can give them supplements to get their blood count up before surgery,'' McCall says. To that end a 2005 South Australian audit found that 18 per cent of people who had been on waiting lists for elective surgery had anemia, which increases the chances of needing a transfusion. If the anemia had been better managed before surgery some of those patients could have avoided blood transfusions, according to Kathryn Robinson, medical adviser of South Australia's BloodSafe.

But for all the bad news, experts say that change is on the horizon. Various states are developing initiatives to help decrease unnecessary transfusions, and at a conference of federal and state health ministers in March the federal Government said it would fund two initiatives expected to improve the safety of the blood supply and improve outcomes for people who do ultimately need transfusions. One of those initiatives is the universal testing of platelets, which carry particularly high risks of complications. Unlike other blood products, platelets can't be refrigerated, so they are susceptible to contamination by bacteria. International guidelines recommend all platelets be universally tested for the bacteria, but currently only about 5 per cent of the supply is tested, McNicol says.

At the same meeting the government announced that by 2010 all blood will be processed to remove white blood cells, known as leuko-reduced blood, which has been shown to dramatically reduce complications and is already in widespread use in Canada, New Zealand, Western Europe and elsewhere. "There are three randomised controlled studies in heart surgery, where patients who were deemed appropriate to be transfused got either leuko-reduced blood or blood with white cells present,'' Spiess says. "The death rate in those with leuko-reduced blood was roughly half that in those with blood with white cells,'' Speiss says. "In the patients that got no blood, there were no deaths at all.'' [Quite amazing testimony to the fragile status of medical "wisdom". And it is this false "wisdom" that has been enforced by law in many places!]

Source



British Food Fascism Hits Egg Advertisement

We read:

"Fifty years after Britons were implored to "Go to work on an egg", an advertising watchdog has banned a revival of the campaign, saying that it breaches health guidelines. Plans to mark the anniversary by broadcasting the original television advertisements featuring Tony Hancock have had to be called off.

The ban by the Broadcast Advertising Clearance Centre, which vets television advertisements, was condemned as ridiculous yesterday by the novelist Fay Weldon, who used to work in advertising and helped to create the campaign. "I think the ruling is absurd," she said. "We seem to have been tainted by all the health and safety laws. If they are going to ban egg adverts then I think they should ban all car adverts, because cars really are dangerous, and bad for the environment.

The advertising clearance centre, a government-backed watchdog, says that it blocked the campaign because eating an egg for breakfast every day was not a "varied diet". ....

The egg information service offered to add a line to the adverts saying that eggs should be eaten as part of a varied diet. The compromise was rejected.

The egg information servicesaid it was shocked by the ruling. It said eggs were a healthy food recommended by nutritionists and many other advertisers promote their products to be eaten every day, "so we are very surprised eggs have been singled out.

Source

****************

Just some problems with the "Obesity" war:

1). It tries to impose behavior change on everybody -- when most of those targeted are not obese and hence have no reason to change their behaviour. It is a form of punishing the innocent and the guilty alike. (It is also typical of Leftist thinking: Scorning the individual and capable of dealing with large groups only).

2). The longevity research all leads to the conclusion that it is people of MIDDLING weight who live longest -- not slim people. So the "epidemic" of obesity is in fact largely an "epidemic" of living longer.

3). It is total calorie intake that makes you fat -- not where you get your calories. Policies that attack only the source of the calories (e.g. "junk food") without addressing total calorie intake are hence pissing into the wind. People involuntarily deprived of their preferred calorie intake from one source are highly likely to seek and find their calories elsewhere.

4). So-called junk food is perfectly nutritious. A big Mac meal comprises meat, bread, salad and potatoes -- which is a mainstream Western diet. If that is bad then we are all in big trouble.

5). Food warriors demonize salt and fat. But we need a daily salt intake to counter salt-loss through perspiration and the research shows that people on salt-restricted diets die SOONER. And Eskimos eat huge amounts of fat with no apparent ill-effects. And the average home-cooked roast dinner has LOTS of fat. Will we ban roast dinners?

6). The foods restricted are often no more calorific than those permitted -- such as milk and fruit-juice drinks.

7). Tendency to weight is mostly genetic and is therefore not readily susceptible to voluntary behaviour change.

8). And when are we going to ban cheese? Cheese is a concentrated calorie bomb and has lots of that wicked animal fat in it too. Wouldn't we all be better off without it? And what about butter and margarine? They are just about pure fat. Surely they should be treated as contraband in kids' lunchboxes! [/sarcasm].

Trans fats:

For one summary of the weak science behind the "trans-fat" hysteria, see here. Trans fats have only a temporary effect on blood chemistry and the evidence of lasting harm from them is dubious. By taking extreme groups in trans fats intake, some weak association with coronary heart disease has at times been shown in some sub-populations but extreme group studies are inherently at risk of confounding with other factors and are intrinsically of little interest to the average person.

The use of extreme quintiles (fifths) to examine effects is in fact so common as to be almost universal but suggests to the experienced observer that the differences between the mean scores of the experimental and control groups were not statistically significant -- thus making the article concerned little more than an exercise in deception

*********************



20 June, 2007

A gene for deafness

A gene that contributes to one of the commonest causes of deafness has been identified for the first time, in a step towards improving diagnosis and treatment. People with otosclerosis, the most common reason for hearing loss among white adults, are more likely to carry a particular variant of a gene called TGBF1 than those who are unaffected, scientists in Belgium have discovered.

The findings, from a team based at the University of Antwerp, promise new insights into the origins and development of the condition, which usually begins in the twenties or thirties and affects about one in 250 people. In the long term, that could lead to new ways of preventing and treating otosclerosis, for which the best option today is usually an operation that is not always effective. One of the most attractive prospects would be to use the new genetic clue to design a drug that stops the progression of otosclerosis before it causes potentially irreversible tinnitus and hearing loss. Much more research is still needed to confirm the effect, to establish how it influences the disorder, and to develop a drug. Melissa Thys, who led the study team, said that it could be ten years before the results have an impact on medicine.

Otosclerosis is known to be affected by genetic and environmental factors. TGBF1 is the first gene to be conclusively linked to it. The find is especially promising because the gene is known to be involved in the embryonic development of the ear and influences a pathway that appears important to the progression of otosclerosis.

The condition involves abnormal bone growth in the middle ear, which impairs movement of the stapes or "stirrup" - the last of the three tiny bones that transmit sound to the inner ear. It generally causes tinnitus and the loss of hearing at lower frequencies.

Ms Thys, who presented the research to the European Society of Human Genetics conference in Nice yesterday, said: "The gene in which the variant is located points to a pathway that contributes to the disease. This may be a lead for better forms of treatment in the future. Currently the best option is an operation. However, there is often an additional component of hearing loss, which can't be restored by surgery. As the gene involved is a growth factor, and the disease manifests itself by the abnormal growth of bone in the middle ear, it may have a large potential for therapy."

In the study, Ms Thys's team compared 630 patients with otosclerosis with the same number of unaffected controls in Belgium and the Netherlands. They found that a protective variant of TGBF1 was carried by 7 per cent of healthy subjects, compared with only 2.5 per cent of the otosclerosis group. The data has been confirmed in a French group of 457 patients and 497 controls. Ms Thys said: "Combining the data from both groups with a common odds ratio gave a significant result, from which we were able to conclude that we were the first to identify a gene that influences the susceptibility for otosclerosis. And, as further evidence, we were also able to show that a more active variant of this gene is protective against the disease."

Catriona Crombie, of the Royal National Institute for Deaf People, welcomed the findings. "The discovery of this gene responsible for a common cause of hearing loss is a fantastic breakthrough," she said. "The effects of otosclerosis can be devastating - imagine the frustration of incessant ringing in your ears, or of being constantly asked to `speak up'. "Researchers can now focus their effort on this gene and the processes it controls to develop new ways of preventing and treating otosclerosis." "If a drug could be developed for this devastating condition, it could save many from repeated painful surgery. This study highlights the vital role genetic research can play in helping us understand the causes of many types of hearing loss, which could lead to ways of protecting and restoring hearing ."

Source




Another oldster gives his recipe for long life

The fact that the recipes vary so much suggests that it is your genes rather than what you do or eat that matters. So eat what you like!

With Japan’s welfare system buckling under the demands of an ageing society, the world’s oldest man apologised yesterday for his longevity. As Tomoji Tanabe, 111, received his certificate from Guinness World Records, the former engineer, who never touches alcohol, said that his feat of survival was nothing special. “I have been around too long,” he joked, “I am sorry.”

Mr Tanabe added his customary explanation of how he has managed to reach such a ripe old age: “Not drinking alcohol is the best formula for keeping myself healthy,” he said. Other residents of his village attributed Mr Tanabe’s long life to a diet that consists chiefly of vegetables and very little fried food.

His explanation fuels a continuing mystery about the ideal formula for longevity – as each new holder of the title is crowned, each attributes his or her success to diets, lifestyles and habits that differ widely. Some have said that fresh air is the key, others have been heavy smokers. Some have taken vigorous exercise, others have sworn by periods of inactivity.

The Mayor of Miyakonojo, the village where Mr Tanabe lives with his family, presented the certificate to its famous resident after nearly five months of birthdate verification by the Guinness World Records team. Mr Tanabe unofficially inherited the title when its previous incumbent, Emiliano Mercado del Toro, of Puerto Rico, died in January, aged 115. The crowning of Mr Tanabe, who was born in the southern island of Kyushi in 1895, brings the coveted “double trophy” back to Japan. Yone Minagawa, who lives in the same prefecture, is 114 and holds the title of world’s oldest woman.

Japan’s population of centenarians is the largest in the world. Most of the 28,000 Japanese who have made it beyond 100 are women and the highest concentration of the very elderly is in the southern part of the archipelago. The area around Hiroshima and the island of Okinawa are especially rich in former “world’s oldest” title holders.

The number of centenarians has risen 160-fold since records began in the 1960s. Although Japan is proud of its record-breaking longevity, the success of Mr Tanabe comes as the country is running short of ideas for how to solve its ageing crisis. With the fertility rate still at record lows, government and private sector efforts to stimulate the birthrate have met with little success. As the number of children dwindles, the future welfare burden for working-age Japanese may become intolerably large.

The problem is already acute in the very rural areas where the likes of Mr Tanabe and Ms Yone have grown so old. The few children who are born in those regions move quickly to the big cities when they grow up, pushing the average age of some villages above 50.

Source

****************

Just some problems with the "Obesity" war:

1). It tries to impose behavior change on everybody -- when most of those targeted are not obese and hence have no reason to change their behaviour. It is a form of punishing the innocent and the guilty alike. (It is also typical of Leftist thinking: Scorning the individual and capable of dealing with large groups only).

2). The longevity research all leads to the conclusion that it is people of MIDDLING weight who live longest -- not slim people. So the "epidemic" of obesity is in fact largely an "epidemic" of living longer.

3). It is total calorie intake that makes you fat -- not where you get your calories. Policies that attack only the source of the calories (e.g. "junk food") without addressing total calorie intake are hence pissing into the wind. People involuntarily deprived of their preferred calorie intake from one source are highly likely to seek and find their calories elsewhere.

4). So-called junk food is perfectly nutritious. A big Mac meal comprises meat, bread, salad and potatoes -- which is a mainstream Western diet. If that is bad then we are all in big trouble.

5). Food warriors demonize salt and fat. But we need a daily salt intake to counter salt-loss through perspiration and the research shows that people on salt-restricted diets die SOONER. And Eskimos eat huge amounts of fat with no apparent ill-effects. And the average home-cooked roast dinner has LOTS of fat. Will we ban roast dinners?

6). The foods restricted are often no more calorific than those permitted -- such as milk and fruit-juice drinks.

7). Tendency to weight is mostly genetic and is therefore not readily susceptible to voluntary behaviour change.

8). And when are we going to ban cheese? Cheese is a concentrated calorie bomb and has lots of that wicked animal fat in it too. Wouldn't we all be better off without it? And what about butter and margarine? They are just about pure fat. Surely they should be treated as contraband in kids' lunchboxes! [/sarcasm].

Trans fats:

For one summary of the weak science behind the "trans-fat" hysteria, see here. Trans fats have only a temporary effect on blood chemistry and the evidence of lasting harm from them is dubious. By taking extreme groups in trans fats intake, some weak association with coronary heart disease has at times been shown in some sub-populations but extreme group studies are inherently at risk of confounding with other factors and are intrinsically of little interest to the average person.

The use of extreme quintiles (fifths) to examine effects is in fact so common as to be almost universal but suggests to the experienced observer that the differences between the mean scores of the experimental and control groups were not statistically significant -- thus making the article concerned little more than an exercise in deception

*********************



19 June, 2007

Expanding lifespans make health doomsters look absurd

Most of the oldsters discussed below would have grown up on a diet heavy in animal fat, salt, sugar and just about everything the food freaks deplore

WHEN Judy Meade turned 50 she bought herself a speedboat and learnt to water-ski. That was 50 years ago. This year she marked her 100th birthday with a regular glass of red wine and a few choice remarks about those who feel sorry for the aged. "I haven't seen a doctor in years," said the Atlanta-based widow. "I don't believe in them. They haven't done a darn thing for me. There really isn't anything difficult about being 100."

As a centenarian in rude health, Meade is far from being unusual. America is beginning to wake up to a demographic revolution that is forcing officials to redefine old age and life expectancy. As the 20th century's postwar baby-boom generation edges towards retirement, scientists are predicting explosive growth in the segment of the population aged 100 or older. There are currently more than 80,000 centenarians in America; by 2050 there will be more than 1m.

Despite a constant drumbeat of warnings that everything we eat is contributing to our imminent demise, recent studies have confirmed that human longevity is steadily expanding, especially in the country that invented the fat-clogged cheeseburger. "The centenarians we are studying disprove the perception that `the older you get, the sicker you get'," said Dr Thomas Perls of the Boston University School of Medicine, which is conducting the world's largest research project into the health and lives of 100-year-olds. He added: "Centenarians teach us that the older you get, the healthier you've been."

In a study of 800 centenarians and around 700 of their siblings and children, Perls and his team found that neither education nor socio-economic status played a significant role in living to 100. "Some have no years of school, others have postgraduate degrees. They are very poor to very rich. They are strictly vegetarian or have diets extremely rich in saturated fats," he said.

Yet several important patterns have emerged. Men who live to 100 tend to have lower than average blood pressure and are almost always lean. Most centenarians never smoked, and those who did gave up on average in their late fifties. But a few, like Meade in Atlanta, still smoke up to two packs a day.

The Boston study also found that women who give birth naturally after the age of 40 have a four times greater chance of living to 100 than other women. Bearing a child in your 40s may be a sign that the body is ageing slowly, Perls said.

Dementia is not inevitable. The study found that 30% of centenarians had no significant changes in their thinking abilities. A separate study of 100 centenarians by a nursing home chain found that 27 liked to watch the MTV music channel, 15 played video games, and four knew how to use an iPod.

The last US Census revealed that there are already 1m Americans aged 90-94. Improvements in health care will enable many of those to reach three figures, but there is one statistical imbalance that science has not yet been able to correct. At the age of 85, there are only 46 men for every 100 women. Centenarian romance has been found to be rare.

Source




Flesh-eating bacterium on rapid rise in Victoria

The original heading on this article referred to a "virus". Should journalists who obviously don't know the most basic things about biology be reporting on health-related matters? A bacterium is NOT a virus, nor anything like it. It is about as intelligent as saying a cat is a fungus

HUNDREDS of Victorians each year are contracting a virulent flesh-eating bug described by scientists as "the most dangerous in the world". More than 300 Victorians fell victim to the invasive 'A' streptococcal disease during a two-year period of a study and 25 of them died.

Medical experts want the disease to become a reportable condition in Victoria. Australian streptococcal expert Prof Jonathon Carapetis, who led the study, said people in Victoria were not being protected against the spread of the bacteria. "There is a strong case that people who come in contact with streptococcal patients are at risk," he said. "They should be given antibiotics to prevent contracting the nasty bug, as is done with those who come in contact with meningococcal - and they are not. "We also believe that immuno globulin and clindamycin can stop the bacteria, but most people are not being given these drugs."

The disease particularly affects children under five, pregnant women and the elderly. One of the victims in the study was a two-year-old child, with a history of a sore throat, who died of streptococcal bacteraemia.

Prof Carapetis said the Victorian health department needed to make it a notifiable disease because Victorians were at risk. "It has been around for decades and we suspect in that time there have been many more severe cases," he said.

The study, between 2002 and 2004, tracked the number of serious strep cases found in hospitals and GP's surgeries in Victoria. Of the 25 victims, five died from necrotising fasciitis (flesh-eating disease) caused by the streptococcal bacteria and 11 died from toxic shock because of overwhelming infection.

Source




Goji berry fad a fraud

THEY are extolled as a "miracle food" with powers to prevent cancer, heart disease and obesity. But experts warn trendy goji berries are nothing more than an expensive and cleverly marketed fruit. The dried red berries and juice have become the latest nutrition fad to hit Australia, flying off shelves in health food shops, supermarkets and shopping centre stalls.

They are not cheap, at up to $34 per 500g packet and $70 for a one-litre bottle. Yet suppliers say sales are sky-rocketing, with one company reportedly making $4 million in sales per month. According to marketing, the berry is one of the most nutrient-dense foods in the world, has anti-ageing properties and can help everything from cellulite and diabetes to impotence.

But the NSW Food Authority forbids distributors from making any health claims about goji berries, which are usually imported from Tibet or China. Kathy Chapman, a nutritionist with the Cancer Council NSW, said consumers should be aware goji berries do not have special benefits that you can't get from other fruit and vegetables. "The people who probably get most pulled in are those who have cancer, as they want to do everything they can to improve survival," she said. "But you can't say that goji berries will do that any better than any other fruit and vegetables."

Christopher Cooper, general manager in the Pacific region for goji juice distributor FreeLife, said his company had to be vigilant to stop eager distributors from making health claims about the berry. "A lot of Hollywood celebrities are name-dropping in relation to our products," Mr Cooper said. "There is a bit of a euphoria about goji juice, which for us is terrific, but we are not driving it. "We are doubling our sales every few months and making $4 million a month in sales of Himalayan Goji Juice."

The NSW Food Authority is currently investigating the activities of companies marketing the juice to ensure compliance with Australian food standards rules.

Source

****************

Just some problems with the "Obesity" war:

1). It tries to impose behavior change on everybody -- when most of those targeted are not obese and hence have no reason to change their behaviour. It is a form of punishing the innocent and the guilty alike. (It is also typical of Leftist thinking: Scorning the individual and capable of dealing with large groups only).

2). The longevity research all leads to the conclusion that it is people of MIDDLING weight who live longest -- not slim people. So the "epidemic" of obesity is in fact largely an "epidemic" of living longer.

3). It is total calorie intake that makes you fat -- not where you get your calories. Policies that attack only the source of the calories (e.g. "junk food") without addressing total calorie intake are hence pissing into the wind. People involuntarily deprived of their preferred calorie intake from one source are highly likely to seek and find their calories elsewhere.

4). So-called junk food is perfectly nutritious. A big Mac meal comprises meat, bread, salad and potatoes -- which is a mainstream Western diet. If that is bad then we are all in big trouble.

