Worried About Holiday Weight Gain?

Media moron alert!

Where does ABCNews find them?

"The general belief is that Americans gain between five and nine pounds between Halloween and New Year's Day, but that may be an exaggeration. A study conducted in 2000 by the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development and the National Institute of Diabetes suggested that Americans, on average, gain only about one pound during the winter holidays.

But this weight gain accumulates over the years, possibly contributing to the overall weight gain someone experiences in the course of a lifetime."

One pound gained in two months worth of holidays is great. (if you believe them and him)

But to suggest that "this weight gain accumulates over the years, possibly contributing to the overall weight gain someone experiences in the course of a lifetime," is imbecilic.

What is going on the other 10 months? The one pound ain't squat, moron, it's the remainder of the year.

If people only gained the one pound per year from the holidays there is no way that we would be experiencing the epidemic of overweight and obesity that we are.

Certainly this is an impossible statistic for fat kids who have not lived long enough to accumulate their overweight and obesity at one pound per year.

Here is one of this expert's moronic "holiday weight gain" solutions:

"Solution 3: Wii Fit

By now everyone has heard about this integration of video games and workout programs. Many of us have video consoles in our houses because of our children, or maybe we even play them ourselves. Invest in one of the Nintendo Wii Fit workout programs..."

See here and here to get a sense of what your hundreds of dollars buys you fitness-wise.

Then there is this plum:

"None of the above solutions will not work if you don't know why you want to do them."

What does that mean? And these are supposed to be the pros in fitness and communication.

The author of the piece:

"Stefan Aschan is the owner and founder of www.strength123.com, providing nutrition and exercise programs in New York City."

They left out that Stefan is also a moron.

Wii players need to exercise too

Maybe. Maybe not. See below.

Interactive consoles get kids off the couch

Maybe. Maybe not. See above.

Dark chocolate 'not so healthy'

Just when you foolishly thought it was safe.

"For those of you tucking into dark chocolate this Christmas using the excuse it is good for you, think again."

Guess what?

"A top medical journal said any health claims about plain chocolate may be misleading.

Plain chocolate is naturally rich in flavanols, plant chemicals that are believed to protect the heart.

But an editorial in the Lancet points out that many manufacturers remove flavanols because of their bitter taste.

Instead, many products may just be abundant in fat and sugar - both of which are harmful to the heart and arteries, the journal reported...

'The devil in the dark chocolate is the fat, sugar and calories it also contains.'"

It's all about Calories in and Calories out.

Period.

Some Healthy Resolutions Stick

Maybe. But this is certainly not one of them.

"Eighteen months after taking a four week health education course, class participants remained significantly more active taking 800 more steps per day than when they enrolled."

There are about 2000 steps in a mile. From: Work/Life Program for The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston.

On average, about 100 Calories are burned per mile traveled on foot.

800 steps is the equivalent of 40 Calories.

Some victory.

"Significantly more active" has been apparently been downgraded.

FDA Investigation Leads To Prison Sentence For Woman Who Claimed To Cure 'Lou Gehrig's Disease'

Now if it would only go after the diet experts and their false claims.

"The U.S. Food and Drug Administration's (FDA) Office of Criminal Investigations announced that a New Jersey woman has been sentenced to 33 months in prison for falsely claiming that she could cure amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), commonly called "'Lou Gehrig's Disease.'"

This seems clearly untrue:

"'The FDA's Office of Criminal Investigations aggressively pursues those that provide false hope to patients by making unproven medical claims to unsuspecting patients - many with serious or life-threatening conditions who are desperate for a medical cure,' said Terry Vermillion, director of FDA's Office of Criminal Investigations."

Maybe it is true if FDA wants to beat its chest taking on a single individual. Big deal.

While millions are hurt by bad diet advice from experts, diet gurus, the sick care industry, talk show hosts, Big Pharma, publishers, the media, etc., the FDA pulverizes this one person.

If they need to go after one person, try Oprah. She has single-handedly cast an Orwellian pall over the weight loss industry.

It is like Animal Farm.

The pig is in charge.

But, in case I am wrong about the veracity of the above quote, give FDA a holler if you tried an expert's weight loss program and failed.

For starters, you can refer them here, here and here.

