Public Health

In 2011, the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations propose using animals like pigs to study the best way of evaluating protein quality in foods eaten by children. The researchers behind a new study calculated protein scores for eight sources of protein, derived from both plants and animals. Protein scores compare the amount of digestible amino acids in a food with a "reference protein," a theoretical protein which contains fully digestible amino acids in the proportions required for human nutrition at a particular stage of life. The score which has been used for more…

If you hand food to a child when they are sad, or angry, or anything else, they will begin to associate food with those feelings. As adults, this emotional eating will be a tough habit to break. In youth, it will be even more difficult because kids aren't always aware that good things can be bad for you in excess. A new longitudinal study from Norway finds that school-age children whose parents fed them more to soothe their negative feelings were more likely to eat emotionally later on. The reverse was also found to be the case, with parents of children who were more easily soothed by food…

Health care expansion in Massachusetts, which became a model for the controversial Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) caused a surge in surgeries for thyroid cancer. What that means depends on who is doing the framing. One side can argue that surgeons now had the state government paying for everything, so more were done, while another can argue that people were more likely to go to the doctor. Thyroid cancer diagnoses have gone up about 5 percent per year over the last decade. Some is over-diganosis, some may be that the effects of lifestyles in previous generations…

Activist groups have continually perpetuated claims about artificial sweeteners, without noting that they are in animal models - and a billion rats have been killed by chemicals found in every food - and that to get similar risk in humans, you would need to drink 7,000 diet sodas per day. But animal models are not fans of the "natural" sweetener Truvia either. A study tested survival rates of house flies (Musca domestica), on erythritol--the main ingredient in Truvia--compared to natural sugar, agar, and water alone. They found that the flies both strongly preferred high-calorie natural sugar…

The headline almost jumps out at you – “BPA Substitute Could Cause Adverse Pregnancy Outcomes.”  That alarming headline appears in an industry publication, but the same story was widely reported in the popular media, which tends to cover science only when they can create scare stories. The article reports the results of a new study from a group of Chinese researchers on health effects associated with a substance named fluorene-9-bisphenol (BHPF), which the authors claim is now a common alternative to bisphenol A (BPA).  According to the researchers, and amplified by the media, BHPF…

Politicians are arguing with each other about health care. One side is yelling that people have coverage, even if they can't afford to use it and twice as many people will lose than ever got it. Another side claims emergency room visits and pediatric care are a luxury. What is clear is that something needs to be fixed.  While advocates for the ACA will say that only 6 to 8 percent of US health care expenditures are primary care, critics argue that we already had the best in the world. What is clear to all is that payment models introduced under the Affordable Care Act raised expectations…

The numerous nutrition guidelines promoted by the U.S. federal government are obeyed by just 2 percent of Americans. If only 2 percent of any population can obey your guidelines, they are a nutritional wishlist created by groups of experts promoting their diet fads, not evidence-based information. However, one group is constantly criticized by everyone else - pregnant mothers - and a new study shows that no pregnant women in any demographic are able to achieve the Dietary Guidelines for Americans. Which means those guidelines are irrelevant, not that expectant moms need even more…

If you’ve ever needed a blood transfusion, or donated blood, you probably would have been asked your blood type. While it was once thought all blood was the same, we now know there are different types of blood, called blood groups. Transfusions between blood groups can be catastrophic, even deadly, so knowing the blood type of donors and recipients is of the utmost importance. Our bodies contain trillions of red blood cells. Each is covered in an array of proteins and sugars, inherited from our parents, which determine our blood group. We can all be classified into group A, B, AB or O, based…

There are multiple food fads trying to catch on per year but as the saying goes in science, if one epidemiology study counted, everything would cause or prevent cancer. One long-held epidemiology belief is that the more vegetables you eat, the healthier your heart will be.  While vegetarians and animal activists tout such claims, the actual evidence is not clear. In recent decades we've been told bacon, butter and red meat all cause heart disease. But the same groups scaremongering food have also claimed that coffee causes breast cancer, that cell phones cause all kinds of cancer, and…

You might think that after the November elections, the last group anyone will listen to for guidance on the American public are partisan pundits. But they are still lobbying for an alternative result, now saying that if President Trump wants to honor his commitment to repealing the The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) while allowing more coverage, better benefits, and lower costs, the only choice is a Single Payer system; socialized medicine. They list now-famous pretend money, the same optimistic estimates that led to the Obamacare system being financially viable,…