5). Food warriors demonize salt and fat. But we need a daily salt intake to counter salt-loss through perspiration and the research shows that people on salt-restricted diets die SOONER. And Eskimos eat huge amounts of fat with no apparent ill-effects. And the average home-cooked roast dinner has LOTS of fat. Will we ban roast dinners?

6). The foods restricted are often no more calorific than those permitted -- such as milk and fruit-juice drinks.

7). Tendency to weight is mostly genetic and is therefore not readily susceptible to voluntary behaviour change.

8). And when are we going to ban cheese? Cheese is a concentrated calorie bomb and has lots of that wicked animal fat in it too. Wouldn't we all be better off without it? And what about butter and margarine? They are just about pure fat. Surely they should be treated as contraband in kids' lunchboxes! [/sarcasm].

Trans fats:

For one summary of the weak science behind the "trans-fat" hysteria, see here. Trans fats have only a temporary effect on blood chemistry and the evidence of lasting harm from them is dubious. By taking extreme groups in trans fats intake, some weak association with coronary heart disease has at times been shown in some sub-populations but extreme group studies are inherently at risk of confounding with other factors and are intrinsically of little interest to the average person.

The use of extreme quintiles (fifths) to examine effects is in fact so common as to be almost universal but suggests to the experienced observer that the differences between the mean scores of the experimental and control groups were not statistically significant -- thus making the article concerned little more than an exercise in deception

*********************



18 June, 2007

Hope for liver cancer

A crying researcher woke Gunnar Riemann, the head of Bayer's $10 billion drug business, from his bed Feb. 9. They were tears of joy: A study had found that Nexavar, a drug Bayer invented and developed with tiny biotech Onyx Pharmaceuticals of Emeryville, Calif., extended the lives of patients with advanced liver cancer, the first time a treatment has been demonstrated to be effective for the hard to treat disease. Onyx shares jumped almost 10%, to $33.83, in early morning trading Monday.

Over the past 30 years, doctors have conducted about a 100 studies on various treatments to help these very sick patients, to no avail. However, in the case of Nexavar, Phase III clinical trials with 602 patients showed that it extended the life of the average patient by 2.8 months to 10.7 months, as compared to patients who received a placebo. Side effects were benign for a cancer drug, with the most common being severe diarrhea and rashes on the hands and feet. The data were set to be presented here Monday morning at the annual meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology.

"The results are a breakthrough," says Josep Llovet, a liver specialist with the Hospital Clinic of Barcelona and the Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York who helped organize and conduct the trial for Bayer. "The difference in survival is completely unprecedented. You are freezing the tumor and delaying the progression of the disease."

Liver cancer is one of the deadliest of cancers. It afflicts 19,000 people in the U.S. each year, killing the vast majority. For many patients with the advanced form of the disease, Nexavar will now become the standard treatment, eventually generating hundreds of millions in sales for the partners. Liver cancer is far more prevalent overseas, with 600,000 new cases a year worldwide. The highest rates are in Asia, where hepatitis B and C are common. Nexavar is still being tested there.

Bayer and Onyx have been working toward this victory for 13 years. Bayer chemists developed Nexavar based on proteins Onyx identified that showed promise for halting tumor growth. The drug has already been approved and marketed for treating kidney tumors, and the two companies last year spent $160 million testing it in new diseases.

While the promising results for Nexavar may bring tears to the eyes of Bayer researchers and hope to cancer patients, doctors have lately become used to such breakthroughs, with pharmaceutical giants like Pfizer, GlaxoSmithKline and AstraZeneca testing dozens of new targeted cancer pills. Bayer recently bought German rival Schering AG partly to get its hands on that company's cancer drug pipeline.

This year's meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) is a "building year," says David Parkinson, head of oncology at Biogen Idec. David Schenkein, a Genentech vice president, says the advances are "incremental."

Pfizer's kidney cancer drug Sutent has been outpacing Nexavar, with sales of $102 million versus $60 million for Nexavar in the first quarter of 2007. But study results for Sutent on liver cancer look less promising, and an abstract already presented here seems to point to a far worse side-effect profile for Sutent than Nexavar in treating that form of the disease. Reduced white blood cell and platelet counts were common, and there were five patients who developed very serious problems, including liver problems and bleeding. Pfizer notes that the study is small and early.

Source




Another angle to the attack on Foie gras

Mostly speculation, of course

FOIE GRAS, enjoyed as a luxury since ancient Egyptian times, may be linked to the onset of diseases including Alzheimer's, type 2 diabetes and rheumatoid arthritis, researchers have suggested. The scientists who carried out the study say those with a family history of such illnesses should consider avoiding foie gras.

The possible risk comes from "amyloid" proteins found in the delicacy, which is made from the swollen livers of force-fed geese and ducks. The proteins have been linked to the onset of all these conditions. In their study, the researchers found mice fed on foie gras started growing amyloid proteins in various organs. They observed a similar result when extract of foie gras was injected into the rodents' bloodstream. "It may be hazardous for individuals who are prone to develop other types of amyloid-related disorders such as Alzheimer's or type 2 diabetes to consume such products," said Alan Solomon, an expert in amyloid diseases at the University of Tennessee medical school, who led the research.

Foie gras has long been controversial because of the way food is forced down the birds' throats. In Britain it fetches premium prices with Fortnum & Mason offering a 310g goose liver - enough to make starters for four or five people - for 60 pounds. But one department store chain, House of Fraser, recently announced it would stop stocking foie gras.

Amyloid disease occurs when proteins that would normally be soluble undergo a change in shape. This makes them form insoluble clumps in organs that damages the way they work. Such abnormal behaviour by proteins seems to play a role in many diseases, including BSE, Alzheimer's, type 2 diabetes and rheumatoid arthritis. There appear to be many triggers for creating such rogue proteins in the body - one of them is eating foods that already contain them. It was, for example, the consumption of brains from cattle infected with BSE that transmitted the disease to humans, killing 161 Britons since 1995.

The possible link between food and amyloid diseases needs to be confirmed by further studies, for example comparing populations to see how disease prevalence varies with diet. The stakes could be high. In Britain, out of a population of 60m, there are already 700,000 people with dementia. France, with a similar population, has 1m sufferers. But there are many causes and the difference in prevalence is not being linked to far higher French consumption of foie gras. [How restrained!]

Source

****************

Just some problems with the "Obesity" war:

1). It tries to impose behavior change on everybody -- when most of those targeted are not obese and hence have no reason to change their behaviour. It is a form of punishing the innocent and the guilty alike. (It is also typical of Leftist thinking: Scorning the individual and capable of dealing with large groups only).

2). The longevity research all leads to the conclusion that it is people of MIDDLING weight who live longest -- not slim people. So the "epidemic" of obesity is in fact largely an "epidemic" of living longer.

3). It is total calorie intake that makes you fat -- not where you get your calories. Policies that attack only the source of the calories (e.g. "junk food") without addressing total calorie intake are hence pissing into the wind. People involuntarily deprived of their preferred calorie intake from one source are highly likely to seek and find their calories elsewhere.

4). So-called junk food is perfectly nutritious. A big Mac meal comprises meat, bread, salad and potatoes -- which is a mainstream Western diet. If that is bad then we are all in big trouble.

5). Food warriors demonize salt and fat. But we need a daily salt intake to counter salt-loss through perspiration and the research shows that people on salt-restricted diets die SOONER. And Eskimos eat huge amounts of fat with no apparent ill-effects. And the average home-cooked roast dinner has LOTS of fat. Will we ban roast dinners?

6). The foods restricted are often no more calorific than those permitted -- such as milk and fruit-juice drinks.

7). Tendency to weight is mostly genetic and is therefore not readily susceptible to voluntary behaviour change.

8). And when are we going to ban cheese? Cheese is a concentrated calorie bomb and has lots of that wicked animal fat in it too. Wouldn't we all be better off without it? And what about butter and margarine? They are just about pure fat. Surely they should be treated as contraband in kids' lunchboxes! [/sarcasm].

Trans fats:

For one summary of the weak science behind the "trans-fat" hysteria, see here. Trans fats have only a temporary effect on blood chemistry and the evidence of lasting harm from them is dubious. By taking extreme groups in trans fats intake, some weak association with coronary heart disease has at times been shown in some sub-populations but extreme group studies are inherently at risk of confounding with other factors and are intrinsically of little interest to the average person.

The use of extreme quintiles (fifths) to examine effects is in fact so common as to be almost universal but suggests to the experienced observer that the differences between the mean scores of the experimental and control groups were not statistically significant -- thus making the article concerned little more than an exercise in deception

*********************



17 June, 2007

Mind-numbing stupidity

Read the media report below and see if you can see what is truly weird about it

OBESITY could soon be treated with a new drug that reduces the urge to binge eat, according to research in the American Journal of Physiology – Endocrinology and Metabolism. The drug is a synthetic form of the hormone amylin, which is produced by the pancreas and causes a feeling of fullness during eating. The study involved 88 obese men and women aged 25 to 60. For six weeks, participants received either the drug or an inactive placebo by self-injection under the skin, 15 minutes before each meal (breakfast, lunch and dinner). By the end of the study, those receiving the drug had reduced their daily calorie intake by 680 and lost an average of two kilograms, while those in the placebo group reduced their calorie intake by only 191 and stayed the same weight. While the group taking the drug also reduced their portion sizes, they reported feeling just as full and satisfied as the placebo group.

Source

Does anybody seriously believe that fatties would self-inject themselves before each meal day in and day out just so they could feel a little fuller?? My guess is that the average time anybody would persist with such an invasive and unpleasant routine would be less than one week. I doubt that most would make it through a day




DNA RULEZ!

A new understanding of how DNA shapes our health and makes us human has emerged from the most exhaustive analysis yet of the workings of the human genome. The first "parts list" of genetic elements that are biologically active in the body has revealed that DNA functions in a much more complex fashion than was once assumed, offering insights into the inherited roots of diseases such as diabetes and cancer.

The work of the Encode Consortium - the acronym stands for Encyclopedia of DNA Elements - also sheds important light on the genetic differences that separate humans from chimpanzees and other species. While the human genome is made up of approximately three billion DNA "letters", only about 3 per cent of these are known to contribute to 22,000 or so genes - DNA "sentences" containing instructions for making proteins that control the body's chemical reactions. Most of the remaining 97 per cent has traditionally been thought of as "junk DNA", which appeared to be an evolutionary relic that performed no tasks of significance. The new research shows that much of this junk DNA is not redundant but is chemically active in ways that influence how genes are switched on and off. Mutations in these regulatory genetic regions are thus likely to explain some of our varying susceptibility to disease - some have already been linked to type 2 diabetes and prostate and colon tumours.

While the bulk of our genes are shared with other organisms, much more of our [so-called] junk DNA is peculiar to our species: 99 per cent of human and chimpanzee genes are identical compared with only 96 per cent of all DNA. As there is more variation in the junk, this could influence traits such as intelligence and language.

Ewan Birney, of the European Bioinformatics Institute, near Cambridge, who led the analysis, said: "Our data certainly agree with the idea that many of the differences between mammals lie in this junk DNA. We now have a much better idea of what most of our DNA might actually be doing. That is also going to help us to characterise what is going on in disease."

Francis Collins, director of the US National Human Genome Research Institute, which funded the project, said: "This impressive effort has uncovered many exciting surprises and blazed the way for future efforts to explore the functional landscape of the entire human genome."

The consortium, which pub-lishes its results today in Nature and Genome Research, set out to examine what every bit of DNA does by looking in detail at 30 million letters or base pairs - 1 per cent of the genome. About 3 per cent of the DNA - the genes - was found to be transcribed into the signalling molecule RNA and then to make proteins. Another 6 per cent hitherto regarded as junk, however, was unexpectedly found to be written into RNA without producing proteins. It is this part of the genome that appears to play a critical regulatory role, controlling when genes are active or silent.

Some of this active DNA outside genes, however, appears to make RNA without affecting the functions of cells - it is chemically alive but neutral. While scientists do not yet know what proportion is neutral, or why, one theory is that it provides a stock of genetic material from which potentially useful mutations can arise to drive evolution. "It may be a kind of warehouse for natural selection," Dr Birney said. "Evolution seems to have kept this around for a reason, to somehow set itself up for the future. It is a bit like Pop Idol- if you throw the net widely, you can pick up talent when it appears." The Encode team is working to scale up the project to cover the entire human genome.

Source

****************

Just some problems with the "Obesity" war:

1). It tries to impose behavior change on everybody -- when most of those targeted are not obese and hence have no reason to change their behaviour. It is a form of punishing the innocent and the guilty alike. (It is also typical of Leftist thinking: Scorning the individual and capable of dealing with large groups only).

2). The longevity research all leads to the conclusion that it is people of MIDDLING weight who live longest -- not slim people. So the "epidemic" of obesity is in fact largely an "epidemic" of living longer.

3). It is total calorie intake that makes you fat -- not where you get your calories. Policies that attack only the source of the calories (e.g. "junk food") without addressing total calorie intake are hence pissing into the wind. People involuntarily deprived of their preferred calorie intake from one source are highly likely to seek and find their calories elsewhere.

4). So-called junk food is perfectly nutritious. A big Mac meal comprises meat, bread, salad and potatoes -- which is a mainstream Western diet. If that is bad then we are all in big trouble.

5). Food warriors demonize salt and fat. But we need a daily salt intake to counter salt-loss through perspiration and the research shows that people on salt-restricted diets die SOONER. And Eskimos eat huge amounts of fat with no apparent ill-effects. And the average home-cooked roast dinner has LOTS of fat. Will we ban roast dinners?

6). The foods restricted are often no more calorific than those permitted -- such as milk and fruit-juice drinks.

7). Tendency to weight is mostly genetic and is therefore not readily susceptible to voluntary behaviour change.

8). And when are we going to ban cheese? Cheese is a concentrated calorie bomb and has lots of that wicked animal fat in it too. Wouldn't we all be better off without it? And what about butter and margarine? They are just about pure fat. Surely they should be treated as contraband in kids' lunchboxes! [/sarcasm].

Trans fats:

For one summary of the weak science behind the "trans-fat" hysteria, see here. Trans fats have only a temporary effect on blood chemistry and the evidence of lasting harm from them is dubious. By taking extreme groups in trans fats intake, some weak association with coronary heart disease has at times been shown in some sub-populations but extreme group studies are inherently at risk of confounding with other factors and are intrinsically of little interest to the average person.

The use of extreme quintiles (fifths) to examine effects is in fact so common as to be almost universal but suggests to the experienced observer that the differences between the mean scores of the experimental and control groups were not statistically significant -- thus making the article concerned little more than an exercise in deception

*********************



16 June, 2007

Hay fever makes you dumb?

I think it is obvious that sneezing and sore eyes (which I myself suffer badly from) would be distracting and tiring during an exam but I doubt that there is anything more than that going on. I hate to state the boringly obvious again but the fact that those on medication did worse probably means that it was they whose symptoms were worse. The absurd original heading on this article was: "Hay fever drugs ‘cost students an exam grade’". Hostility to drug companies obviously matters a lot more than the facts

Nearly three quarters of students taking hay fever medication can expect to drop a grade in their exams this year as ingredients in the most popular remedies interfere with their ability to concentrate, research suggests. Even hay fever sufferers not taking any medication face a 40 per cent risk of achieving lower grades than expected as a result of their condition, the study by the Education for Health charity has found. The study was funded by the drug firm Shering-Plough, which makes several hay fever remedies.

Samantha Walker, the charity's director of research and the lead author of the study, said that for too long hay fever had been regarded as a trivial condition. "Hay fever peaks between the ages of 14 and 24. This is precisely the time when many people are doing life-changing exams and we need to take it seriously," she said. She hoped that the study, based on the exam performance of 1,834 15 to 17-year-olds, would open a discussion on how to "remove the bias operating against those with hay fever" by shifting the examination season to a time that does not coincide with the peak pollen count. Dr Walker said she also hoped that the study, the first to analyse the impact of the condition on exam performance, would help students to manage their hay fever symptoms better by directing them towards the most appropriate, nonsedating medication.

The study compared the exam performance of participants in mock and final GCSE exams for maths, English or science. The normal expectation is that most children will achieve the same grade achieved in their mocks, or with increased effort, improve on them when sitting the exam. Any drop in grade is therefore unexpected. But the study found that those who had hay fever symptoms on an exam day were 40 per cent more likely to drop a grade between their mock and their final exam. This increased to 70 per cent if they were on a sedating allergy medication at the time of their exam.

Teenagers with severe hay fever, and a history of symptoms in previous years, were twice as likely to drop a grade. Michelle Cox, 18, sneezed her way through her English literature A Level paper on Monday and fears that it may well have cost her a grade. Ms Cox, from Bexleyheath, South London, had a similar experience when she sat her GCSE maths paper. "I was sneezing and my nose really hurt and I was so tired. I got a grade D, but had been expected to get a C," she said. She takes hay fever medication every day, but was not aware that it might be making her drowsy. She is hoping that things will improve for her remaining three A level papers.

Some 28 per cent of students on hay fever medication were on a sedating antihistamine. This is despite the wide availability of effective nonsedating treatments and guidelines recommending their use. Dr Walker said that the sedating treatments, containing the drug chlorpheniramine and most usually sold under the name Piriton, adversely affected exam performance. Students who fear that hay fever has interfered with their results can apply to the Joint Council for Qualifications, for their condition to be taken into account.

Source




Obesity treated as child neglect in Britain

In a world where science trumped politics, it would be treated as a genetic abnormality

Obesity has played a part in at least 20 child-protection cases across Britain in the past year, a study has found. Fifty paediatricians were asked by the BBC if they thought that childhood obesity could be a child-protection issue.

One doctor spoke of a 10-year-old girl who could walk only a few yards with a stick. He believed that her parents were "killing her slowly" with a diet of chips and high-fat food. Some doctors now believe that extreme cases of overfeeding a young child should be seen as a form of abuse or neglect, according to the report.

Tabitha Randell, a consultant from Nottingham, said that in one case she saw a child aged 2«, who weighed more than 4st (25.4 kg). She said: "They said she was big-boned and they were, too. Parents' perception is a very real problem."

Source



Dangerous cookies

Just for fun I reproduce below the label on a packet of peanut cookies that I bought from the local IGA supermarket today. I am sure the supplier put on the label exactly the warning mandated by the bureaucrats. For the record, each cookie did visibly have peanuts protruding from it. I would not have bought them otherwise. I certainly wanted more than "traces" of nuts in them.



****************

Just some problems with the "Obesity" war:

1). It tries to impose behavior change on everybody -- when most of those targeted are not obese and hence have no reason to change their behaviour. It is a form of punishing the innocent and the guilty alike. (It is also typical of Leftist thinking: Scorning the individual and capable of dealing with large groups only).

2). The longevity research all leads to the conclusion that it is people of MIDDLING weight who live longest -- not slim people. So the "epidemic" of obesity is in fact largely an "epidemic" of living longer.

3). It is total calorie intake that makes you fat -- not where you get your calories. Policies that attack only the source of the calories (e.g. "junk food") without addressing total calorie intake are hence pissing into the wind. People involuntarily deprived of their preferred calorie intake from one source are highly likely to seek and find their calories elsewhere.

4). So-called junk food is perfectly nutritious. A big Mac meal comprises meat, bread, salad and potatoes -- which is a mainstream Western diet. If that is bad then we are all in big trouble.

5). Food warriors demonize salt and fat. But we need a daily salt intake to counter salt-loss through perspiration and the research shows that people on salt-restricted diets die SOONER. And Eskimos eat huge amounts of fat with no apparent ill-effects. And the average home-cooked roast dinner has LOTS of fat. Will we ban roast dinners?