Here is the FDA's link: http://www.fda.gov

FDA warns of deaths from fentanyl patch

Today the Fentanyl patch, tomorrow the Fatanal patch.

You have to be a friggin' idiot to put yourself voluntarily (through overeating) into a position to get fat person drugs pushed by the sick care industry.

"Improper use of patches that emit the painkiller fentanyl is still killing people, the government said Friday — its second warning in two years about the powerful narcotic."

Unless the Fatanal patch is duck tape covering a fat person's piehole.

That would work, be proper use and without mortal risk.

Doctors advised to defer booster shots of vaccine

More tainted drugs. And fat people voluntarily set themselves up for medicating.

"Doctors should defer giving booster shots of a widely used childhood vaccine in the wake of a voluntary recall last week of 1.2 million doses by Merck & Co Inc, U.S. health authorities said on Wednesday."

For fat people, it is nigh time to rethink your weight loss strategy.

Health care debate shifts to new area: consumption

Some partially rational voices.

Good:

"While presidential candidates natter about health reforms that focus on insuring more Americans, a quiet but potentially very disruptive shift in defining the problem is under way in Washington."

Better:

"The new hypothesis would focus instead on volume. If less were done, cost pressures would ease. Fewer tests and operations would force spending down."

Even better:

"There's little we can do quickly about the demographic pattern, but consumption patterns are more amenable to change. Simply find out what works, Mr. Orszag argues, and make that the norm. Then stop doing all the things that don't work, increase costs and put patients at risk."

Best:

Stop paying for overweight/obesity, as they are not medical conditions, and make the overfat contribute to/pay for their diseases of choice.

Stop those who are preventing the fat from succeeding at weight loss.

Stop the bad weight loss advice.

See here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here and here, for starters.

Fit and fat, unite to fight.

Women With Osteoporosis, Previous Vertebral Fracture Have Increased Long-Term Risk For New Fracture

Fitness is a good way to prevent osteoporosis and the fractures subsequent to osteoporosis and the disabilities subsequent to the fractures.

"Over a 15 year period, women with low bone mineral density and a previous vertebral fracture had an increased risk of a new vertebral fracture compared to women with normal bone mineral density and no previous fracture..."

Give fitness a shot.

Elderly Adhere To Exercise Program, Improve Physical Function

Who could have predicted this without funding yet another study?

"Elderly adults at risk for physical disabilities are able to adhere to a regular program of moderate exercise for one year, a recent study of 213 men and women suggests...the authors observed that improvement in physical function was related to the participants' ability to adhere to the physical activity regimen."

Money well spent.

Not.

Mediterranean Diet Also Beneficial in US Populations

Hey, everybody! (fat people, too) Start smoking!

"The largest study to evaluate the Mediterranean diet and mortality in a US population has found that adherence to such a diet reduces deaths..

The researchers found that the diet appears to be particularly beneficial among smokers but that it was not really helpful among obese subjects who had never smoked."

Interesting diet.

Do any diet you want, preferably one without smoking. Just watch your Calories.

Walking packs huge health punch, study confirms

Insane.

"A brisk 30-minute walk 6 days a week is enough to trim waistlines and cut the risk of metabolic syndrome -- an increasingly common condition that is linked to obesity and a sedentary lifestyle, a new study indicates. 'Our study shows that you'll benefit even if you don't make any dietary changes,' study leader Johanna L. Johnson, a clinical researcher at Duke University Medical Center, Durham, North Carolina, said in a statement."

It shows nothing of the sort.

In fact, walking for weight loss will only work not "even if you don't make any dietary changes," but ONLY "if you don't make any dietary changes."

Except Calorie intake reduction, which if you were able to do this, you would not need to spend 3 hours per week walking.

Exercise is and remains a terribly inefficient way to lose weight.

Plus, their data is clearly suspect.

"... the inactive control group gained an average of about one pound and a half-inch around the waist. 'That may not sound like much, but that's just 6 months. Over a decade, that's an additional 20 pounds and 10 inches at the belt line,' noted Duke cardiologist Dr. William E. Kraus, the study's principal investigator."

Do you really believe that your usual and customary fat person will add a full 1/2 inch to his or her waist by gaining merely one pound?

"'The results of our study,' he added, 'underscore what we have known for a long time.'"

