Public Health

Some studies have identified mobile phones and related devices as sources of metal sensitization and potential causes of allergic contact dermatitis (ACD). The belief is that many phones on the market release levels of metals, such as nickel and chromium, which are sufficient to induce ACD, according to an article in Pediatric Allergy, Immunology, and Pulmonology. In the article "Mobile Phone Dermatitis in Children and Adults: A Review of the Literature," a team of researchers led by Jacob Thyssen, MD, PhD, Copenhagen University Hospital Gentofte (Hellerup, Denmark), Loma Linda University…

A new review in CA: A Cancer Journal for Clinicians summarizes what is known about economic factors tied to the obesity epidemic in the United States. It includes what most people knew; despite claims of 40 years ago that a population bomb was going to cause mass starvation, agricultural science instead caused the food curve to rise sharply. For the first time in the history of the world, the poorest people can afford to be fat, a privilege only available to the wealthy in past years. The review by Roland Sturm, PhD of RAND Corporation and Ruopeng An, PhD of the University of Illinois at…

Following a genetic marker for breast cancer, the actress Angelina Jolie had a preventative double mastectomy. Cancer experts were horrified - and with good reason. About 70 percent of women who have both breasts removed following a breast cancer diagnosis do so against doctor recommendations, so healthy women certainly should not.  And they certainly should not take medical advice from a women who wrote her first husband's name in her blood on their wedding day. Yet she is not alone. Recent studies have shown an increase in women with breast cancer choosing this more aggressive…

If you could save the lives of 2.7 million children would you do it? I think it is safe to say that most people would answer “yes.” You may be thinking, "But I am only one person—how could I make a difference?" You have family, don’t you? You have friends, don’t you? You have colleagues and coworkers, don’t you? You could save the lives of 2.7 million children by doing nothing more than informing your family, friends, colleagues, and coworkers about Vitamin A Deficiency (VAD) and the simple, safe, inexpensive, and sustainable solution: Golden Rice. If you tell just ten people about Golden…

Antibiotics for acute bronchitis don't work.  Yet despite clear evidence of ineffectiveness, guidelines and more than 15 years of educational efforts stating that the antibiotic prescribing rate for acute bronchitis should be zero, the rate was about 70 percent from 1996-2010 and increased during this time period, according to a study in the May 21 issue of JAMA. Acute bronchitis is a cough-predominant respiratory illness of less than 3 weeks' duration. For more than 40 years, trials have shown that antibiotics are not effective for this condition. Despite this, between 1980 and 1999,…

The first "Global Matrix" using nine indicators of children's physical activity has ranked video game-obsessed Scots among the least active in the world. So much for the days when active Scottish lads spent their days headbutting and then kicking each other on the ground. Now they only do it in "Splinter Cell: Blacklist". Out of 15 countries assessed, Scottish kids were ranked lowest in physical activity and highest in screen-based leisure time, including watching TV and gaming.  The other countries submitting data were Australia, Canada, Colombia, England, Finland, Ghana, Ireland, Kenya…

Somewhere south of a sunny childhood are emotional and physical abuse and neglect. There are four possible combinations: emotional abuse, emotional neglect, physical abuse, and physical neglect. If one or more of these describe your childhood, maybe you’ve worked hard to put all that stuff behind you -- but a study on early view at the journal Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research shows it’s not that easy to keep your past in the past. It may come as no surprise that people who were mistreated as children are more likely to struggle with alcohol addiction as adults. But exactly what…

“Particulate matter causes premature death. It doesn’t make you sick. It’s directly causal to dying sooner than you should,” former EPA administrator Lisa Jackson told Congress on Sept. 22, 2011. “If we could reduce particulate matter to healthy levels it would have the same impact as finding a cure for cancer in our country.”  So basically the EPA wants to give people cancer in order to prove cancer exists. I can't think of any other reason the EPA would subject human beings to particulate matter in live trials. Read more: http://dailycaller.com/2014/04/02/report-epa-tested-deadly-…

There is a discovery out there that has shown some success with multiple sclerosis, with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS - Lou Gehrig's Disease), and has even improved the function of aging hearts – but despite all that, you have probably never heard of it. No, this is not a story about how a revolutionary breakthrough got bought up by some giant corporation and stuck in a warehouse to protect their profits - it is instead a story about how potentially good products may never see the light of day for lots of reasons. It happens more often than you think. In 2013, we covered a study on…

Since the commercialization of medical marijuana in the middle of 2009, the proportion of marijuana-positive drivers involved in fatal motor vehicle crashes in Colorado has increased dramatically, according to data from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration's Fatality Analysis Reporting System covering 1994 to 2011. The University of Colorado School of Medicine  researchers analyzed fatal motor vehicle crashes in Colorado and in the 34 states that did not have medical marijuana laws, comparing changes over time in the proportion of drivers who were marijuana-…