6). The foods restricted are often no more calorific than those permitted -- such as milk and fruit-juice drinks.

7). Tendency to weight is mostly genetic and is therefore not readily susceptible to voluntary behaviour change.

8). And when are we going to ban cheese? Cheese is a concentrated calorie bomb and has lots of that wicked animal fat in it too. Wouldn't we all be better off without it? And what about butter and margarine? They are just about pure fat. Surely they should be treated as contraband in kids' lunchboxes! [/sarcasm].

Trans fats:

For one summary of the weak science behind the "trans-fat" hysteria, see here. Trans fats have only a temporary effect on blood chemistry and the evidence of lasting harm from them is dubious. By taking extreme groups in trans fats intake, some weak association with coronary heart disease has at times been shown in some sub-populations but extreme group studies are inherently at risk of confounding with other factors and are intrinsically of little interest to the average person.

The use of extreme quintiles (fifths) to examine effects is in fact so common as to be almost universal but suggests to the experienced observer that the differences between the mean scores of the experimental and control groups were not statistically significant -- thus making the article concerned little more than an exercise in deception

*********************



15 June, 2007

Health screening as dangerous quackery

In A Day at the Races, the Marx Brothers’ 1937 classic, a generously unholstered matron, played by Margaret Dumont, threatens to leave the Standish Sanatorium because it cannot find anything wrong with her. “I’m going to someone who understands me, I’m going to Dr Hackenbush! . . . Why, I didn’t know there was a thing the matter with me until I met him!” she says. Hackenbush, played by Groucho, takes her money and feeds her pills intended for horses.

Some doctors suspect that today’s craze for screening is not so very different. Feeling healthy? Come and have a CT scan and we’ll soon find you’re not. It’s hard to escape the relentless plugging of health scans from pop-up ads on the internet to women’s magazines and even Men’s Health. We haven’t gone as far as the US, where CT scans are advertised on gantries over freeways, but the message is the same: a day spent being screened could save your life.

Rejecting this seductive patter may seem contrary, even Luddite. But screening can be dangerous. Companies offering scans imply that being screened will detect hidden medical problems so early that they can be nipped in the bud. The process is compared to giving the car a service or an MOT. Anybody failing to listen is selling themselves and their loved ones short. The presumption is that by acting now we can buy our way out of future ill-health and that it’s worth spending a lot of money to do it. When an American physician asked a group of 55-year-olds if they regarded cancer screening as an obligation, most said they did. Asked to choose between a whole-body scan and $1,000 in cash, 73 per cent went for the scan.

Exact UK figures are scarce, partly because the scanning companies are relatively new. But Prescan, who opened in London just eight months ago, say they have carried out an average of 25 full body scans a week at an average cost of 1,200 pounds — a total of 960,000.

But screening has a downside. At worst, it may increase your risk of disease. Equally, it could set you off on a conveyer-belt of ever more intrusive and unpleasant tests that will leave you poorer but no healthier. This month, the Committee on the Medical Aspects of Radiation in the Environment will discuss a draft report on the radiation doses from unregulated screening. The Department of Health asked it to investigate after warnings from bodies including the British Medical Association that scans could do more harm than good.

CT scans represent only about 6 per cent of the X-rays done in Britain, but are responsible for 40 per cent of the radiation exposure. A typical dose from a CT scanner is around 10 millisieverts per scan, 500 times as much as in a typical chest X-ray. That may be a price worth paying if the scan is being used to monitor treatment of a serious disease, but to expose healthy people to such high doses is hard to justify. The estimate is that a dose this high increases the lifetime risk of cancer by about one in 2,000. Are the benefits of CT scanning of healthy people greater than this? The scanning clinics’ response is that in 2 to 3 per cent of those scanned, some life-threatening abnormality is found. Sometimes they can be treated successfully. For these individuals, the benefit certainly exceeds the risks.

But for the generality, we simply don’t know. For every dangerous aneurysm discovered and dealt with, there are a plethora of what radiologists call “incidentalomas” — odd abnormalities that probably don’t matter but often need further investigations to make sure. In one US study of 1,200 body scans, nearly a third of patients were advised to have further tests, most of them unnecessary because there wasn’t anything wrong.

CT scans produce amazingly detailed images, and no two individuals are identical. As one American radiologist put it: “With this level of information, I have yet to see a normal patient.” Scanning clinics, well aware of these criticisms, have focused on magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) rather than CT scans. Prescan, for example, based in London, says: “CT scans have a very high incidence of false positives. In other words, when the scan does find something (which can be as high as 90 per cent of the time) it has to be investigated with further costly and often invasive procedures. “The finding is usually a benign tumour, cyst or scar tissue but the person has incurred the cost and the discomfort of further tests — plus the stress of waiting for results.” Peter Mace, the assistant medical director of BUPA, said that the private health insurance company does not offer whole-body scanning using either CT or MRI because the benefits have not been clearly demonstrated and the radiation dose — in the case of CT — is significant. “What we do do are closely focused scans on the heart, looking for evidence of calcium,” he said.

The rationale for this is that as hardening of the arteries develops, the amount of calcium detectable by CT scanning rises, and there are studies that correlate calcium scores with the risk of heart attacks. The issue is whether knowing this calcium score adds to the predictive value of the other risk factors for heart disease, such as cholesterol levels, blood pressure and smoking status. Last year the American Heart Association concluded that it did, but only in people at medium risk. In those of low or high risk, it adds no extra predictive value. “I think that there is a reasonable amount of evidence, and it is growing, that coronary calcium is important,” Dr Mace says. “What we haven’t got is evidence that knowing the coronary calcium score will make people live longer. But inferentially, using common sense, I believe that is true.”

Most people tend to see screening as an entirely benign procedure. But it is not. Muir Gray, for many years programme director of the UK National Screening Committee, puts it strongly. “All screening progammes do harm,” he said. “Some do good as well, and some do more harm than good.” For NHS screening programmes, strict rules apply. The disease being screened for must have an early stage, for which an effective treatment exists. There must be an effective test, shown to work in properly conducted trials, that does not throw up too many false results, either positive or negative. And the benefits in lives saved must exceed the risks.

Even when these criteria are met it is hard to be sure that a screening programme is justified, as the arguments over the effectiveness of breast mammography make clear. The claim is that breast cancer screening saves 300 lives a year in Britain, but critics contest it. Their reasons include a dearth of convincing blind trials, and that scans may pick up early tumours that never develop, causing unnecessary treatment.

Cervical screening is less contentious, and the NHS is now slowly implementing a bowel cancer screening programme. There is good evidence that the use of ultrasound to screen for aortic aneurysms — swellings of the blood vessels in the abdomen that can burst without warning — would be costeffective.

Private screening clinics do not need to satisfy such demanding criteria. They rely on the worried well — or, as one wag put it, the worried wealthy — to pay large sums of money for tests that have not been shown to be cost-effective or really to save lives. There is anecdotal evidence of patients for whom such a test does pick up something that matters — an aneurysm or a tumour. If it can be treated successfully, that is a positive outcome. If not, it may mean that someone has longer to live in the knowledge of an incurable disease.

The medical literature is short of any convincing evidence that MRI scans, used on healthy people, save lives — one reason why BUPA does not offer them, Dr Mace says. But companies such as Prescan, Preventicum and ScanandScreen do. A whole-body MRI scan at Prescan costs 1,090 pounds, or 1,390 if you add a CT scan of the heart. Prescan failed to respond to my requests for evidence that such scans do more than lighten a patient’s wallet. What we do know is that such scans do typically pick up medically significant findings in 1 to 2 per cent of healthy people tested.

In a proportion of these positive findings, something can be done. For example, the discovery of an aneurysm in the brain might justify life-saving surgery to repair it. But even then the situation is more complicated than it seems, as a team from the University of Edinburgh makes clear in the latest issue of the Journal of Medical Screening. For healthy people with no family history, the lifetime risk of a bleed from an aneurysm in the brain is 0.6 per cent. But aneurysms are found in about 2 per cent of people scanned.

That means that for every three found, less than one would ever have been a problem. But once an aneurysm is found, treatment is likely. If 1,000 adults were screened, 20 of them would be found with an aneurysm, only six of which would ever have bled. If all of these 20 were treated surgically, two would be dead, disabled or brain-damaged by one year after the operation, and in eight cases out of the 20 the operation would have been only partly successful, leaving a risk of a future bleed.

That makes the discovery of an aneurysm a far less positive thing than the scanning companies pretend. It would, in fact, face the patient with an agonising choice and a fair chance of being killed or disabled to treat a condition that might never have caused him or her any harm.

The Edinburgh team, led by Dr Rustam Al-Shahi Salman, are in little doubt. The balance of risks and benefits mean that brain MRI scans “cannot be recommended outside the context of a research study”. They go on: “Undoubtedly, further research is needed to establish whether whole-body screening is effective, although it would require a very large randomised trial. “Regulatory bodies in the UK should follow the example of others such as Health Canada and the Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Radiologists by stating their view on whether whole-body screening is appropriate.” MRI scans do have appropriate uses in screening. They are, for example, better at detecting breast cancer in young women than conventional mammography, and the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence recommends their use in women between 20 and 49 known to be at high risk of the disease because they carry a predisposing gene.

At the very least, the companies that offer whole-body scans should make it clear that the procedure is unproven and that there is no robust evidence to show health benefits from undergoing it. “Why not treat a loved one or a valued employee to the ultimate spring gift?” asks Preventicum on its website. Frankly, it’s a gift I would have no hesitation in turning down. I’d just as soon have a horse pill.

Source

****************

Just some problems with the "Obesity" war:

1). It tries to impose behavior change on everybody -- when most of those targeted are not obese and hence have no reason to change their behaviour. It is a form of punishing the innocent and the guilty alike. (It is also typical of Leftist thinking: Scorning the individual and capable of dealing with large groups only).

2). The longevity research all leads to the conclusion that it is people of MIDDLING weight who live longest -- not slim people. So the "epidemic" of obesity is in fact largely an "epidemic" of living longer.

3). It is total calorie intake that makes you fat -- not where you get your calories. Policies that attack only the source of the calories (e.g. "junk food") without addressing total calorie intake are hence pissing into the wind. People involuntarily deprived of their preferred calorie intake from one source are highly likely to seek and find their calories elsewhere.

4). So-called junk food is perfectly nutritious. A big Mac meal comprises meat, bread, salad and potatoes -- which is a mainstream Western diet. If that is bad then we are all in big trouble.

5). Food warriors demonize salt and fat. But we need a daily salt intake to counter salt-loss through perspiration and the research shows that people on salt-restricted diets die SOONER. And Eskimos eat huge amounts of fat with no apparent ill-effects. And the average home-cooked roast dinner has LOTS of fat. Will we ban roast dinners?

6). The foods restricted are often no more calorific than those permitted -- such as milk and fruit-juice drinks.

7). Tendency to weight is mostly genetic and is therefore not readily susceptible to voluntary behaviour change.

8). And when are we going to ban cheese? Cheese is a concentrated calorie bomb and has lots of that wicked animal fat in it too. Wouldn't we all be better off without it? And what about butter and margarine? They are just about pure fat. Surely they should be treated as contraband in kids' lunchboxes! [/sarcasm].

Trans fats:

For one summary of the weak science behind the "trans-fat" hysteria, see here. Trans fats have only a temporary effect on blood chemistry and the evidence of lasting harm from them is dubious. By taking extreme groups in trans fats intake, some weak association with coronary heart disease has at times been shown in some sub-populations but extreme group studies are inherently at risk of confounding with other factors and are intrinsically of little interest to the average person.

The use of extreme quintiles (fifths) to examine effects is in fact so common as to be almost universal but suggests to the experienced observer that the differences between the mean scores of the experimental and control groups were not statistically significant -- thus making the article concerned little more than an exercise in deception

*********************



14 June, 2007

Affluence does NOT give you skin cancer

Refreshing to see an epidemiological study that did NOT leap to the apparent conclusion. Even epidemiologists can think sometimes

Wealthier people are more than twice as likely to develop the deadliest form of skin cancer, research suggests. A study of more than 23,000 patients in Northern Ireland has shown a 20 per cent rise in patients suffering from skin cancer over a 12-year period. The research, published today in the British Journal of Dermatology, showed that women living in richer areas were 29 per cent more likely than people living in disadvantaged areas to suffer from basal cell carcinoma, and 2« times more likely to suffer from malignant melanoma, the most dangerous form of the disease. Men were 41 per cent more likely to suffer from basal cell carcinoma if they lived in an affluent area and 2« times more likely to suffer from malignant melanoma.

Every year there are estimated to be more than 100,000 cases of the more easily treated skin cancers in the UK, and just over 8,000 cases of malignant melanoma. The scientists, from the Royal Group of Hospitals and Queen's University Belfast, said that two explanations were most likely - that middle-class people took more holidays in sunny places, or were simply more likely to go for treatment when they developed suspicious-looking damage to their skin. Olivia Dolan, a co-author of the study and consultant dermatologist at the Royal Victoria Hospital, Belfast, said: "It's probably a combination of the two." Older people now developing skin cancers tend to be those from families who were rich enough to holiday overseas when they were young, when the skin is most vulnerable to such damage.

Analysis of the data, which came from the Northern Ireland Cancer Registry at Queen's University Belfast and covered the period from 1993 to 2004, indicated a 20 per cent increase in patients and a 62 per cent increase in skin cancer samples processed by pathology laboratories. Affluence did not seem to affect squamous cell carcinoma. This may be because numbers of this cancer were small, Dr Dolan said. She added that the results showed that skin cancer incidence was systematically underestimated, because only the first instance was recorded and many patients developed multiple cancers. "It would be very helpful if every cancer were recorded," she said.

Source




A promising surgical development

WHICH would you prefer: a surgical procedure that left you in pain, incapacitated and scarred, or one that was virtually painless, involved no recovery time and left no visible scar at all? It may sound too good to be true, but a radical improvement in surgery is the promise held out by a new technique, called "natural-orifice translumenal endosurgery", or NOTES. Rather than operating on the abdomen by making incisions in the skin, it involves passing flexible instruments through the body's orifices and entering the abdomen from the inside.

One of the most widely studied approaches is "transgastric" surgery, in which the instruments are passed through the mouth and into the stomach. From there, the surgeon cuts a hole in the stomach wall to enter the abdominal cavity and perform the operation. Once it is complete the instruments, along with any removed tissue, are drawn back out through the stomach and mouth and the access incision is stitched up. Similar approaches involve entering through the rectum, the vagina and even the penis.

It may sound somewhat drastic, but the rationale for doing this goes well beyond the desire to avoid leaving a scar. NOTES could have many medical benefits over conventional surgery, and even over laparoscopic or "keyhole" surgery, in which the operation is performed via a small number of external incisions. NOTES could reduce the risk of post-operative infections. It does not require a general anaesthetic, making it an attractive option for the elderly or infirm.

Post-operative convalescence normally involves recovering from the access incisions made in the abdomen. NOTES should mean shorter recovery periods, since the stomach wall has relatively few pain receptors, says Paul Swain, an endosurgeon at Imperial College London who is one of the British pioneers of the technique. "Patients theoretically would be able to go back to work the next day, rather than taking a week or two off," says Lee Swanstrom, director of minimally invasive surgery at the Oregon Clinic in Portland, Oregon.

In recent months several surgical groups have reported early successes using NOTES to carry out procedures such as gall-bladder and cancer-tumour removals, and diagnoses of pancreatic cancer. In animals even more complex procedures have been demonstrated, such as fallopian-tube resections, organ-bypass procedures, reconstructive stomach-reduction procedures and even the draining of coronary arteries. Yet for NOTES to become as widespread and successful as traditional laparoscopic surgery, an arsenal of new surgical instruments will be needed. Answering this call, physicians and medical-device companies are falling over themselves to develop innovative new tools. "There's an explosion in patent filing in this area," says Dr Swain. "This is one of the great periods of medical innovation."

What makes NOTES so difficult is having to carry out surgery via a single and very narrow point of access. Open surgery doesn't have this problem, because the abdomen is laid bare to the surgeon, and even laparoscopic surgery involves placing at least three (and sometimes as many as five) separate instruments into the abdomen from different directions, through different incisions. This makes it possible to triangulate when cutting, sewing or manipulating tissue, says Eugene Chen, the boss of USGI Medical, a surgical-instruments firm based in San Clemente, California. "We have to create instruments that allow us to do the same thing," he says.

With NOTES, however, all the instruments have to be fed in parallel through a single orifice, and then through a single internal incision. This makes manipulating tissue much more difficult and also limits the surgeon's viewpoint. With existing instruments designed for gastro-intestinal procedures, the camera is attached to the same instrument tip as the grasping and cutting tools, which creates problems. "As soon as you have to move your instrument to grasp something, it changes your view," says Per-Ola Park, another pioneer of NOTES who is based at Sahlgrenska University Hospital in Gothenburg, Sweden.

Furthermore, surgical tools for NOTES need to be able to manipulate, cut and repair kinds of tissue that are very different from those normally found in the gastro-intestinal tract, says Kurt Bally of Ethicon Endo-Surgery, another surgical-tools firm, based in Cincinnati, Ohio. So Ethicon, USGI and other firms are developing entirely new instruments.

More here

****************

Just some problems with the "Obesity" war:

1). It tries to impose behavior change on everybody -- when most of those targeted are not obese and hence have no reason to change their behaviour. It is a form of punishing the innocent and the guilty alike. (It is also typical of Leftist thinking: Scorning the individual and capable of dealing with large groups only).

2). The longevity research all leads to the conclusion that it is people of MIDDLING weight who live longest -- not slim people. So the "epidemic" of obesity is in fact largely an "epidemic" of living longer.

3). It is total calorie intake that makes you fat -- not where you get your calories. Policies that attack only the source of the calories (e.g. "junk food") without addressing total calorie intake are hence pissing into the wind. People involuntarily deprived of their preferred calorie intake from one source are highly likely to seek and find their calories elsewhere.

4). So-called junk food is perfectly nutritious. A big Mac meal comprises meat, bread, salad and potatoes -- which is a mainstream Western diet. If that is bad then we are all in big trouble.

5). Food warriors demonize salt and fat. But we need a daily salt intake to counter salt-loss through perspiration and the research shows that people on salt-restricted diets die SOONER. And Eskimos eat huge amounts of fat with no apparent ill-effects. And the average home-cooked roast dinner has LOTS of fat. Will we ban roast dinners?

6). The foods restricted are often no more calorific than those permitted -- such as milk and fruit-juice drinks.

7). Tendency to weight is mostly genetic and is therefore not readily susceptible to voluntary behaviour change.

8). And when are we going to ban cheese? Cheese is a concentrated calorie bomb and has lots of that wicked animal fat in it too. Wouldn't we all be better off without it? And what about butter and margarine? They are just about pure fat. Surely they should be treated as contraband in kids' lunchboxes! [/sarcasm].

Trans fats:

For one summary of the weak science behind the "trans-fat" hysteria, see here. Trans fats have only a temporary effect on blood chemistry and the evidence of lasting harm from them is dubious. By taking extreme groups in trans fats intake, some weak association with coronary heart disease has at times been shown in some sub-populations but extreme group studies are inherently at risk of confounding with other factors and are intrinsically of little interest to the average person.