Yeah. That researchers in the overweight/obesity game are full of it.

Lack of sleep linked to obesity risk

This says it all:

"It's not clear if the sleep loss was actually a cause of the weight problems in these study patients."

Only eating more Calories than you burn leads to overweight/obesity.

How much or how little sleep you get makes no difference in the absence of more Calories in than out.

Period.

Slimming Surgery Increases Fivefold In Five Years, And Is Lowering Mortality

It is not "slimming surgery." It is malpractice.

"The worldwide obesity epidemic has increased the number of bariatric (slimming) surgical procedures more than fivefold within five years in most developed countries..."

Untrue.

It is not "the worldwide obesity epidemic has increased the number of bariatric (slimming) surgical procedures more than fivefold."

It is the willingness of corrupt sick care systems and practitioners to victimize patients and the rest of society with their deceptive, costly and harmful interventions.

"They conclude: 'In summary, there is good evidence to show that bariatric surgery is more effective than non-surgical approaches in the therapy of morbid obesity.'"

That makes sense since "non-surgical approaches" are intended to fail by design. See here, here, here and here.

Fundamental Discovery By Einstein Researchers Reveals How Fat Is Stored In Cells

These folks are no Einsteins.

"In discovering the genes responsible for storing fat in cells, scientists at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine of Yeshiva University have answered one of biology's most fundamental questions."

Trash.

Fat is stored in cells when you eat more Calories than you burn.

That is the sum total of the news you can use.

The rest is a ruse.

"Their findings, which appear in the December 17 to 21 "Early Edition" online issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, could lead to new strategies for treating obesity and the diseases associated with it. "

More crap.

The old strategy, which is the only worthwhile and safe strategy, is to eat fewer Calories than you burn.

This strategy is the hook used by the opportunistic to get more money for their research.

Report sees 7.6 million global 2007 cancer deaths

As you sow, so shall you reap (grimly).

"Cancer's burden is on the rise in developing countries as deaths from infectious diseases and child mortality fall and more people live longer, American Cancer Society epidemiologist Ahmedin Jemal said in a telephone interview. Cancer is more common as people get older, Jemal noted.

Cancer also is increasing in developing countries as people embrace habits linked to cancer such as smoking and fattier diets, Jemal said."

Bon appetit.

First Transgenic Kids With The Human Lactoferrin Gene

Watch your newborns suck on mouse teats. Now that's entertainment!

"Human beings consume lactoferrin with breast milk since the very birth. Lactoferrin protects the baby from bacteria and viruses until the infant's own immunological protection mechanism is formed. Since not all mothers have milk nowadays, human lactoferrin addition into the artificial feeding mixtures will assist in health care of new-born children...

Unfortunately, a woman's organism produces only 4-5 grams of lactoferrin per liter of milk, besides, donor milk can be infected by HIV or other dangerous viruses...

The idea of getting lactoferrin from the milk of transgenic animals awoke our interest about ten years ago. We started our experiments with genetic construction, made great progress, after which we received transgenic mice. As a result of lengthy and laborious efforts with more than 5,000 transgenic mice, it was ascertained that the transgene was inherited by posterity, and the lactoferrin concentration is several times higher than that in the feminine breast milk. The 'record-holder' mice produced up to 40 grams of human lactoferrin per liter of their milk..."

If their research is as good as the English of their press release, what is there to worry about?

Good suck, er, luck.

U.S. panel says cold medicines work

Hey fat people, do you really think that you want their surgeries and drugs when the experts cannot even agree on the simple stuff?

"Over-the-counter cold medicines made with phenylephrine appear effective for relieving nasal congestion, a U.S. advisory panel said on Friday...

The panel ruled after hearing from researchers who said there was no evidence that 10 milligrams of phenylephrine provided any benefit."

Get fit. And keep yourselves safe.

Short Sleep Times In Patients With Chronic Medical Diagnoses Are Associated With An Increased Risk Of Obesity - JCSM

Now I wonder how the he American Academy of Sleep Medicine (AASM) could possibly benefit from this research. Hmm...

"A study published in the December 15 issue of the Journal of Clinical Sleep Medicine (JCSM) demonstrates an association between short sleep times and obesity in patients with chronic medical problems...