The use of extreme quintiles (fifths) to examine effects is in fact so common as to be almost universal but suggests to the experienced observer that the differences between the mean scores of the experimental and control groups were not statistically significant -- thus making the article concerned little more than an exercise in deception

*********************



13 June, 2007

"Ecstasy" DAMAGES YOUR MENTAL ABILITIES

The study below is pretty good. It does not seem to have been double blind but it is at least a before and after study so is a big step up from the usual epidemiological crap. I think is pretty convincing that you would now have to be moronic or suicidal to use "Ecstasy"

Cognition in Novice Ecstasy Users With Minimal Exposure to Other Drugs

By Thelma Schilt et al.

Context: Ecstasy (street name for [~]-3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine [MDMA]) use has been associated with cognitive deficits, especially in verbal memory. However, owing to the cross-sectional and retrospective nature of currently available studies, questions remain regarding the causal direction and clinical relevance of these findings.

Objective: To examine the relationship between Ecstasy use and subsequent cognitive performance.

Design: A prospective cohort study in Ecstasy-naive subjects with a high risk for future first Ecstasy use, as part of the Netherlands XTC Toxicity study. The initial examination took place between April 10, 2002, and April 28, 2004; follow-up was within 3 years after the initial examination.

Setting and Participants: One hundred eighty-eight healthy Ecstasy-naive volunteers (mean age, 22 years) were recruited. Of these, 58 subjects started using Ecstasy (mean cumulative dose, 3.2 tablets; median cumulative dose, 1.5 tablets). They were compared with 60 persistent Ecstasy-naive subjects matched on age, sex, intelligence, and use of substances other than Ecstasy. Differences in cognition between Ecstasy users and Ecstasy-naive subjects were adjusted for differences in cannabis and other recreational drug use.

Main Outcome Measures: Change scores between the initial examination and follow-up on neurocognitive tests measuring attention, working memory, verbal and visual memory, and visuospatial ability.

Results: At the initial examination, there were no statistically significant differences in any of the neuropsychological test scores between persistent Ecstasy-naive subjects and future Ecstasy users. However, at follow-up, change scores on immediate and delayed verbal recall and verbal recognition were significantly lower in the group of incident Ecstasy users compared with persistent Ecstasy-naive subjects. There were no significant differences on other test scores.

Conclusions: Our findings suggest that even a first low cumulative dose of Ecstasy is associated with decline in verbal memory. Although the performance of the group of incident Ecstasy users is still within the normal range and the immediate clinical relevance of the observed deficits is limited, long-term negative consequences cannot be excluded.

Arch Gen Psychiatry. 2007;64:728-736




Legal row on vaccine, autism link

A SPECIAL court that will pit scientists against activists in the debate over whether vaccines have caused autism in children was to begin sitting last night. It will be the first test case on the subject, and involves a 12-year-old Arizona girl.

Although science has weighed in heavily on the question - with strong evidence that vaccines are not linked to the syndrome - one group of people remains unconvinced. More than 4800 cases are pending, filed by parents who believe their children have autism caused by vaccines. The little-known US Court of Federal Claims has set up a hearing in Washington, with the first case expected to last three weeks. The parents want payment under the National Vaccine Injury Compensation Program, a no-fault system that has a $US2.5 billion ($A2.9 billion) fund built up from a tax on vaccines of 75 cents a dose.

"Monday will mark the first time ever that evidence of autistic harm from childhood vaccines is examined and cross-examined in a court of law," said activist David Kirby, who wrote a book about the purported vaccine and autism link. Families will try to convince the special "vaccine court" that the vaccines can cause healthy and outgoing children to withdraw into uncommunicative, autistic shells, even though much evidence and expert opinion has found no link.

The court has never heard a case of such magnitude. The shift from laboratory to courtroom means the outcome will hinge not on scientific standards of evidence but on a legal standard of plausibility. Rather than judges, three "special masters" will hear the test cases. The first test case will ask whether a combination vaccine for measles, mumps and rubella, or MMR, plus a mercury-containing preservative called thimerosal, caused the autism of Michelle Cedillo, now 12. "The profound downward change in Michelle's health began seven days following the MMR," the Legal Times newspaper quoted Michelle's mother, Theresa Cedillo, as saying.

Vaccine experts point out that parents often link vaccines with their children's symptoms because getting a shot can be upsetting. They also claim that children are vaccinated at an age when autism and related disorders are often first diagnosed. They point to two Institute of Medicine reports, in 2001 and 2004, that reviewed the evidence and determined there was no link between vaccines and autism. "From my standpoint, this question has been asked and answered," Paul Offitt, of the Philadelphia Children's Hospital, told reporters.

It was Dr Offitt who helped invent a rotavirus vaccine. "You know, it's a scientific question," he said. "It's best answered in a scientific venue. It's been done. I mean, the court is not a place to determine scientific truths. The court is a place to settle disputes." The US Centres for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that about one in every 150 children has autism.

Source

****************

Just some problems with the "Obesity" war:

1). It tries to impose behavior change on everybody -- when most of those targeted are not obese and hence have no reason to change their behaviour. It is a form of punishing the innocent and the guilty alike. (It is also typical of Leftist thinking: Scorning the individual and capable of dealing with large groups only).

2). The longevity research all leads to the conclusion that it is people of MIDDLING weight who live longest -- not slim people. So the "epidemic" of obesity is in fact largely an "epidemic" of living longer.

3). It is total calorie intake that makes you fat -- not where you get your calories. Policies that attack only the source of the calories (e.g. "junk food") without addressing total calorie intake are hence pissing into the wind. People involuntarily deprived of their preferred calorie intake from one source are highly likely to seek and find their calories elsewhere.

4). So-called junk food is perfectly nutritious. A big Mac meal comprises meat, bread, salad and potatoes -- which is a mainstream Western diet. If that is bad then we are all in big trouble.

5). Food warriors demonize salt and fat. But we need a daily salt intake to counter salt-loss through perspiration and the research shows that people on salt-restricted diets die SOONER. And Eskimos eat huge amounts of fat with no apparent ill-effects. And the average home-cooked roast dinner has LOTS of fat. Will we ban roast dinners?

6). The foods restricted are often no more calorific than those permitted -- such as milk and fruit-juice drinks.

7). Tendency to weight is mostly genetic and is therefore not readily susceptible to voluntary behaviour change.

8). And when are we going to ban cheese? Cheese is a concentrated calorie bomb and has lots of that wicked animal fat in it too. Wouldn't we all be better off without it? And what about butter and margarine? They are just about pure fat. Surely they should be treated as contraband in kids' lunchboxes! [/sarcasm].

Trans fats:

For one summary of the weak science behind the "trans-fat" hysteria, see here. Trans fats have only a temporary effect on blood chemistry and the evidence of lasting harm from them is dubious. By taking extreme groups in trans fats intake, some weak association with coronary heart disease has at times been shown in some sub-populations but extreme group studies are inherently at risk of confounding with other factors and are intrinsically of little interest to the average person.

The use of extreme quintiles (fifths) to examine effects is in fact so common as to be almost universal but suggests to the experienced observer that the differences between the mean scores of the experimental and control groups were not statistically significant -- thus making the article concerned little more than an exercise in deception

*********************



12 June, 2007

The dislexia sceptik is onn to sumthing

Academic and supposed dyslexic James Panton thinks the professor who describes dyslexia as a 'social fig leaf' for the middle classes has a point. I don't entirely agree. There are some otherwise highly intelligent individuals who have difficulty with reading but I DO agree that the diagnosis is now far too widely applied. It is in fact often an excuse for poor teaching of literacy

British professor Julian Elliott first hit the headlines two years ago with his claim that there is no scientific evidence for the existence of dyslexia. Last week, he sparked further controversy when he said that `dyslexia has become a social fig leaf for middle-class parents who do not want their children to be considered lazy, thick or stupid' (1). Of course, his argument is a little more subtle than we were led to believe by last week's media furore. So he didn't quite say, as was claimed in the Mail on Sunday, that `Dyslexia is a fantasy' (2).

Rather, Elliott argues that dyslexia `persists as a construct largely because it serves an emotional, not a scientific, function' (3). He says there is no rigorous consensus about how the condition should be defined or what diagnostic criteria should be used: `There are so many different understandings of what dyslexia is, or is not, that the term as used in professional practice has become almost meaningless.' (4) Standard symptoms - such as the inversion of letters, clumsiness, untidy writing or poor working memory - are all commonly found in people who have no reading difficulties at all, as well as in poor readers who would nonetheless not be considered dyslexic. Elliott points out that contrary to the myths of `miracle cures', diagnosing someone as dyslexic tells us almost nothing about how that individual can best be taught to read: `There is no sound, widely accepted, body of scientific work that has shown that there exists any particular teaching approach which is more appropriate for "dyslexic" children than for other poor readers.' (5)

Elliott's views - particularly controversial at the moment, given that the British government has just promised that 900,000 pounds will be spent on training teachers to spot dyslexia in their classrooms (6) - are important. The fact that `dyslexia' is now used to describe a wide variety of learning difficulties, to the extent that it has apparently become all but meaningless, should make us reconsider our use of the word as a scientific label. His even more controversial claim (that dyslexia has now become a `social fig leaf') rings true, too - though he is wrong to think that this is simply a middle-class phenomenon. In truth, the rise of the dyslexia tag points to broader, and more worrying, shifts in the cultural landscape.

I previously argued on spiked that the category of dyslexia has become remarkably woolly over the past few years. In the mid-1990s, figures suggested that as much as four per cent of the population was dyslexic; in the 10 years since, that number has more than doubled. According to the UK charity Dyslexia Action: `About 10 per cent of the population are affected by dyslexia to some degree.' (7) (Emphasis added.) Other studies claim that as many as 15 per cent of us are dyslexic (8). In the US, it is claimed that between 15 and 20 per cent of the population has a `language-based learning disability', of which dyslexia accounts for the greatest proportion (9) (see Can't read, won't read, by James Panton).

I am a good example of this rather woolly category expansion. Throughout my childhood and teenage years, both in primary and comprehensive school, I was tested for dyslexia. I was diagnosed on each occasion as a poor speller, a clumsy and untidy writer, not much cop at mental arithmetic, and not particularly good at organising my thoughts on paper. But I was not, according to the educationalists, dyslexic. The standard prescription was that I should make a bit more effort and spend a bit more time learning the rules of spelling, grammar and punctuation. In short, I should pull my socks up.

By the time I was 21 and about to sit my finals at Oxford, I was tested again. This time it was discovered that I was suffering from dyslexia, somewhere on the scale between moderate and extreme. Given that none of my symptoms had become worse - indeed, I had made a very concerted effort to overcome them - it seemed instead that the criteria for diagnosing dyslexia had undergone a significant shift.

I have every sympathy with parents who want to find out why their child is struggling at school, and I know the sense of relief that the diagnosis of dyslexia must bring. For parents who have suffered sleepless nights, convinced that their child is not stupid but unable to explain why he or she cannot learn to read or add up, the dyslexia label must seem like an answer to their prayers. Yet this tendency to categorise more and more children as dyslexic, a tag that now covers a broad range of learning difficulties, creates far more problems than it solves.

By labelling great numbers of children as dyslexic, we do a disservice to those children who really do suffer from severe learning difficulties - those who do need special attention and resources in order to be properly educated and to compete with other children on an equal footing. Expanding the category of dyslexia runs the risk of draining resources away from these children. Moreover, we also do a disservice to the newly labelled `dyslexic children'. Once children, and their parents, have a medical label through which to understand the problems they experience in the classroom, there is a strong temptation to interpret all their experiences through this label. Rather than serving as a springboard to better educational achievement, the category dyslexia can quite easily serve as both an explanation and an excuse for every difficulty a child encounters.

I am glad that I was never diagnosed dyslexic as a child. Instead of thinking my underachievement was the result of a medical problem, I realised that if I was to make my ambitions a reality then I would need to push myself beyond my limitations. I remember smuggling maths books home at night in my first two years at high school so that I could keep up with my peers; I forced myself to read ever more complicated books, and taught myself to speed-read, too. It was only by challenging my limitations that I was able to go on from school to university to postgraduate study, and now to work in the academy.

And yet the temptation to interpret any difficulties I encounter as a product of `my dyslexia' remains strong. It's a little embarrassing to admit to my peers in the senior common room that I failed to get a first-class result in my university exams. perhaps if I tell them I am dyslexic they will be less severe in their judgments. When I can't quite be bothered to open a long and difficult book, or when the complexity of an argument makes the words start swimming in front of my eyes, it is tempting to give up, and to console myself with the thought that these things don't come easy to me because I Am Dyslexic. Worse, I sometimes sneakily think that the things I do achieve are all the more impressive because I am dyslexic.

Professor Elliott is no doubt on to something when he says that parents, who understandably don't want their children to be labelled lazy, thick or stupid, have started to embrace the label dyslexia as an explanation for all their woes. And yet, while it may well be the case that middle-class parents are more attuned to the possibility of having their child labelled dyslexic rather than lazy, to think that the expansion of the D-word is a simply a middle-class phenomenon, as Elliott claims, is to miss broader trends in contemporary culture that have led to an increased diagnosis of dyslexia.

Today, a broad range of social and educational problems is understood in pseudo-medical terms. Over the past few years, along with a phenomenal rise in the number of children and young people labelled dyslexic, we've also seen more children diagnosed as suffering from Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD). Just as dyslexia has been expanded to include a host of learning difficulties, so ADHD now describes all sorts of children, from those who exhibit severe hyperactivity symptoms to those who simply won't sit still.

Finding pseudo-scientific solutions to the very many problems that afflict the education sector is now all the rage. Last year, it was reported that the British government was considering giving omega-3 and omega-6 oil supplements to schoolchildren in an effort to improve their behaviour (10). A few months ago, it was suggested that teenagers' capacity to concentrate in class might be improved if the school day were started later because teens have biologically programmed sleep patterns that are different to those of adults (11). The scientific substance of both proposals may, or may not, be sound. But come on - problems with behaviour and concentration in schools are not a product of children failing to eat enough tuna at lunchtime or needing to have a nap in the afternoon, and to argue so is to overlook the various ways in which the education system could be improved across the board.

Not long ago, discovering that your child had a learning disability would have been a little embarrassing; it certainly wasn't something to be discussed at the schoolgates. Yet now, dyslexia has become almost a badge of honour. `Our Tommy can't read because he's dyslexic; Julie can't play netball because she's dispraxic; and though we used to think that little David was just badly behaved, we're really delighted now we know he has ADHD!' In contemporary culture, these labels are no longer things to be embarrassed about - rather they have become signs of just how very `special' our children are.

There is something unhealthy about a culture that employs an ever-expanding plethora of labels to categorise children. The tendency to seek out individuated and increasingly medicalised solutions to social and educational problems suggests that achievement and struggle are undervalued today. In our willingness to label children, we encourage a climate of special pleading that undermines the effort, hard work and the sentiment of `going for it!' that should be at the heart of education. By teaching children to understand that their problems are `natural', we are implicitly shifting the focus of education away from pushing children to achieve to the best of their abilities and turning schools into a kind of doctor's surgery for monitoring differently abled subsets of youth. That can only foster a culture of low achievement and diminished aspirations.

Source




Possible remedy for Parkinson's?

A drug that is used to treat high blood pressure may be able to slow or even halt the progress of Parkinson's disease, experiments suggest. A team from Northwestern University in Chicago has found that isradipine, a calcium-blocker that is marketed in Britain by Novartis as Prescal for the control of high blood pressure, can correct the underlying problem in Parkinson's: the failure of brain cells to make dopamine.

The disease mainly affects people aged 60 and over, and occurs when dopamine neurons in the brain start to die. The dopamine released by the cells is a chemical messenger that affects the control of movement. When dopamine is lacking, movement becomes more difficult and uncoordinated. Sufferers experience muscle rigidity and tremors and lose the ability to walk or talk.

In Nature online, a team led by James Surmeier reported that mice with a disease related to Parkinson's were rejuvenated by doses of isradipine. Tests showed that the mice, which had been genetically engineered to have a Parkinson's-like disease, resisted becoming ill and their dopamine-producing cells began to function as if they were younger. If the same was found to be true in human patients it could be a big advance in managing the disease. Professor Surmeier said: "Our hope is that this drug will protect dopamine neurons, so that if you began taking it early enough you won't get Parkinson's disease, even if you were at risk. It would be like taking a baby aspirin every day to protect your heart."

Using the drug, or similar calcium blockers, could extend the effectiveness of traditional dopamine-boosting medication - possibly doubling or tripling the length of time that it worked, said Professor Surmeier, who has been researching Parkinson's disease for 20 years. This in itself would be a huge advance, he said.

The team found that the dopamine cells had two distinct ways of operating. When cells were young they used sodium ions to produce electrical signals. When they were older, they switched to using calcium ions. Potentially, calcium ions can cause a lot of trouble inside cells, and they need to be pumped out efficiently. This uses a lot of energy and puts the cells under stress - one reason, Professor Surmeier surmises, why they tend to die. When isradipine was used to block the "gateways" through which calcium ions entered the cells, the neurons reverted to their youthful behaviour. After a short "silent" interval they went back to using sodium.

The scientists intend to launch a clinical patient trial. If the treatment works, some patients may already have benefited if they developed high blood pressure and were treated with calcium-channel blockers.

Although some epidemiological studies have shown that people who take blood-pressure drugs have a lower risk of Parkinson's, a study published in the journal Parkinsonism and Related Disorders in April found no clear benefit from calcium-channel blockers. A team from the University of Washington in Seattle compared a group of Parkinson's sufferers with a matched group of healthy people and found no persuasive evidence of a protective effect. But this study involved all calcium-channel blockers. A study that focused on isradipine alone may have reached a different conclusion.

Kieran Breen, director of research and development at the Parkinson's Disease Society, said that more work had to be done. "The results that have been reported are from a very early stage preclinical trial using a model of Parkinson's. Further trials are needed to establish whether similar results are seen in people with the condition," he said. "It is too early to state with confidence that this drug will be appropriate for the treatment for Parkinson's disease."

Source

****************

Just some problems with the "Obesity" war:

1). It tries to impose behavior change on everybody -- when most of those targeted are not obese and hence have no reason to change their behaviour. It is a form of punishing the innocent and the guilty alike. (It is also typical of Leftist thinking: Scorning the individual and capable of dealing with large groups only).

2). The longevity research all leads to the conclusion that it is people of MIDDLING weight who live longest -- not slim people. So the "epidemic" of obesity is in fact largely an "epidemic" of living longer.

3). It is total calorie intake that makes you fat -- not where you get your calories. Policies that attack only the source of the calories (e.g. "junk food") without addressing total calorie intake are hence pissing into the wind. People involuntarily deprived of their preferred calorie intake from one source are highly likely to seek and find their calories elsewhere.

4). So-called junk food is perfectly nutritious. A big Mac meal comprises meat, bread, salad and potatoes -- which is a mainstream Western diet. If that is bad then we are all in big trouble.

5). Food warriors demonize salt and fat. But we need a daily salt intake to counter salt-loss through perspiration and the research shows that people on salt-restricted diets die SOONER. And Eskimos eat huge amounts of fat with no apparent ill-effects. And the average home-cooked roast dinner has LOTS of fat. Will we ban roast dinners?

6). The foods restricted are often no more calorific than those permitted -- such as milk and fruit-juice drinks.

7). Tendency to weight is mostly genetic and is therefore not readily susceptible to voluntary behaviour change.

8). And when are we going to ban cheese? Cheese is a concentrated calorie bomb and has lots of that wicked animal fat in it too. Wouldn't we all be better off without it? And what about butter and margarine? They are just about pure fat. Surely they should be treated as contraband in kids' lunchboxes! [/sarcasm].

Trans fats:

For one summary of the weak science behind the "trans-fat" hysteria, see here. Trans fats have only a temporary effect on blood chemistry and the evidence of lasting harm from them is dubious. By taking extreme groups in trans fats intake, some weak association with coronary heart disease has at times been shown in some sub-populations but extreme group studies are inherently at risk of confounding with other factors and are intrinsically of little interest to the average person.

The use of extreme quintiles (fifths) to examine effects is in fact so common as to be almost universal but suggests to the experienced observer that the differences between the mean scores of the experimental and control groups were not statistically significant -- thus making the article concerned little more than an exercise in deception

*********************



11 June, 2007

VICTIMS OF THE OBESITY WAR?

Can stomach stapling send you around the twist? The article below says it can. It is a clinical report however so the causal link is purely speculative

Neurologic complications of gastric bypass surgery for morbid obesity

By Katalin Juhasz-Pocsine et al.

Background: The number of bariatric procedures is rapidly growing as the prevalence of obesity in the USA is increasing. Such procedures are not without complications, and those affecting the nervous system are often disabling and irreversible. We now describe our experience with these complications and review the pertinent literature.

Methods: We describe 26 patients with major neurologic conditions that seemed causally related to bariatric surgery encountered in the neurology service of a tertiary referral university medical center over a decade.

Results: The neurologic complications affected most regions of the nervous system: encephalopathy, optic neuropathy, myelopathy, polyradiculoneuropathy, and polyneuropathy. Myelopathy was the most frequent and disabling problem; symptoms began about a decade after surgery [So it is most unlikely that surgery was the cause]. Encephalopathy and polyradiculoneuropathy were acute and early complications. Except for vitamin B12 and copper deficiencies in patients with myelopathy, we could not correlate specific nutritional deficiencies to the neurologic complications. All patients had multiple nutritional deficiencies, but their correction did not often yield dramatic results. The best result was achieved in one patient after surgical revision to reduce the bypassed jejunum.

Conclusions: A wide spectrum of serious neurologic conditions may follow bariatric surgery. These complications may occur acutely or decades later.

NEUROLOGY 2007;68:1843-1850




THAT WICKED ELECTRICITY AGAIN

If ever there was a hardy perennial, it is the belief that exposure to a lot of electricity gives you cancer. There have been repeated demonstrations that it does not but the epidemiologists never give up. Below is the latest effort. The amusing thing is that they examined several occupational categories with varying levels of exposure to electricity but found differences betweeen only two -- so it is THOSE differences that we must regard as meaningful, apparently. So once again we have the good old data-dredging technique that will usually come up with SOMETHING on a purely random basis.

Note my post of May 15th showing no adverse effects of heavy exposure among Danish electricity workers. In connection with that I am going to make a small logical point that is probably beyond the comprehension of any epidemiologist but which others should grasp:

If X is caused by Y, then ALL instances of Y should cause at least some X. If there is just ONE occasion where Y has not caused any X at all among anybody, then it shows that X is NOT caused by Y. You need only one disproof. So the Danish study junks the "carcinogenic electricity" hypothesis. Even if there are LOTS of other occasions when X and Y occur together it proves nothing. At most it may prove that if you dredge through the data zealously enough you will always find something to suit your preconceptions purely on a random basis.

Leukaemia, Brain Tumours and Exposure to Extremely Low Frequency Magnetic Fields: Cohort Study of Swiss Railway Employees

By Martin Roosli et al

Aims: We investigated the relationship between extremely low frequency magnetic field (ELF-MF) exposure and mortality from leukaemia and brain tumour in a cohort of Swiss railway workers

Methods: We studied 20,141 Swiss railway employees with 464,129 person-years of follow-up between 1972 and 2002. Mortality rates for leukaemia and brain tumour of highly exposed train drivers (21 ~T average annual exposure) were compared with medium and low exposed occupational groups (i.e. station masters with an average exposure of 1 ~T). In addition, individual cumulative exposure was calculated from on-site measurements and modelling of past exposures.

Results: The hazard ratio (HR) for leukaemia mortality of train drivers was 1.43 (95% CI 0.74 to 2.77) compared to station masters. For myeloid leukaemia the HR of train drivers was 4.74 (95% CI 1.04 to 21.60) and for Hodgkin's disease 3.29 (95% CI 0.69 to 15.63). Lymphoid leukaemia, non-Hodgkin's disease and brain tumour mortality were not associated with magnetic field exposure. Concordant results were obtained from analyses based on individual cumulative exposure.

Conclusions: We found some evidence of an exposure-response association for myeloid leukaemia and Hodgkin's disease, but not for other haematopoietic and lymphatic malignancies and brain tumours.

Occup Environ Med., 24 May 2007

****************

Just some problems with the "Obesity" war:

1). It tries to impose behavior change on everybody -- when most of those targeted are not obese and hence have no reason to change their behaviour. It is a form of punishing the innocent and the guilty alike. (It is also typical of Leftist thinking: Scorning the individual and capable of dealing with large groups only).

2). The longevity research all leads to the conclusion that it is people of MIDDLING weight who live longest -- not slim people. So the "epidemic" of obesity is in fact largely an "epidemic" of living longer.

3). It is total calorie intake that makes you fat -- not where you get your calories. Policies that attack only the source of the calories (e.g. "junk food") without addressing total calorie intake are hence pissing into the wind. People involuntarily deprived of their preferred calorie intake from one source are highly likely to seek and find their calories elsewhere.

4). So-called junk food is perfectly nutritious. A big Mac meal comprises meat, bread, salad and potatoes -- which is a mainstream Western diet. If that is bad then we are all in big trouble.

5). Food warriors demonize salt and fat. But we need a daily salt intake to counter salt-loss through perspiration and the research shows that people on salt-restricted diets die SOONER. And Eskimos eat huge amounts of fat with no apparent ill-effects. And the average home-cooked roast dinner has LOTS of fat. Will we ban roast dinners?

6). The foods restricted are often no more calorific than those permitted -- such as milk and fruit-juice drinks.

7). Tendency to weight is mostly genetic and is therefore not readily susceptible to voluntary behaviour change.

8). And when are we going to ban cheese? Cheese is a concentrated calorie bomb and has lots of that wicked animal fat in it too. Wouldn't we all be better off without it? And what about butter and margarine? They are just about pure fat. Surely they should be treated as contraband in kids' lunchboxes! [/sarcasm].

Trans fats:

For one summary of the weak science behind the "trans-fat" hysteria, see here. Trans fats have only a temporary effect on blood chemistry and the evidence of lasting harm from them is dubious. By taking extreme groups in trans fats intake, some weak association with coronary heart disease has at times been shown in some sub-populations but extreme group studies are inherently at risk of confounding with other factors and are intrinsically of little interest to the average person.

The use of extreme quintiles (fifths) to examine effects is in fact so common as to be almost universal but suggests to the experienced observer that the differences between the mean scores of the experimental and control groups were not statistically significant -- thus making the article concerned little more than an exercise in deception

*********************



10 June, 2007

MILK IS GOOD FOR YOU

It would be surprising if it were not. The study below shows that old ladies who drink lots of milk and eat lots of cheese get less breast cancer. As usual, the reasons are speculative. Pinpointing vitamin D and calcium is just a pretense to knowledge. The effects were in any case tiny -- shown only by comparing extreme quintiles. So no general need to start making dairy farmers rich but those who drink no milk at all might do well to start drinking some

Intakes of Calcium and Vitamin D and Breast Cancer Risk in Women

By Jennifer Lin et al.

Background: Animal data suggest the potential anticarcinogenic effects of calcium and vitamin D on breast cancer development. However, epidemiologic data relating calcium and vitamin D levels to breast cancer have been inconclusive.

Methods: We prospectively evaluated total calcium and vitamin D intake in relation to breast cancer incidence among 10 578 premenopausal and 20 909 postmenopausal women 45 years or older who were free of cancer and cardiovascular disease at baseline in the Women's Health Study. Baseline dietary intake was assessed by a food frequency questionnaire. We used Cox proportional hazards regression to estimate hazard ratios and 95% confidence intervals.

Results: During an average of 10 years of follow-up, 276 premenopausal and 743 postmenopausal women had a confirmed diagnosis of incident invasive breast cancer. Higher intakes of total calcium and vitamin D were moderately associated with a lower risk of premenopausal breast cancer; the hazard ratios in the group with the highest relative to the lowest quintile of intake were 0.61 (95% confidence interval, 0.40-0.92) for calcium (P = .04 for trend) and 0.65 (95% confidence interval, 0.42-1.00) for vitamin D intake (P = .07 for trend). The inverse association with both nutrients was also present for large or poorly differentiated breast tumors among premenopausal women (P = 04 for trend). By contrast, intakes of both nutrients were not inversely associated with the risk of breast cancer among postmenopausal women.

Conclusions: Findings from this study suggest that higher intakes of calcium and vitamin D may be associated with a lower risk of developing premenopausal breast cancer. The likely apparent protection in premenopausal women may be more pronounced for more aggressive breast tumors.

Arch Intern Med. 2007;167:1050-1059




WORKERS DRINK LESS ALCOHOL IF THEIR BOSSES DISCOURAGE IT

Earth-shattering conclusion? That's what the paper below tells us. Don't ask me why it was thought to be worth publishing

Drinking Social Norms and Drinking Behaviours: a Multilevel Analysis of 137 Workgroups in 16 Worksites

By Tonatiuh Barrientos-Gutierrez et al.

Objectives: Previous studies on worksite drinking norms showed individually perceived norms were associated with drinking behaviours. This study examines whether restrictive drinking social norms shared by workgroup membership are associated with decreased heavy drinking, frequent drinking and drinking at work at the worker level.

Methods: The sample included 5,338 workers with complete data nested in 137 supervisory workgroups from 16 U.S. worksites. Multilevel models were fitted to examine the association between workgroup drinking norms and heavy drinking, frequent drinking and drinking at work.

Results: Multivariate adjusted models showed participants working in workgroups in the most discouraging drinking norms quartile were 45% less likely to be heavy drinkers, 54% less likely to be frequent drinkers and 69% less likely to drink at work than their counterparts in the most encouraging quartile.

Conclusions: Strong associations between work-group level restrictive drinking social norms and drinking outcomes suggest public health efforts at reducing drinking and alcohol related injuries, illnesses and diseases should target social interventions at worksites.

Occup Environ Med., 24 May 2007

****************

Just some problems with the "Obesity" war:

1). It tries to impose behavior change on everybody -- when most of those targeted are not obese and hence have no reason to change their behaviour. It is a form of punishing the innocent and the guilty alike. (It is also typical of Leftist thinking: Scorning the individual and capable of dealing with large groups only).

2). The longevity research all leads to the conclusion that it is people of MIDDLING weight who live longest -- not slim people. So the "epidemic" of obesity is in fact largely an "epidemic" of living longer.

3). It is total calorie intake that makes you fat -- not where you get your calories. Policies that attack only the source of the calories (e.g. "junk food") without addressing total calorie intake are hence pissing into the wind. People involuntarily deprived of their preferred calorie intake from one source are highly likely to seek and find their calories elsewhere.

4). So-called junk food is perfectly nutritious. A big Mac meal comprises meat, bread, salad and potatoes -- which is a mainstream Western diet. If that is bad then we are all in big trouble.

5). Food warriors demonize salt and fat. But we need a daily salt intake to counter salt-loss through perspiration and the research shows that people on salt-restricted diets die SOONER. And Eskimos eat huge amounts of fat with no apparent ill-effects. And the average home-cooked roast dinner has LOTS of fat. Will we ban roast dinners?

6). The foods restricted are often no more calorific than those permitted -- such as milk and fruit-juice drinks.

7). Tendency to weight is mostly genetic and is therefore not readily susceptible to voluntary behaviour change.

8). And when are we going to ban cheese? Cheese is a concentrated calorie bomb and has lots of that wicked animal fat in it too. Wouldn't we all be better off without it? And what about butter and margarine? They are just about pure fat. Surely they should be treated as contraband in kids' lunchboxes! [/sarcasm].

Trans fats:

For one summary of the weak science behind the "trans-fat" hysteria, see here. Trans fats have only a temporary effect on blood chemistry and the evidence of lasting harm from them is dubious. By taking extreme groups in trans fats intake, some weak association with coronary heart disease has at times been shown in some sub-populations but extreme group studies are inherently at risk of confounding with other factors and are intrinsically of little interest to the average person.

The use of extreme quintiles (fifths) to examine effects is in fact so common as to be almost universal but suggests to the experienced observer that the differences between the mean scores of the experimental and control groups were not statistically significant -- thus making the article concerned little more than an exercise in deception

*********************



9 June, 2007

A COSMETIC THAT WORKS?

Rather to my surprise, I can't see much wrong with the study immediately below. Nice to see some double-blind evidence instead of epidemiological garbage. What was shown is that rubbing vitamin A cream into yourself puffs up your skin and so reduces wrinkles

Improvement of Naturally Aged Skin With Vitamin A (Retinol)

By Reza Kafi et al.

Objective: To evaluate the effectiveness of topical retinol (vitamin A) in improving the clinical signs of naturally aged skin.

Design: Randomized, double-blind, vehicle-controlled, left and right arm comparison study.

Setting: Academic referral center.

Patients: The study population comprised 36 elderly subjects (mean age, 87 years), residing in 2 senior citizen facilities.

Intervention: Topical 0.4% retinol lotion or its vehicle was applied at each visit by study personnel to either the right or the left arm, up to 3 times a week for 24 weeks.

Main Outcome Measures: Clinical assessment using a semiquantitative scale (0, none; 9, most severe) and biochemical measurements from skin biopsy specimens obtained from treated areas.

Results: After 24 weeks, an intent-to-treat analysis using the last-observation-carried-forward method revealed that there were significant differences between retinol-treated and vehicle-treated skin for changes in fine wrinkling scores (-1.64 [95% CI, -2.06 to -1.22] vs -0.08 [95% CI, -0.17 to 0.01]; P<.001). As measured in a subgroup, retinol treatment significantly increased glycosaminoglycan expression (P = .02 [n = 6]) and procollagen I immunostaining (P = .049 [n = 4]) compared with vehicle.

Conclusions: Topical retinol improves fine wrinkles associated with natural aging. Significant induction of glycosaminoglycan, which is known to retain substantial water, and increased collagen production are most likely responsible for wrinkle effacement. With greater skin matrix synthesis, retinol-treated aged skin is more likely to withstand skin injury and ulcer formation along with improved appearance.

Arch Dermatol. 2007;143:606-612




DO SPROUTS STOP CANCER?

There is a whole industry telling us how good for us Brussels sprouts are -- which is entirely predictable from the fact that they taste bad. So after the sound study above we need a laugh, so let us have a look at some epidemiology about sprouts.

The big hole in epidemiological studies is that you can never be certain what caused an observed difference. Just suggest a reasonable alternative causal chain to that advanced in the original study and the original study proves nothing. So I will just suggest my old favourite -- the one that most medical researchers zealously ignore -- the role of social class.

The basic question that the study raises is: Why would healthier people say they eat more sprouts? My guess is because economically more successful people are better at saying the "right" things. So the study has really only separated out the dummies from the smarties -- and it is an old and general truth that dumber and poorer people have worse health. This study is another instance of it. It proves nothing about actually eating sprouts!

The abstract is pretty heavy going even after I have paragraphed it so I start below with a media summary and then give the abstract:

BRUSSEL sprouts may not be a dinner-party favourite, but they could protect you against bladder cancer. In the International Journal of Cancer this week, researchers report that so-called "cruciferous" vegetables, such as brussel sprouts, broccoli, cauliflower, turnips, cabbage, radish and watercress help to prevent cancer because they are rich in chemicals called isothiocyanates (ITCs). The study included 697 patients who had recently been diagnosed with bladder cancer and 708 healthy controls. Participants completed a dietary survey to assess their intake of ITCs. Bladder cancer patients had a significantly lower daily intake of ITCs than the cancer-free controls. Overall, high ITC intake was associated with a 29 per cent lower risk of bladder cancer. This anti-cancer effect was stronger in men, in patients aged 64 or older, and in smokers.

Source

Dietary isothiocyanates, GSTM1, GSTT1, NAT2 polymorphisms and bladder cancer risk

By Hua Zhao et al.

Isothiocyanates (ITCs) are nonnutrient compounds in cruciferous vegetables with anticarcinogenic properties. ITCs down-regulate cytochrome P-450 biotransformation enzyme levels, activate Phase II detoxifying enzymes and induce apoptosis. On the other hand, ITCs also serve as a substrate for GSTs. Experimental evidences suggest that ITCs have anticarcinogenic effect on bladder cancer. Therefore, we evaluated dietary intake of ITCs, GSTM1, GSTT1 and NAT2 polymorphisms, and bladder cancer risk in a case-control study.

There were 697 newly diagnosed bladder cancer cases identified from The University of Texas M. D. Anderson Cancer Center and 708 healthy controls matched to cases by age (~5), gender and ethnicity. Participants underwent an in-person interview, in which epidemiologic and food frequency questionnaires were administered to collect demographic and dietary intake data.

Median ITC intake per day was statistically significantly lower in cases than in controls (0.23 vs. 0.33, p < 0.001). High ITC intake was associated with 29% decreased risk of bladder cancer [Odds ratio (OR) = 0.71, 95% confidence interval (CI) = 0.57, 0.89]. The protective effect was more evident in older individuals ( 64-years-old), men, ever smokers and heavy smokers in stratified analysis. Compared with NAT2 rapid acetylator, NAT2 slow acetylator had an increased risk of bladder cancer in Caucasians (OR = 1.31, 95% CI = 1.02, 1.69). There was no main effect associated with the GSTM1 or GSTT1 genotypes. The protective effect of ITCs against bladder cancer was not modified by GSTM1, GSTT1 or NAT2 genotypes. This is the first epidemiological report that ITCs from cruciferous vegetable consumption protect against bladder cancer.

****************

Just some problems with the "Obesity" war:

1). It tries to impose behavior change on everybody -- when most of those targeted are not obese and hence have no reason to change their behaviour. It is a form of punishing the innocent and the guilty alike. (It is also typical of Leftist thinking: Scorning the individual and capable of dealing with large groups only).

2). The longevity research all leads to the conclusion that it is people of MIDDLING weight who live longest -- not slim people. So the "epidemic" of obesity is in fact largely an "epidemic" of living longer.

3). It is total calorie intake that makes you fat -- not where you get your calories. Policies that attack only the source of the calories (e.g. "junk food") without addressing total calorie intake are hence pissing into the wind. People involuntarily deprived of their preferred calorie intake from one source are highly likely to seek and find their calories elsewhere.

4). So-called junk food is perfectly nutritious. A big Mac meal comprises meat, bread, salad and potatoes -- which is a mainstream Western diet. If that is bad then we are all in big trouble.

5). Food warriors demonize salt and fat. But we need a daily salt intake to counter salt-loss through perspiration and the research shows that people on salt-restricted diets die SOONER. And Eskimos eat huge amounts of fat with no apparent ill-effects. And the average home-cooked roast dinner has LOTS of fat. Will we ban roast dinners?