According to the results, subjects with short sleep times (less than seven hours) had a significantly increased likelihood of obesity defined by a body mass index greater than 30 kg/meters2 when compared to the reference group of eight to nine hours. There was a U-shaped relationship between obesity and sleep time in women indicating that women who had both short and long sleep times were more likely to be obese. This relationship was not present in men. Other factors predicting obesity in these clinic patients included young age (18 to 49 years), not smoking, drinking alcohol, hypertension, diabetes, and sleep apnea."

Interestingly, there was apparently no relationship between being fat and consuming too many Calories.

Some scientists, eh?

"'Our study demonstrates that short sleep times have an association with obesity in adults with chronic medical problems and that chronic disease and attendant therapies and/or changes in physical activities do not obscure this relationship,' said Kenneth Nugent, MD, of Texas Tech University, lead author of the study. 'This study suggests that adults should sleep eight to nine hours per night to maintain optimal weight. Whether or not manipulating sleep time in adults will prevent additional weight gain or facilitate weight loss is unclear. This question will require therapeutic trials in which sleep hygiene is addressed during weight loss studies.'"

Their study demonstrates that they are morons.

Nothing more, nothing less.

Give them more money for research if you are one, too.

Count me out.

Transtheoretical Model Published In The JCSM May Help To Identify OSA Patients' Level Of Intention To Exercise

Technobabble alert! Words, like "transtheoretical," are used to con you.

"Research has shown a strong relationship between weight and obstructive sleep apnea (OSA). Your neck gets thicker as you gain weight. This increases the level of fat in the back of the throat, making your airway more likely to be blocked. Because exercise reduces body weight, it has been suggested as a potential intervention for mild to moderate OSA. In an effort to answer the question as to how ready OSA patients are to engage in exercise, a study published in the December 15 issue of the Journal of Clinical Sleep Medicine (JCSM) features the Stages of Change, a construct of the Transtheoretical Model (TTM) of behavior change."

"Exercise" is a clear way to fail at reducing body weight.

"According to Dr. Smith, standard medical approaches to managing OSA, such as continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP), can be effective for patients with moderate to severe disease. However, for patients with mild sleep apnea, for those who have trouble using CPAP, or for those who would like to take charge of their own health, increasing exercise and reducing body mass may be one practical route, added Dr. Smith."

Not in a million years.

Dad's parenting style tied to child's weight

Okay. So now what?

"Preschool age children may be more likely to have a higher body mass index -- an indicator of being overweight or obese -- when their fathers are either permissive or disengaged as parents, study findings suggest."

Now the "helpful" part.

"Summing up, the researchers remind parents that warm, firm, and authoritative parenting is known to be associated with the best child outcomes."

Whatever that means.

Useless.

Democratic Presidential Candidates Agree on Expansion of Health Insurance During Last Debate in Iowa

A confederacy of dunces. Powerful dunces. Dunces who will kill us as they drive us broke.

"Six Democratic presidential candidates on Thursday during a debate in Johnston, Iowa, sponsored by the Des Moines Register and Iowa Public Television discussed health care and other issues, the New York Times reports (Healy/Zeleny, New York Times, 12/14). According to the Washington Post, the candidates "found general agreement by promising" that they would expand health insurance to all U.S. residents (Kornblut/Balz, Washington Post, 12/14)."

This is the one thing that should not be done, unless coverage is limited which I have yet to hear is in the offing.

What must occur is the opposite.

More funding of sick care will never improve health. They are two separate concepts.

What will work is more responsibility placed on individuals to improve their own health so the sick care industry can be more effective.

"Former Sen. John Edwards (N.C.) said that previous efforts to expand health insurance to all residents have failed because 'we have a small group of entrenched interests, corporate powers, corporate greed, the wealthiest people in America, who are controlling what's happening in the democracy.' Edwards added, "And we have to take it back" (Beaumont, Des Moines Register, 12/14)."

Indeed we do.

They are called politicians. (This is a non-partisan post. It is just that the article was about Democrats. There is no implication here that they have a stranglehold on stupid.)

Fight back before they kill us all.

Health Care Costs Will 'Consume' U.S. Economy, CBO Director Says

Be fat. Be proud. Be American. Be broke.