6). The foods restricted are often no more calorific than those permitted -- such as milk and fruit-juice drinks.

7). Tendency to weight is mostly genetic and is therefore not readily susceptible to voluntary behaviour change.

8). And when are we going to ban cheese? Cheese is a concentrated calorie bomb and has lots of that wicked animal fat in it too. Wouldn't we all be better off without it? And what about butter and margarine? They are just about pure fat. Surely they should be treated as contraband in kids' lunchboxes! [/sarcasm].

Trans fats:

For one summary of the weak science behind the "trans-fat" hysteria, see here. Trans fats have only a temporary effect on blood chemistry and the evidence of lasting harm from them is dubious. By taking extreme groups in trans fats intake, some weak association with coronary heart disease has at times been shown in some sub-populations but extreme group studies are inherently at risk of confounding with other factors and are intrinsically of little interest to the average person.

The use of extreme quintiles (fifths) to examine effects is in fact so common as to be almost universal but suggests to the experienced observer that the differences between the mean scores of the experimental and control groups were not statistically significant -- thus making the article concerned little more than an exercise in deception

*********************



8 June, 2007

Widespread influence of genes confirmed

An unprecedented selection of genes that contribute to common diseases has been identified by the biggest survey of the human genome. The discovery promises to transform treatment and diagnosis of everyday health problems. The study, which screened DNA samples from 17,000 British volunteers, has identified 24 genetic variants that influence six common conditions that together affect tens of millions of people. Half the genes have effects that are new to science, and the findings open new approaches to research into type 1 and type 2 diabetes, heart disease, Crohn's disease, bipolar disorder and rheumatoid arthritis. Genetic variants that may affect a seventh disorder, high blood pressure, have also been highlighted, though these links have yet to be confirmed.

The discovery by the Wellcome Trust Case Control Consortium is a landmark in humanity's ability to understand our genetic code, illustrating how variations in DNA make different people susceptible to diseases. As the seven studied conditions and the genes that influence them are common, the results should help scientists to design therapies and screening techniques from which millions will benefit.

Many of the new genes lie in areas of the genome that were not previously thought to be related to the diseases in question. As all the variants have small effects, which predispose to disorders rather than inevitably causing them, the study should also reveal environmen-tal factors that matter as well. "We have known for a long time that genes play a large role in common human diseases such as heart disease, diabetes and many psychiatric disorders," said Professor Peter Donnelly, of the University of Oxford, who led the research team. "What we have not known is which parts of the genome are involved." "Many of the most common diseases are very complex, part nature and nurture, with genes interacting with our environment and lifestyles. By identifying the genes underlying these conditions, our study should enable scientists to understand better how disease occurs, which people are most at risk and, in time, produce more effective, more personalised treatments."

In the study, published in the journal Nature, more than 200 scientists took DNA samples from 2,000 individuals with each of the seven diseases and from 3,000 healthy control subjects. The study compared 500,000 genetic markers to identify which were more common in people with disease. This technique, whole genome association, can find genetic variants that have small effects. The new variants are carried by between 5 per cent and 40 per cent of the population. Most raise the risk of developing a disease by up to 40 per cent if one copy is inherited, and by double this in people with two copies.

Details of several genes identified by the consortium have already been published, including the FTO gene that influences obesity and a cluster that affects type 2 diabetes.

The most exciting results concern type 1 diabetes and Crohn's disease, a bowel disorder. Specialists in each disease will be watching progress in the others in search of clues. "If there is a breakthrough in Crohn's disease, we will be looking at it in type 1 diabetes," said Professor John Todd, of the University of Cambridge, who led the type 1 diabetes arm of the research.

Mark Walport, director of the Wellcome Trust, said: "This research shows that it is possible to analyse human variation in health and disease on an enormous scale."

Hope for six conditions:

Bipolar disorder: Psychiatric illness that affects 100 million people worldwide. One new genetic area reliably linked. Many other genes likely to have a small effect on risk

Coronary heart diseaseL Britain's biggest killer, causing 105,000 deaths annually. Genetic area on chromosome 9 doubles risk in the 20 per cent of people who have two copies, increases risk by 50 per cent in the 50 per cent of people with one copy of the variant

Crohn's disease: Inflammatory bowel disorder that affects up to 60,000 people in Britain. Three new genes discovered that raise the risk by 40 per cent. The study confirms six other previously identified genes are also linked

Rheumatoid arthritis: Auto-immune condition affecting 387,000 people in Britain. One genetic region confirmed to have impact on women

Type 1 diabetes: Insulin-dependent form of the condition that usually begins in childhood, affecting 350,000 people in Britain. Four genes found that have an effect, raising risk by up to 40 per cent when people have one copy. Effect of three other genes confirmed

Type 2 diabetes: Adult-onset form of the condition, affecting 1.9 million people in Britain. Three new genes that affect risk identified, including the FTO gene that contributes to the risk of obesity

Source

****************

Just some problems with the "Obesity" war:

1). It tries to impose behavior change on everybody -- when most of those targeted are not obese and hence have no reason to change their behaviour. It is a form of punishing the innocent and the guilty alike. (It is also typical of Leftist thinking: Scorning the individual and capable of dealing with large groups only).

2). The longevity research all leads to the conclusion that it is people of MIDDLING weight who live longest -- not slim people. So the "epidemic" of obesity is in fact largely an "epidemic" of living longer.

3). It is total calorie intake that makes you fat -- not where you get your calories. Policies that attack only the source of the calories (e.g. "junk food") without addressing total calorie intake are hence pissing into the wind. People involuntarily deprived of their preferred calorie intake from one source are highly likely to seek and find their calories elsewhere.

4). So-called junk food is perfectly nutritious. A big Mac meal comprises meat, bread, salad and potatoes -- which is a mainstream Western diet. If that is bad then we are all in big trouble.

5). Food warriors demonize salt and fat. But we need a daily salt intake to counter salt-loss through perspiration and the research shows that people on salt-restricted diets die SOONER. And Eskimos eat huge amounts of fat with no apparent ill-effects. And the average home-cooked roast dinner has LOTS of fat. Will we ban roast dinners?

6). The foods restricted are often no more calorific than those permitted -- such as milk and fruit-juice drinks.

7). Tendency to weight is mostly genetic and is therefore not readily susceptible to voluntary behaviour change.

8). And when are we going to ban cheese? Cheese is a concentrated calorie bomb and has lots of that wicked animal fat in it too. Wouldn't we all be better off without it? And what about butter and margarine? They are just about pure fat. Surely they should be treated as contraband in kids' lunchboxes! [/sarcasm].

Trans fats:

For one summary of the weak science behind the "trans-fat" hysteria, see here. Trans fats have only a temporary effect on blood chemistry and the evidence of lasting harm from them is dubious. By taking extreme groups in trans fats intake, some weak association with coronary heart disease has at times been shown in some sub-populations but extreme group studies are inherently at risk of confounding with other factors and are intrinsically of little interest to the average person.

The use of extreme quintiles (fifths) to examine effects is in fact so common as to be almost universal but suggests to the experienced observer that the differences between the mean scores of the experimental and control groups were not statistically significant -- thus making the article concerned little more than an exercise in deception

*********************



7 June 2007

SMOKING AND ASTHMA

I am extremely dubious about the study below. I accept that the incidence of asthma has risen in recent decades and I accept that a probable cause of that is insufficient challenge to the immune system in early childhood. What I do NOT accept is that smoking has increased in recent years. Everything I have read tells me that decades of health warnings have gradually had an effect and that smoking has DECREASED in recent decades. The article below asks us to believe the opposite of that. I think it is just another politically correct attack on smoking. How the author jimmied her data to get her desired conclusion I think I know (I suspect that she ignored recent decades and just looked at the century-wide trend) but I can't be bothered wasting my time by looking into it. This is really epidemiology at its worst. Smoking MAY aggravate asthma -- I expect it does -- but this study does not prove it

Environmental tobacco smoke and the epidemic of asthma in children: the role of cigarette use

By Renee D. Goodwin

Abstract

Background: Asthma is the most common chronic disease affecting youth worldwide. The prevalence of asthma has increased at least 3-fold during the past several decades. The reason for this increase remains unknown.

Objective: To examine one possible factor that may be affecting the increase in prevalence of asthma among youth.

Methods: Data on the incidence of asthma among youth were aggregated using the National Health Interview Survey (sample of 4,500 children) and were compared on an ecologic level with data on cigarette consumption in the United States from 1900 to 2003 from the American Lung Association.

Results: Our results suggest a parallel increase in the rates of cigarette use among adults and asthma in children. These findings show an increase in cigarette use during the past 4 birth cohorts, with subsequent leveling off at a population level with a progressively more prominent increase in cigarette use among women in the United States.

Conclusion: We present one possible factor that may be contributing to the epidemic of childhood asthma. We hypothesize that (1) there has been a marked increase in smoking during the past century, (2) this increase in smoking has resulted in a substantial increase in exposure to environmental tobacco smoke among children, and (3) increased exposure to environmental tobacco smoke has contributed to the increase in childhood asthma. Data on trends in cigarette use among adults and asthma prevalence among children during the past century are presented as ecological evidence in support of this hypothesis. Future studies will be needed to confirm these findings with community-level analyses in a variety of geographic regions.

Annals of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology, 2007, vol. 98, no. 5, pp. 447 - 454




The blind to see again?

A routine operation to restore the sight of people with the most common cause of blindness will be available within a decade, scientists believe. A team of British doctors said that a groundbreaking stem-cell treatment for age-related macular degeneration (AMD), which affects a quarter of people over 60 to some degree, should become widely available. The condition is responsible for the blindness of 14 million Europeans. The doctors are recruiting patients for the first clinical trials, scheduled to take place within five years. The team said that, after earlier studies, they were confident of success.

AMD is caused by the failure of retinal pigment epithelial (RPE) cells - the support cells under the retina that process light. The macula - the central area of the retina - then degenerates and gradually knocks out central vision. The doctors from University College London, Moorfields Eye Hospital in London and the University of Sheffield have already repaired the vision of a handful of patients with AMD using cells from the patients' own eyes. The London Project to Cure AMD, which was launched yesterday with 4 million pounds funding from an anonymous American donor, intends to carry out the same operation using retinal cells grown in the laboratory from embryonic stem cells. Stem cells are immature, dormant cells with the ability to turn into different cell types. Embryonic stem cells are obtained from early-stage embryos the size of a pinhead.

There are two types of AMD: "wet" and "dry". While much progress has been made in tackling wet AMD, which is characterised by leaking blood vessels and accounts for 10 per cent of cases, no treatment is available for dry AMD. It is believed that the new development will offer hope even to patients with the dry form.

Lyndon da Cruz, a consultant ophthalmic surgeon at Moorfields Eye Hospital, has carried out an operation in a few patients with wet AMD to take cells from the healthy periphery of the eye and transplant them into the affected area. The procedures have been successful but are associated with complications, take more than two hours and require two operations. To make it quicker, easier and more widely available researchers at the University of Sheffield have grown RPE cells from embryonic stem-cell lines. The hope is that this can be processed into a layer that can be injected into the patient's eye during a simple 45-minute operation. Tests of the laboratory-grown RPE cells in rats with AMD showed that they restored vision.

Professor Pete Coffey, the project director from the Institute of Ophthalmology at University College London, said that although they had grown RPE cells successfully they now needed to make sure that the cells were safe enough to be used in humans. "Using stem cells - which are far more adaptable - can only improve success of what has already been achieved and in addition establish this as a global therapy. "The goal is within five years to have a cohort of patients to put the cells into," said Professor Coffey, whose team is preparing the laboratory-derived cells for transplant. Given that AMD could affect up to one third of the population by 2070, with the majority suffering from dry AMD, the benefits could be substantial. "The potential to create a treatment strategy for this condition is critical and may have a major impact on vision loss," Mr da Cruz said.

He added that if in ten years the proposed 4mm by 6mm transplant patch of stem cells was not in global use, something major would have failed in the research. "We have the RPE, we have the evidence that doing this can restore vision. [We are dealing with] practicality issues rather than a big unknown."

More operations are also planned with patients' own cells in those suffering from dry AMD to test the procedure's effectiveness. Barbara McLaughlan, from the Royal National Institute of Blind People, said that taking the research from the laboratory into human trials was exciting. "This is particularly good news for the 150,000 people in the UK with dry AMD which currently has no treatment," she said. "However, even if all goes well with this project, potential treatment being made available on the NHS is still five to seven years away."

Last year The Times revealed that thousands of patients whose sight could be saved by the new drug Macugen were being denied treatment on the NHS on the ground of cost. Later an insurance company offered to cover the cost of drugs for older patients for an annual premium equal to their age in years.

Source

****************

Just some problems with the "Obesity" war:

1). It tries to impose behavior change on everybody -- when most of those targeted are not obese and hence have no reason to change their behaviour. It is a form of punishing the innocent and the guilty alike. (It is also typical of Leftist thinking: Scorning the individual and capable of dealing with large groups only).

2). The longevity research all leads to the conclusion that it is people of MIDDLING weight who live longest -- not slim people. So the "epidemic" of obesity is in fact largely an "epidemic" of living longer.

3). It is total calorie intake that makes you fat -- not where you get your calories. Policies that attack only the source of the calories (e.g. "junk food") without addressing total calorie intake are hence pissing into the wind. People involuntarily deprived of their preferred calorie intake from one source are highly likely to seek and find their calories elsewhere.

4). So-called junk food is perfectly nutritious. A big Mac meal comprises meat, bread, salad and potatoes -- which is a mainstream Western diet. If that is bad then we are all in big trouble.

5). Food warriors demonize salt and fat. But we need a daily salt intake to counter salt-loss through perspiration and the research shows that people on salt-restricted diets die SOONER. And Eskimos eat huge amounts of fat with no apparent ill-effects. And the average home-cooked roast dinner has LOTS of fat. Will we ban roast dinners?

6). The foods restricted are often no more calorific than those permitted -- such as milk and fruit-juice drinks.

7). Tendency to weight is mostly genetic and is therefore not readily susceptible to voluntary behaviour change.

8). And when are we going to ban cheese? Cheese is a concentrated calorie bomb and has lots of that wicked animal fat in it too. Wouldn't we all be better off without it? And what about butter and margarine? They are just about pure fat. Surely they should be treated as contraband in kids' lunchboxes! [/sarcasm].

Trans fats:

For one summary of the weak science behind the "trans-fat" hysteria, see here. Trans fats have only a temporary effect on blood chemistry and the evidence of lasting harm from them is dubious. By taking extreme groups in trans fats intake, some weak association with coronary heart disease has at times been shown in some sub-populations but extreme group studies are inherently at risk of confounding with other factors and are intrinsically of little interest to the average person.

The use of extreme quintiles (fifths) to examine effects is in fact so common as to be almost universal but suggests to the experienced observer that the differences between the mean scores of the experimental and control groups were not statistically significant -- thus making the article concerned little more than an exercise in deception

*********************



6 June, 2007

COFFEE IS GOOD FOR GOUT!

My day, like that of many millions of other people, starts with a cup of hot, sweet coffee. The caffeine in it lifts the mood as it sweeps away early-morning inertia. The sugar taken with the coffee is an admirable way of correcting any hypo-glycaemia. I repeat the dose when I reach my office. Is the small luxury of drinking coffee evidence of an addiction to caffeine, popularly supposed to be a noxious chemical and regularly attacked in the health and beauty columns of magazines? Or is it, as I prefer to believe, regularly but falsely maligned, and not only harmless but, when taken in moderate amounts, beneficial to someone's health?

Most doctors have been brought up to believe, as the health and beauty correspondents do, that the world would be a better place without coffee drinking. Doctors mutter darkly that coffee could be responsible for an increased risk of a fast heart rate, other cardiac arrhythmias, high blood pressure and heart attacks. They even hint that it could cause cancers, including cancer of the pancreas.

Few of those who preach against coffee have studied the evidence. If they did, they might realise that many of the stories that have circulated about coffee since it was discovered 1,300 years ago in the Middle East are myths. Recent research has suggested that for most people it is clinically harmless, and for many medically helpful. The latest benefit attributed to coffee is its ability to reduce the levels of uric acids in the blood, cutting the number of attacks of gout that periodically afflict some people. This conclusion resulted from work at the Harvard School of Public Health, the Women's Hospital, Harvard Medical School and the Canadian Arthritis Research Centre at the University of British Columbia.

The evidence that research teams have collected and analysed on the benefits of coffee for gout sufferers has been published in the latest issue of Arthritis and Rheumatism. The conclusion was that drinking four or more cups of coffee a day dramatically reduces the risk of gout in men.

[Drama is in the eye of the beholder. Only 1.6% of the sample got gout so for most people drinking coffee or not is irrelevant. It should also be noted that decaffeinated coffee was recorded as having similar effects. What it means that most gout sufferers did not drink much coffee is however entirely speculative. Perhaps it just means that they preferred drinking port!]

The study was based on the analysis of people drawn from the 50,000 health professionals whose medical condition has been carefully followed for the past 12 years.

Other university work includes a smaller study of 757 patients who had been found to be suffering from gout. Researchers assessed the risk of having attacks of acute gout and related this to the amount of coffee drunk. The likelihood of an attack of gout was 40 per cent lower in those patients who drank four to five cups of coffee, but reduced by a dramatic 59 per cent for those who drank six or more cups daily.

Nearly all the myths surrounding coffee that have terrified its drinkers over the years have been exploded. For example, a former patient of mine told me this week that his father had forbidden him to have coffee as it caused liver cirrhosis. An old belief, but absolute nonsense. Six years ago Dr Arthur Klatsky, a well-known American research physician, and other investigators showed that coffee, but no other caffeine-based drink, tended to delay the onset of alcoholic and nonalcoholic cirrhosis.

Eight years ago research published in the Journal of the American Medical Association indicated that coffee drinking reduced the incidence of gallstones and gall bladder disease. More recently, it has also been shown to lessen the likelihood of developing type 2 diabetes.

Harvard studies have cleared coffee of the frequent charge that it increases the chances of strokes and heart attacks. Now there is convincing evidence that it certainly has no adverse effect on the heart attack or stroke rate, but shows a slight benefit. However, the advantage of taking it as a cardio-protective drug is so small that it is safer to describe its influence as neutral.

Nor has there ever been any evidence that coffee causes cancer. Its influence on rectal cancer has been debated for many years but the current opinion is if it has one, it is likely to be beneficial.

Is there such a thing as too much coffee? It is probably safer to take coffee and all other pharmacologically active substances in moderation, but three or four cups are unlikely to hurt anyone. As it increases alertness and sensitivity, it would be as well to avoid it altogether if you have insomnia, or a heart rate that behaves erratically when stimulated in other ways. Pregnant women should also take it in strict moderation. Everyone else should enjoy their early-morning coffee. It's not a vice but a pleasure. As they drink it, they should remember that it even reduces the suicide rate in women.

Source




The flavonol crusade continues

The wonders of flavonols seem to be most promoted in connection with chocolate but double-blind studies have not borne out the epidemiological enthusiasms -- e.g. Farouque HM et al. "Acute and chronic effects of flavanol-rich cocoa on vascular function in subjects with coronary artery disease: a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled study." Clinical Science, 2006 . Pesky, isn't it?

Researchers may have the answer: a dietary supplement containing a compound found in common foods like grapes, tea, cocoa, and blueberries, coupled with a little exercise. In a study conducted in mice, animals fed a diet enriched with the compound, known as epicatechin, showed signs of better brain functioning than mice that ate a typical diet. When the supplement was combined with regular exercise, the advantages went up significantly.

The investigators believe epicatechin, which is a type of chemical known as flavonols, helps the brain work better by promoting blood vessel growth in a part of the brain responsible for learning and memory. It may also play a role in developing mature nerve cells. When epicatechin is combined with exercise, it also appears to favorably impact genes important in protecting learning and memory, and dampen down the effect of genes responsible for inflammatory and neurodegeneration.

The researchers plan more studies to confirm the beneficial effects of epicatechin. "A logical next step will be to study the effects of epicatechin on memory and brain blood flow in aged animals," study author Henriette van Praag, Ph.D., of the Salk Institute, was quoted as saying, "and then humans, combined with mild exercise." She and her fellow investigators write in the paper, "An active lifestyle combined with a flavonol-rich diet may prevent aging-related cognitive disorders and/or neurodegenerative disease."

Source

****************

Just some problems with the "Obesity" war:

1). It tries to impose behavior change on everybody -- when most of those targeted are not obese and hence have no reason to change their behaviour. It is a form of punishing the innocent and the guilty alike. (It is also typical of Leftist thinking: Scorning the individual and capable of dealing with large groups only).

2). The longevity research all leads to the conclusion that it is people of MIDDLING weight who live longest -- not slim people. So the "epidemic" of obesity is in fact largely an "epidemic" of living longer.

3). It is total calorie intake that makes you fat -- not where you get your calories. Policies that attack only the source of the calories (e.g. "junk food") without addressing total calorie intake are hence pissing into the wind. People involuntarily deprived of their preferred calorie intake from one source are highly likely to seek and find their calories elsewhere.

4). So-called junk food is perfectly nutritious. A big Mac meal comprises meat, bread, salad and potatoes -- which is a mainstream Western diet. If that is bad then we are all in big trouble.

5). Food warriors demonize salt and fat. But we need a daily salt intake to counter salt-loss through perspiration and the research shows that people on salt-restricted diets die SOONER. And Eskimos eat huge amounts of fat with no apparent ill-effects. And the average home-cooked roast dinner has LOTS of fat. Will we ban roast dinners?

6). The foods restricted are often no more calorific than those permitted -- such as milk and fruit-juice drinks.

7). Tendency to weight is mostly genetic and is therefore not readily susceptible to voluntary behaviour change.

8). And when are we going to ban cheese? Cheese is a concentrated calorie bomb and has lots of that wicked animal fat in it too. Wouldn't we all be better off without it? And what about butter and margarine? They are just about pure fat. Surely they should be treated as contraband in kids' lunchboxes! [/sarcasm].

Trans fats:

For one summary of the weak science behind the "trans-fat" hysteria, see here. Trans fats have only a temporary effect on blood chemistry and the evidence of lasting harm from them is dubious. By taking extreme groups in trans fats intake, some weak association with coronary heart disease has at times been shown in some sub-populations but extreme group studies are inherently at risk of confounding with other factors and are intrinsically of little interest to the average person.

The use of extreme quintiles (fifths) to examine effects is in fact so common as to be almost universal but suggests to the experienced observer that the differences between the mean scores of the experimental and control groups were not statistically significant -- thus making the article concerned little more than an exercise in deception

*********************



5 June, 2007

WHO HAS FAT KIDS?

Some really weird results here, which I will discuss at the end. Media summary below followed by journal abstract:

Researchers have found the children of single mothers are more likely to grow up to be overweight or obese. The findings in the Medical Journal of Australia suggest that things such as family conflict or negative events do not have much of an impact on a child's weight.

But Lisa Gibson from the Telethon Institute for Child Health Research says the health and relationship status of their mother does. "We found that having an overweight mother or coming from a single [parent] family were the most important predictors of a child being overweight or obese," she said. Dr Gibson says it is possible single mothers do not have the time or resources to feed their children nutritious foods, or to give them exercise and recreational facilities. She says when it comes to children with an overweight mother, the link is probably a mixture of genetics and a shared environment.

Source

Journal abstract follows:

The role of family and maternal factors in childhood obesity

By Lisa Y Gibson et al.

Objective: To investigate the relationship between a child's weight and a broad range of family and maternal factors.

Design, setting and participants: Cross-sectional data from a population-based prospective study, collected between January 2004 and December 2005, for 329 children aged 6-13 years (192 healthy weight, 97 overweight and 40 obese) and their mothers (n = 265) recruited from a paediatric hospital endocrinology department and eight randomly selected primary schools in Perth, Western Australia.

Main outcome measures: Height, weight and body mass index (BMI) of children and mothers; demographic information; maternal depression, anxiety, stress and self-esteem; general family functioning; parenting style; and negative life events.

Results: In a multilevel model, maternal BMI and family structure (single-parent v two-parent families) were the only significant predictors of child BMI z scores.

Conclusion: Childhood obesity is not associated with adverse maternal or family characteristics such as maternal depression, negative life events, poor general family functioning or ineffective parenting style. However, having an overweight mother and a single-parent (single-mother) family increases the likelihood of a child being overweight or obese.

A journal abstract is supposed to be a strictly factual summary of the full article. In this case the abstract represents the conclusions of the article but not its results. Box 2 of the full article showed that it was OVERWHELMINGLY single mothers who had fat kids. But the really odd thing is that having a fat mother had virtually NO effect on how fat the kid was. The multivariate analysis did not alter that much. What the multivariate analyses DID bring out, however, was that mothers who had never attended primary school (aborigines, most likely) were highly likely to have fat kids.

That fat mothers did not tend to have fat kids flies in the face of all previous research, however, so I think we must completely dismiss this article as based on either corrupted data, flawed analysis or hopelessly unrepresentative sampling. I am greatly surprised that it was published.

If I had been asked to referee the article I would have asked for at least the zero-order correlation matrix plus some crosstabs so that readers would have SOME hope of figuring out what was going on -- but asking me to referee ANY medical article would require a courageous editor -- given the frequency with which I detect nonsense




The stupidity of a British medical journal

The editor of "The Medical Journal of Australia" comments below on an editorial in a typically politicized British medical journal: "Australia: the politics of fear and neglect". Lancet 2007; 369: 1320. The Australian editor is too diplomatic to mention it but a journal from the home of the ever-decaying "National Health Service" lecturing Australia on its health system really is hilarious. See Matthew 7:3-5

From the first days of European settlement, our colonies were bombarded with bureaucratic edicts from the Motherland, until Federation and Australia's emergence as a proud and independent nation put an end to our dependency. But the Motherland's long-lost role was recently revived in an editorial in The Lancet entitled Australia: the politics of fear and neglect. Short, simplistic and sensational, it proclaimed that Australia's progressive and inclusive culture was burdened by a dark underbelly of political conservatism.

It further asserted that the Australian Government had effectively silenced dissent in the scientific community, and propagated a political view "that those who spoke up for indigenous health were simply `establishing politically and morally correct credentials'". To top it off, the Prime Minister was portrayed as ruthlessly exploiting Australia's strong undercurrent of political conservatism.

And The Lancet's solution? Gratuitous advice to oust the conservatives at this year's federal election and usher in a new era of "enlightenment" for Australian health and medical science!

Significantly, the editorial was silent on the concerted efforts of dedicated Australian researchers and doctors working to improve Indigenous health, and the fearless advocacy of this goal by various professional bodies and this Journal. Despite The Lancet's assertion of "silenced" scientists, its editorial was strangely silent on the conservative government's unprecedented investment in health and medical research.

Following The Lancet's edict, a commentary in The Australian warned scientific and medical journals not to engage in politics+ and put their public standing, independence and integrity at risk. As long as there remain unresolved issues in the delivery of health care to all Australians, requiring political attention and action, the MJA will never heed this injunction. But, in pursuit of this goal, the recent edict from London is hardly an example to emulate.

Source

****************

Just some problems with the "Obesity" war:

1). It tries to impose behavior change on everybody -- when most of those targeted are not obese and hence have no reason to change their behaviour. It is a form of punishing the innocent and the guilty alike. (It is also typical of Leftist thinking: Scorning the individual and capable of dealing with large groups only).

2). The longevity research all leads to the conclusion that it is people of MIDDLING weight who live longest -- not slim people. So the "epidemic" of obesity is in fact largely an "epidemic" of living longer.

3). It is total calorie intake that makes you fat -- not where you get your calories. Policies that attack only the source of the calories (e.g. "junk food") without addressing total calorie intake are hence pissing into the wind. People involuntarily deprived of their preferred calorie intake from one source are highly likely to seek and find their calories elsewhere.

4). So-called junk food is perfectly nutritious. A big Mac meal comprises meat, bread, salad and potatoes -- which is a mainstream Western diet. If that is bad then we are all in big trouble.

5). Food warriors demonize salt and fat. But we need a daily salt intake to counter salt-loss through perspiration and the research shows that people on salt-restricted diets die SOONER. And Eskimos eat huge amounts of fat with no apparent ill-effects. And the average home-cooked roast dinner has LOTS of fat. Will we ban roast dinners?

6). The foods restricted are often no more calorific than those permitted -- such as milk and fruit-juice drinks.

7). Tendency to weight is mostly genetic and is therefore not readily susceptible to voluntary behaviour change.

8). And when are we going to ban cheese? Cheese is a concentrated calorie bomb and has lots of that wicked animal fat in it too. Wouldn't we all be better off without it? And what about butter and margarine? They are just about pure fat. Surely they should be treated as contraband in kids' lunchboxes! [/sarcasm].

Trans fats:

For one summary of the weak science behind the "trans-fat" hysteria, see here. Trans fats have only a temporary effect on blood chemistry and the evidence of lasting harm from them is dubious. By taking extreme groups in trans fats intake, some weak association with coronary heart disease has at times been shown in some sub-populations but extreme group studies are inherently at risk of confounding with other factors and are intrinsically of little interest to the average person.

The use of extreme quintiles (fifths) to examine effects is in fact so common as to be almost universal but suggests to the experienced observer that the differences between the mean scores of the experimental and control groups were not statistically significant -- thus making the article concerned little more than an exercise in deception

*********************



4 June, 2007

Antagonism to a life-prolonging product

First they came for the pregnant women, and I did not speak out because I was not a pregnant woman . . . After Friday's dishonest attempt to tell pregnant women not to drink a drop comes news of more alcophobic idiocy. From next year, all drinks are to carry health warnings - "voluntarily", but if anybody refuses to do as they're told, the Government will make it the law.

Labels will spell out how many units of alcohol the drink contains, official guidelines about how much (ie, little) to drink, and "advice" such as "Drink responsibly" and "Know your limits". Caroline Flint, the Public Health Minister, says they are "about helping people to make the right choice". Which, of course, is always not to have another drink.

If Ms Flint seriously believes that those on a binge will study labels to "calculate at a glance whether they are staying within sensible drinking guildelines", she should get out more (preferably not in any pub I might use). But these seemingly pointless moves do matter, as signs of the creeping advance of what is called "the new politics of behaviour". As with all Newspeak, "public health" here means the opposite - policing our personal habits.

Many women have understandably objected to the Department of Health's revised advice which, unsupported by any medical evidence, treats them as hormone slaves who cannot be trusted to have a drink without falling down the slippery slope and drowning their unborn in booze. But pregnant tipplers are only the, er, thin edge of the wedge, singled out as a vulnerable and health-conscious group on whom to experiment.

The guidelines about how many alcohol units the rest of us can drink are similarly unscientific and arbitrary. The advice on those labels will be that men should drink no more than 3-4 units a day (one pint of strong lager or best bitter = 3), women no more than 2-3 units (a small glass of wine = 2). I often drink more than that and, according to the BBC, so do more than seven million others. The authorities want to teach all seven million a lesson. We are all pregnant now.

Ms Flint generously says: "There is no reason why you or I should not be able to enjoy alcohol safely and healthily" (Doesn't that sound like fun?). But no doubt they would like to expand the guidleines to cover many of the errant millions: "Avoid alcohol if pregnant; if aged 18-25; if standing in a crowded pub; if watching football, on holiday, or after midnight; if wearing short skirts or tattoos; if you've already had some."

Time, ladies and gents, to tell the alcocops where to stick their labels. "Drink responsibly"? For adults that should mean "as you choose, so long as you take responsibility". "Know your limits"? That is one piece of advice the public health zealots would do well to swallow themselves.

Source




When Totalitarianism Comes to America, It Will Come Wrapped in a Whole-Grain, Low-Sodium, Decaffeinated, Re-Usable, Non-Carbon-Footprint Wrapper

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is sponsoring more food totalitarianism for the purpose of suitably herding the kiddies in their daily food round-ups in public schools. An Institute of Medicine committee - set up at the behest of congress - is proposing strict standards for all foods available in the government's daily internment camps.

Ayn Rand or George Orwell couldn't have fictionalized it any better. The Committee for Food Control, as we'll call it, is proposing that food and beverages be individually categorized into defined "tiers." The committee will collectively determine what food and beverages belong in either Tier 1 or Tier 2. Each tier of food and beverage items will come with varying availability according to the time of day and/or the child's grade level.

Tier 1 snacks contain no more than 200 calories per portion, and entr‚e items that could be sold … la carte do not exceed calorie limits on comparable school lunch program items. Tier 1 items have no more than 200 milligrams of sodium per snack portion or 480 milligrams per … la carte entr‚e item. They contain no more than 35 percent of total calories from fat; less than 10 percent of total calories from saturated fats; no trans fats; and no caffeine except in naturally occurring trace amounts. They also contain no more than 35 percent of calories from total sugars; exceptions to this guideline are flavored milk, which may contain up to 22 grams of sugars per 8-ounce serving, and yogurt, which should not exceed 30 grams of sugars per 8-ounce portion.

Got that? This means that yogurt with the inexcusable "fruit-on-the-bottom" will likely exceed the sugar limit and thus be tossed into the "less healthy" Tier 2. In fact, we're told that Tier 1 foods include stuff like carrot sticks, whole-grain, low-sugar cereals, whole fruit, skim or soy milk, and raisins. There would be a cap on juices because of their calorie-laden, sugary nature - 8 ounces for high school kids and 4 ounces for middle and elementary school students.

Tier 2 foods are the borderline sinful items - stuff like low-sodium whole-wheat crackers, caffeine-free diet soda, and seltzer water. These food items can only be made available after school hours and must conform to the U.S. Dietary Guidelines for Americans. Sports drinks, like Powerade or Gatorade, may only be ingested when the child has participated in "one or more hours of vigorous activity." That one ought to make for some great union jobs in providing for oversight and enforcement.

These standards will be applied to food and beverages sold on school grounds, including vending machines; … la carte cafeteria items; and "other foods and drinks that are available outside of - and therefore compete with - federally reimbursable school meals, which already must conform to some nutrition guidelines."

The criticism here is obvious. For starters, there is no room in a free society for lifestyle decrees of this nature - the government has overstepped its boundaries when it extends its coercive powers into the realm of the family and strives to regulate individual human eating habits. An unconstitutional action, yes. But even more so, it's preposterous to think that any group of people can be empowered to determine what kind of nutritional substance (or lack thereof) you can or can't put into your child's body. This proposed esophageal terrorism on the part of big government - under the pretext of making us all healthier - is indeed invasive and controlling enough to justify the term "food totalitarianism."

In reality, in order to enjoy good health and clean eating individuals do not need to categorize all foods as strictly "bad" or "good." They need to balance the healthy foods with the less healthy and moderate their overall diet so that, in total, their bodies are receiving a net advantage of solid, nutritional foods. Self-moderation on the part of the individual eventually brings on more knowledge, better decision-making, and cleaner eating habits. Taking the road from being a sloppy eater who subsists on fast food, sweet stuff, and highly-processed foods toward a life of clean eating is typically not a forced sprint; it is a voluntary walk along the path of knowledge when one strives for personal betterment through enhanced nutritional habits.

Another critique - that complements the comments above - is the government's "one-size-fits-all" proposal. The notion that what is good or bad for one person is necessarily the same for all others is collectivist in its foundation as well as scientifically unsound. Our bodies are so supremely individualistic that no group of us will achieve the same results from a given form of exercise or food program. As for children, there are many determining factors for diet type. A child's natural body type, growth pattern, metabolism, and level of activity will determine what he should be eating and when he should eat it. A centrally-planned food program with calorie ceilings, rigorously-defined good and bad foods, and shared time management techniques is both physically and mentally unhealthy. Envision the negativity that children would experience when eating becomes forced and authoritarian, and falls under yet another set of harsh rulemaking.

Furthermore, there is no totalitarian decree that can effectively centralize the health and food diets of millions of children via random commands from one gigantic central planning commission - made up of establishment doctors, government agencies, health special interests, busybody citizens, and corporatist food interests - headquartered in Washington D.C. In effect, the establishment of twinkie control and calorie constraints is oppressive and inhumane, and surely, it works against the very foundations of freedom that we should savor and preserve.

True, bad eating habits will lead to grim consequences later in life, if not in the here-and-now. However, one's body is one's own to take care of or not. When an obese person - or any individual for that matter - makes the choice to consume a Big Mac or deep-fried, processed corn dogs as opposed to non-fat yogurt and broccoli, they are choosing food consumption as the way to immediate happiness instead of thinking long-term and putting off instant gratification for future health benefits. Done continuously, it's a bad choice, but it is a choice. Poor choices like these are ripe for criticism and open to persuasion from onlookers, but they can never be taken away from individuals if we value self-ownership and the notion of negative liberty - the absence of physical interference with an individual's person and property - as espoused by classical liberal philosophers.

Looking through the proposal, I guess there's one thing for which we can be "grateful" concerning this latest episode of obesity scaremongering: "The standards apply only to competitive items sold or available on campuses, not to federal school meals or to bagged lunches or snacks that children bring to school."

Then again, before you consider this latest oppressive scheme for food control to be only a problem of food served in the public schools, consider the ramp-up in food totalitarianism that we have been witnessing all around us. One thing for certain is that government central planners are always predictable: given the opportunity, they will collectively assimilate all people everywhere into one big kettle and dole out equitable slices of compulsory recommendations that are backed up by the supremacy of law. This is so that we can all share in the same perceived benefits in the same equal amounts as identified by them - the chosen caretakers. Never mind that what may be beneficial to one man may be detrimental to another man. Blessed be thy caretakers. They are spinning Orwell in his grave.

Source

****************

Just some problems with the "Obesity" war:

1). It tries to impose behavior change on everybody -- when most of those targeted are not obese and hence have no reason to change their behaviour. It is a form of punishing the innocent and the guilty alike. (It is also typical of Leftist thinking: Scorning the individual and capable of dealing with large groups only).

2). The longevity research all leads to the conclusion that it is people of MIDDLING weight who live longest -- not slim people. So the "epidemic" of obesity is in fact largely an "epidemic" of living longer.

3). It is total calorie intake that makes you fat -- not where you get your calories. Policies that attack only the source of the calories (e.g. "junk food") without addressing total calorie intake are hence pissing into the wind. People involuntarily deprived of their preferred calorie intake from one source are highly likely to seek and find their calories elsewhere.

4). So-called junk food is perfectly nutritious. A big Mac meal comprises meat, bread, salad and potatoes -- which is a mainstream Western diet. If that is bad then we are all in big trouble.