"Estimated increases in U.S. health care spending in future decades will place the federal budget on an "unsustainable path," which might "seriously harm the economy" without significant reductions in spending or increases in revenue, according to a report released on Thursday by the Congressional Budget Office, CongressDaily reports. According to the report, Medicare and Medicaid spending will increase by an estimated 500% growth over the next 75 years (Kreisher, CongressDaily, 12/13)."

Stop wasting resources on the irresponsible.

Get involved now before it is too late.

Weight Loss Surgery Up Fivefold And Saving Lives Say Scientists

Giving malpractice a voice, and disguising it to sound friendly. Clearly, shame is not in the repertoire of the sick care industry's consciousness.

"According to the American Society for Bariatric Surgery (ASBS), the number of Americans having weight loss surgery has increased from around 16,000 in the early 1990s to more than 103,000 in 2003."

Don't fall for the scam. You do not have to. See here, here, here, here and here.

Budgeting Calories Might Help Take Off Unwanted Pounds

The suggestions of an idiot.

"If most of us could budget our calories like we budget our money, we would have a much better chance of staying in good shape."

Here's how we budget our money:

"The average American household with at least one credit card has nearly $9,200 in credit card debt, according to CardWeb.com, and the average interest rate runs in the mid- to high teens at any given time." (here is another point of view)

Apparently we do "budget our calories like we budget our money."

If you really want to understand the costs of overeating and why diet advice, diet books, diet programs, diet foods and diet products will make you poor, see here.

"'The vast majority of us have a New Year's resolution of losing weight, but few of us stick to any diet plan past the month of January,' Brewton said. 'This is a refreshing new way to look at eating healthy and staying healthy in the new year.'"

Few stick to diet plans for these reasons, see here and here.

Brewton's way is not "refreshing."

It is idiotic.

Obesity Epidemic Needs A Social Approach Urge Scientists

Battle royale of the excusinators!

In this corner, the social excusinators. In the others, the genetic, hormonal, cultural, infectious, etc., excusinators.

And while they battle it out, the public loses.

"Friel and colleagues discuss a range of political, economic and social pressures, including commerce, trade, living and working conditions, that differ among countries and affect people's behaviour, their weight, and ultimately, their health, in different ways. They consider, for instance, the impact of food subsidies, advertising, urban planning, social structure, and employment.

They suggest that food subsidies have distorted food supplies so that the less healthy foods, for instance those high in saturated fats, are favoured over healthier options, and global companies have flooded the market with cheap, energy dense food, devoid of nutritional value. Supermarket bulk purchasing and supersized portions are now the norm, replacing the habit of making smaller purchases that used to take place at family run stores."

Of course, they talk about everything except the real reason, too many Calories in than out, and the culpability of the true offenders:

Governments
Government Agencies
Researchers (like these)
Dietitians
Trainers
Nutritionists
The Media
Diet Experts
Diet Gurus
Big Pharma
Oprah, Barbara Walters and other media giants (literally and figuratively)
The Sick Care Industry (docs, medical centers, etc.)
The Fat People Rescue Industry
Fat People, themselves

They also repeat the banal canard of "healthy" foods:

"In both high income and the "transitioning countries", wrote the authors, energy density and fat intake have gone up, and although on average food prices have gone down, in the richer countries the healthier foods generally cost more than the less healthy ones."

These, as well as most of the other fat researchers can be easily cured of their own overweight/obesity by giving themselves an enema.

The weight they will lose will put their BMIs well below 18.5.

Can junk food ever really be good for you?

More of the con is on.

"At a time when Americans are struggling with obesity and not eating enough vegetables, some major food marketers claim they have an answer. Keen to tap into consumer interest in healthier fare, companies are rolling out snacks sprinkled with what they say are real servings of fruits and veggies.

But nutrition experts say you shouldn't be fooled by their better-for-you promises."

Forget the experts. They will kill you faster than the food.

Just remember it is all about Calories in and Calories out.

Then you will have a chance of succeeding. See here, here, here and here.

NIH Advisory Panel on Incontinence Cites Need for Weight Loss and Exercise

The blind got lucky for a while there. They were spared the sight of Oprahs with poor dentition.

Alas, their luck has run out.

Now they have to smell them.

"Along with the aging of the Baby Boomers will be an increase in the prevalence of fecal and urinary incontinence, but weight loss and exercise can help reverse the conditions, found a panel of NIH advisers.