5). Food warriors demonize salt and fat. But we need a daily salt intake to counter salt-loss through perspiration and the research shows that people on salt-restricted diets die SOONER. And Eskimos eat huge amounts of fat with no apparent ill-effects. And the average home-cooked roast dinner has LOTS of fat. Will we ban roast dinners?

6). The foods restricted are often no more calorific than those permitted -- such as milk and fruit-juice drinks.

7). Tendency to weight is mostly genetic and is therefore not readily susceptible to voluntary behaviour change.

8). And when are we going to ban cheese? Cheese is a concentrated calorie bomb and has lots of that wicked animal fat in it too. Wouldn't we all be better off without it? And what about butter and margarine? They are just about pure fat. Surely they should be treated as contraband in kids' lunchboxes! [/sarcasm].

Trans fats:

For one summary of the weak science behind the "trans-fat" hysteria, see here. Trans fats have only a temporary effect on blood chemistry and the evidence of lasting harm from them is dubious. By taking extreme groups in trans fats intake, some weak association with coronary heart disease has at times been shown in some sub-populations but extreme group studies are inherently at risk of confounding with other factors and are intrinsically of little interest to the average person.

The use of extreme quintiles (fifths) to examine effects is in fact so common as to be almost universal but suggests to the experienced observer that the differences between the mean scores of the experimental and control groups were not statistically significant -- thus making the article concerned little more than an exercise in deception

*********************



3 June, 2007

When eating "right" goes too far

EXTREME healthy eating is becoming such an obsessive ritual that it is risking young women's health and spawning a new eating disorder - orthorexia. A term coined by international doctors in the past decade, orthorexia is when sufferers - particularly adolescent girls - become hooked on healthy and "pure" eating and put serious and damaging restrictions on their diets.

One leading Sydney expert, who said she was seeing an increasing number of teenage girls with the condition, said orthorexia could have short and long-term effects on bone quality, mood and immunity. The Children's Hospital at Westmead dietician Susie Burrell told The Saturday Daily Telegraph the signs of orthorexia were hallmarks of a serious eating disorder to come. "These are usually girls who only want things very healthy, they are very fat-phobic, they cook the meals themselves, they are very fussy about what they will and won't eat," she said. "There is a focus on keeping lean and thin and looking good and it's often smart girls who are doing well; they get very good grades, they're a good daughter and it goes to the next extreme."

Sufferers of the modern food affliction tend to control their meal portions to the extent where they avoid processed foods entirely and eat very small amounts and sometimes exercise obsessively. Unlike clinically diagnosed eating disorders such as anorexia, orthorexia is characterised by sufferers who have a fixation with food, rather than with weight loss.

Anthea Durrell, 14, said she saw schoolgirls in her year who became fanatical about what they ate and said messages about obesity could be misconstrued. "Lots of celebrities these days are really skinny, like Nicole Richie, and they have such a bad impact on what girls see as beautiful," she said. "It gives them messages that it is really bad to be even on the edge of being chubby.

Eating Disorders Foundation chief executive Amanda Jordan said current messages in regard to childhood obesity and increased weight gain could be wrongly interpreted in young, image-obsessed women. "You get really valuable messages that are getting interpreted in a way that actually works against a person's health," she said. Ms Jordan said orthorexia could become an obsession cycle of self-starvation which then escalated into life-threatening eating disorders. "There is a clear trend in people thinking there is a right way to eat and people going too far in following those guidelines," Ms Jordan said. "It's good to be working against having an obese population, particularly in children but the message over time is getting confused with the message that all fat is bad. "The tendency is sometimes to go overboard and I am really worried it will lead to an increase in eating disorders."

Source




Ex-FDA researcher: Many dietary supplements tainted

The $22 billion dietary supplement industry operates with minimal oversight from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, despite a history of suspect quality and safety. About one in four dietary supplements tested don't meet quality or safety standards, according to former FDA research scientist William Obermeyer, a co- founder of the independent testing firm, ConsumerLab.com, which tests thousands of supplement products.

Some are tainted with pesticides, salmonella, glass, bacteria or heavy metals such as lead and cadmium. Others fail for a variety of reasons, including a lack of ingredients, improper ingredients, failure to break down properly and mislabeling.

Because manufacturers seek low-cost ingredients, Obermeyer said it's a safe bet that some of the tainted products contain ingredients from China, which typically are cheaper.

Under a 1994 federal law, most dietary supplements -- vitamins, minerals, herbs, amino acids and other substances such as enzymes and metabolites, which are taken orally and intended to augment the diet -- don't need to be registered or approved by the FDA. FDA inspections have found supplement manufacturing plants with pest infestations, defective equipment and pipes that leak liquid onto products. But after more than 10 years of development, the FDA still hasn't set minimum standards for the safe manufacture of dietary supplements. Instead, manufacturers set their own standards.

Because supplements are classified as food, they aren't regulated by the same strict guidelines that govern drugs. Supplement manufacturers are responsible for ensuring that their products are safe and include all the ingredients listed on the package label. And like food manufacturers, supplement makers don't have to record, review or provide the FDA with reported injuries or illnesses that result from their products. Reporting is voluntary.

If safety, health or mislabeling problems develop, the FDA can restrict or remove a supplement from the market. Drugs, on the other hand, must be deemed safe and effective before they can be prescribed or sold.

China's emergence as a leading ingredient supplier for the supplement industry has raised new fears since a recent pet food scare was traced to adulterated Chinese wheat flour. Earlier this year, a shipment of bacteria-contaminated vitamin A from China also was flagged before it could be added to infant formula in Europe. And the FDA will start testing toothpaste imported from China after a poisonous ingredient used in antifreeze was found in Chinese-made toothpaste in Panama. Record requirements allow officials to track ingredients to the country and plant where they were manufactured.

Supplement companies are urged to buy quality ingredients from reputable firms, whatever country they're in, said Judy Blatman, spokeswoman for the Council for Responsible Nutrition, which represents supplement manufacturers and suppliers. "Quality has to be the No. 1 priority for ingredient suppliers and manufacturers," Blatman said. "We need to have high-quality products in order to maintain consumer confidence in them." That confidence was shaken in 2004, when the FDA banned the sale of dietary supplements containing ephedra, which caused tremors and heart palpitations and was cited as a factor in numerous deaths.

In February 1997, the FDA proposed mandatory rules outlining "good manufacturing practices" for the safe production of dietary supplements. But more than 10 years later, those rules still haven't been finalized.

Source

****************

Just some problems with the "Obesity" war:

1). It tries to impose behavior change on everybody -- when most of those targeted are not obese and hence have no reason to change their behaviour. It is a form of punishing the innocent and the guilty alike. (It is also typical of Leftist thinking: Scorning the individual and capable of dealing with large groups only).

2). The longevity research all leads to the conclusion that it is people of MIDDLING weight who live longest -- not slim people. So the "epidemic" of obesity is in fact largely an "epidemic" of living longer.

3). It is total calorie intake that makes you fat -- not where you get your calories. Policies that attack only the source of the calories (e.g. "junk food") without addressing total calorie intake are hence pissing into the wind. People involuntarily deprived of their preferred calorie intake from one source are highly likely to seek and find their calories elsewhere.

4). So-called junk food is perfectly nutritious. A big Mac meal comprises meat, bread, salad and potatoes -- which is a mainstream Western diet. If that is bad then we are all in big trouble.

5). Food warriors demonize salt and fat. But we need a daily salt intake to counter salt-loss through perspiration and the research shows that people on salt-restricted diets die SOONER. And Eskimos eat huge amounts of fat with no apparent ill-effects. And the average home-cooked roast dinner has LOTS of fat. Will we ban roast dinners?

6). The foods restricted are often no more calorific than those permitted -- such as milk and fruit-juice drinks.

7). Tendency to weight is mostly genetic and is therefore not readily susceptible to voluntary behaviour change.

8). And when are we going to ban cheese? Cheese is a concentrated calorie bomb and has lots of that wicked animal fat in it too. Wouldn't we all be better off without it? And what about butter and margarine? They are just about pure fat. Surely they should be treated as contraband in kids' lunchboxes! [/sarcasm].

Trans fats:

For one summary of the weak science behind the "trans-fat" hysteria, see here. Trans fats have only a temporary effect on blood chemistry and the evidence of lasting harm from them is dubious. By taking extreme groups in trans fats intake, some weak association with coronary heart disease has at times been shown in some sub-populations but extreme group studies are inherently at risk of confounding with other factors and are intrinsically of little interest to the average person.

The use of extreme quintiles (fifths) to examine effects is in fact so common as to be almost universal but suggests to the experienced observer that the differences between the mean scores of the experimental and control groups were not statistically significant -- thus making the article concerned little more than an exercise in deception

*********************



2 June, 2007

New theory about Black Death

There can be various causes of "buboes" (swollen lymph nodes) so the new theory is plausible

For centuries, rats and fleas have been fingered as the culprits responsible for the Black Death, the medieval plague that killed as many as two thirds of Europe’s population. But historians studying 14th-century court records from Dorset believe they may have uncovered evidence that exonerates them. The parchment records, contained in a recently-discovered archive, reveal that an estimated 50 per cent of the 2,000 people living in Gillingham died within four months of the Black Death reaching the town in October 1348.

The deaths are recorded in land transfers lodged with the manorial court which – unusually for the period – sat every three weeks, giving a clear picture of who had died and when. The records show that 190 of the 300 tenants holding land in the town died during the winter of 1348-49, at a time when a form of bubonic plague spread by rat fleas would have been dormant. Experts now believe that the Black Death is more likely to have been a viral infection, similar to haemorrhagic fever or ebola, that spread from person to person.

The records came to light after they were donated to the Dorset History Centre by a firm of solicitors in whose office attic they had been stored. The historian Dr Susan Scott, of the University of Liverpool, said the documents backed up her theory that the outbreak was not caused by bubonic plague. She said: “Bubonic plague relies on fleas breeding and it is too cold during winter in Britain for this to happen.”

Source




Doubts over obesity pill claims

Some of the health benefits claimed for a new weight loss drug may not be justified, say experts. Rimonabant, launched in the UK last summer, has been shown to aid weight loss by reducing appetite. But a Drug and Therapeutics Bulletin paper suggests claims that it also has an additional positive impact on the body's chemistry have not been proved. However, the manufacturers said the findings had proved consistent across all trials.

The National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (Nice) is currently appraising the drug for use on the NHS. Manufacturers Sanofi-Aventis claim it has been shown to cut levels of potentially harmful cholesterol, fats and sugars in the blood to a greater extent than would be expected by weight loss alone. In theory, this should help to reduce the risk of developing type 2 diabetes and heart disease.

But the DTB paper argued that research had failed to prove that any positive impact on body chemistry was solely down to taking the drug. It was possible, for instance, that it was down to advice given to patients taking the drug to lead a more healthy lifestyle, and take more exercise. The paper also highlighted the fact that in trials rimonabant had no effect on levels of "bad" cholesterol, and little or no effect on blood pressure.

It said the drug had not been effectively compared with other, cheaper weight loss drugs, such as Xenical (orlistat) and Reductil (sibutramine), which are both approved for NHS use. The DTB paper stated: "Orlistat is the drug for obesity for which there is the most evidence for efficacy and safety to date, and we have previously concluded that it is a reasonable option for obese patients where diet and exercise and/or behavioural measures alone have failed."

However, Dr Ian Campbell, medical director of the charity Weight Concern, said research did suggest that rimonabant had an extra effect on body chemistry over and above that expected through losing weight alone. He said this might be a direct result of the unusual way it works on fat cells. Dr Campbell said: "It's a new drug and we need more time to become fully aware of all its effects. "It is more expensive than other available drugs but should be considered when the benefits of weight loss for the patient can justify the investment."

A spokeswoman for Sanofi-Aventis said the effects on body chemistry had been consistently seen in all the trials of rimonabant. Further trials were underway to examine the effects of the drug further. She said there was no doubt that adopting a healthier lifestyle could have a positive impact, but in trials people given a dummy drug also improved their general lifestyle without the same level of effect seen in those taking rimonabant.

The Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) rejected a complaint last year that an advert for rimonabant had exaggerated its benefits. A spokesman for the MHRA said it would examine the latest claims.

Source

****************

Just some problems with the "Obesity" war:

1). It tries to impose behavior change on everybody -- when most of those targeted are not obese and hence have no reason to change their behaviour. It is a form of punishing the innocent and the guilty alike. (It is also typical of Leftist thinking: Scorning the individual and capable of dealing with large groups only).

2). The longevity research all leads to the conclusion that it is people of MIDDLING weight who live longest -- not slim people. So the "epidemic" of obesity is in fact largely an "epidemic" of living longer.

3). It is total calorie intake that makes you fat -- not where you get your calories. Policies that attack only the source of the calories (e.g. "junk food") without addressing total calorie intake are hence pissing into the wind. People involuntarily deprived of their preferred calorie intake from one source are highly likely to seek and find their calories elsewhere.

4). So-called junk food is perfectly nutritious. A big Mac meal comprises meat, bread, salad and potatoes -- which is a mainstream Western diet. If that is bad then we are all in big trouble.

5). Food warriors demonize salt and fat. But we need a daily salt intake to counter salt-loss through perspiration and the research shows that people on salt-restricted diets die SOONER. And Eskimos eat huge amounts of fat with no apparent ill-effects. And the average home-cooked roast dinner has LOTS of fat. Will we ban roast dinners?

6). The foods restricted are often no more calorific than those permitted -- such as milk and fruit-juice drinks.

7). Tendency to weight is mostly genetic and is therefore not readily susceptible to voluntary behaviour change.

8). And when are we going to ban cheese? Cheese is a concentrated calorie bomb and has lots of that wicked animal fat in it too. Wouldn't we all be better off without it? And what about butter and margarine? They are just about pure fat. Surely they should be treated as contraband in kids' lunchboxes! [/sarcasm].

Trans fats:

For one summary of the weak science behind the "trans-fat" hysteria, see here. Trans fats have only a temporary effect on blood chemistry and the evidence of lasting harm from them is dubious. By taking extreme groups in trans fats intake, some weak association with coronary heart disease has at times been shown in some sub-populations but extreme group studies are inherently at risk of confounding with other factors and are intrinsically of little interest to the average person.

The use of extreme quintiles (fifths) to examine effects is in fact so common as to be almost universal but suggests to the experienced observer that the differences between the mean scores of the experimental and control groups were not statistically significant -- thus making the article concerned little more than an exercise in deception

*********************



1 June, 2007

NEW JERSEY FIGHTS FAT

Post lifted from Boortz. See the original for links

As is the state of New Jersey needed another excuse to waste money. It has now decided that it is going to take more tax dollars to create yet another government program, and this one's purpose is to prevent obesity.

The Office of Nutrition and Fitness (as it will be called) is dedicated to making sure that you and your neighbors don't become morbidly obese like those people down in Disney this past weekend. Why in the hell is it the government's job to make sure that I look good in my bunhuggers? Take it upon yourself to stay healthy. Join a YMCA, drink more water or-now here's a concept-just get out and walk! It doesn't take rocket science, and especially not the government, to tell me that.

And to top it off, New Jersey has a $30 billion debt. So I've got an idea, let's create a useless government program! After all, it is for the good of 23 percent of New Jersey residents whom are classified as "obese." Oh and here is some food for thought (pun intended): "New Jersey also has many black and Latino youths, who are more likely to be overweight than white youngsters." I've said it before and I'll say it again, America is the only country with overweight poor people.




Crying Over Spilled Semen: Why women who don't use condoms feel happier

An interesting hypothesis. Hard to imagine a double-blind trial of it

The finding that women who do not use condoms during sex are less depressed and less likely to attempt suicide than are women who have sex with condoms and women who are not sexually active, leads one researcher to conclude that semen contains powerful-and potentially addictive-mood-altering chemicals.

Study author Gordon G. Gallup, Ph.D., a psychologist at the State University of New York in Albany, also found that women who routinely had intercourse without condoms became increasingly depressed as more time elapsed since their last sexual encounter. There was no such correlation for women whose partners regularly used condoms. Gallup's survey of 293 college women also found that those who did not use condoms were most likely to initiate sex and to seek out new partners as soon as a relationship ended. "These women are more vulnerable to the rebound effect, which suggests that there is a chemical dependency," says Gallup.

Semen contains hormones including testosterone, estrogen, prolactin, luteinizing hormone and prostaglandins, and some of these are absorbed through the walls of the vagina and are known to elevate mood.

Gallup controlled for variables including method of contraception, frequency of sexual intercourse, as well as the women's perception of their relationship. He concedes that women who regularly have sex without condoms might share personality traits that make them less susceptible to depression. But the behavior most often associated with non-condom users is sexual risk-taking, and studies have found no correlation between high-risk sexual behavior and lower rates of depression.

Gallup's study, which he deems "the first serious attempt to investigate the effect of semen chemistry on women," titillated the public and rankled some academics upon publication in Archives of Sexual Behavior. Gallup says he has since replicated the findings with a sample of 700 women and will examine whether "semen withdrawal" places women at an increased risk for depression when they are premenstrual, menopausal or have just given birth, as many women abstain from sex during these periods.

Source

****************

Just some problems with the "Obesity" war:

1). It tries to impose behavior change on everybody -- when most of those targeted are not obese and hence have no reason to change their behaviour. It is a form of punishing the innocent and the guilty alike. (It is also typical of Leftist thinking: Scorning the individual and capable of dealing with large groups only).

2). The longevity research all leads to the conclusion that it is people of MIDDLING weight who live longest -- not slim people. So the "epidemic" of obesity is in fact largely an "epidemic" of living longer.

3). It is total calorie intake that makes you fat -- not where you get your calories. Policies that attack only the source of the calories (e.g. "junk food") without addressing total calorie intake are hence pissing into the wind. People involuntarily deprived of their preferred calorie intake from one source are highly likely to seek and find their calories elsewhere.

4). So-called junk food is perfectly nutritious. A big Mac meal comprises meat, bread, salad and potatoes -- which is a mainstream Western diet. If that is bad then we are all in big trouble.

5). Food warriors demonize salt and fat. But we need a daily salt intake to counter salt-loss through perspiration and the research shows that people on salt-restricted diets die SOONER. And Eskimos eat huge amounts of fat with no apparent ill-effects. And the average home-cooked roast dinner has LOTS of fat. Will we ban roast dinners?

6). The foods restricted are often no more calorific than those permitted -- such as milk and fruit-juice drinks.

7). Tendency to weight is mostly genetic and is therefore not readily susceptible to voluntary behaviour change.

8). And when are we going to ban cheese? Cheese is a concentrated calorie bomb and has lots of that wicked animal fat in it too. Wouldn't we all be better off without it? And what about butter and margarine? They are just about pure fat. Surely they should be treated as contraband in kids' lunchboxes! [/sarcasm].

Trans fats:

For one summary of the weak science behind the "trans-fat" hysteria, see here. Trans fats have only a temporary effect on blood chemistry and the evidence of lasting harm from them is dubious. By taking extreme groups in trans fats intake, some weak association with coronary heart disease has at times been shown in some sub-populations but extreme group studies are inherently at risk of confounding with other factors and are intrinsically of little interest to the average person.

The use of extreme quintiles (fifths) to examine effects is in fact so common as to be almost universal but suggests to the experienced observer that the differences between the mean scores of the experimental and control groups were not statistically significant -- thus making the article concerned little more than an exercise in deception

*********************