Fecal and urinary incontinence affect more than one-fourth of all Americans during their lives, said the 15-member independent advisory panel, chaired by C. Seth Landefeld, M.D., of the University of California at San Francisco, after a three-day State-of-the-Science conference."

They're everywhere! They're everywhere!

"The panel estimated that 10% of community-dwelling adults have both conditions. But among nursing home residents with chronic diseases the prevalence is probably closer to 40%."

So get fit, so you don't smell like sh*t. (Note that fat people need special tools and methods to clean themselves. Sorta like the elephants at the zoo or Oprah.)

Call for rethink in obesity fight

First, it is not "rethink." It is start thinking.

Second, their rethink will also fail with certainty.

True:

"Obesity cannot be tackled by just encouraging healthier eating and more exercise, health experts say."

False:

"The experts, led by a London-based academic, say governments should adopt more sophisticated approaches.

Work conditions, food subsidies, town planning and advert restrictions are all key, the experts wrote in the British Medical Journal."

Clever. Since people cannot do simple, let's recommend "sophisticated."

Too bad that the experts are too stupid to even know what sophisticated even looks like.

What will work is allowing people the opportunity to live with the consequences of their actions.

And giving them the true way to lose weight successfully without killing them in the process. See here, here, here, here, here, here and here.

Anything else is doomed to fail.

By the way, look at this:

"The findings mirror the conclusions of the recent government-backed Foresight report in the UK, which said societal issues were also to blame for rising obesity levels.

These experts, led by a University College London academic, agreed, saying tackling obesity was far more complex than just encouraging healthy eating and more exercise."

Notice not a peep about genetics, hormones, bacteria, viruses, etc.

Are these experts now saying that none of that stuff is real? If not, then how will their silly plan work anyway if they do not confront their other poltergeists?

Put the kibosh on the efforts to harm the fit in order to further entitle the fat and help all of us, fat and fit, fight the powers that are misleading us to failure, illness, suffering and national bankruptcy. (See here, here and here.)

Yoga alone likely not enough to keep heart healthy

Clearly true. Clearly predictable if you know squat about fitness. Clearly a squandering of resources.

"Yoga...probably won't give you the workout you need to keep your cardiovascular system in shape, a new study shows."

"Probably"?

It is a certainty.

More waste from stupidity.

This is a gross embarrassment.

Don't fall into the trap. Get fit. What works is known and will not change as the foundational principles are immutable. See here, here, here, and here.

No Extra Benefit Found from Surgery for Chronic Knee Pain

Listen up fat people. Think more than twice about the malpractice known as bariatric surgery.

Here is another proven useless surgery that is far less invasive.

"For relief of chronic patellofemoral pain syndrome, eight weeks of home exercise was just as effective as arthroscopic surgery plus the exercise, researchers found in a randomized trial here."

More invasive surgeries have more complications.

And if you think that this knee surgery will help with your painful, overloaded joints, also, think again.

Like treating overfatness, surgery is not the answer.

Get fit. Get better.

U.S. cholesterol average is ideal at 199

A Pyrrhic victory.

"Americans may be too fat, but at least their cholesterol is low. For the first time in nearly 50 years, the average cholesterol level for U.S. adults is in the ideal range, the government reported Wednesday."

How do we do it?

"The growing use of cholesterol-lowering pills in middle-aged and older people is believed to be a key reason for the improvement, experts said. When the survey began in 1960, the average cholesterol was at 222.

While Americans have gotten much heavier since then, they've been able to lower their cholesterol with powerful drugs that carry few if any side effects. High cholesterol can clog arteries and lead to heart disease."

How did we do it?

"Doctors' groups have increasingly recommended more aggressive use of these drugs in patients seen to be at risk from heart disease. And screening has become common — two-thirds of men and three-fourths of women had been screened for high cholesterol in the previous five years, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The result? Cholesterol medications are the top-selling class of U.S. drugs, and sales have grown steadily from about $13 billion in 2002 to nearly $22 billion in 2006, according to IMS Health, a Connecticut-based consulting company that monitors pharmaceutical sales.

'There's been an explosion in the use of these medications, and appropriately so in the majority of cases,' said Dr. Elizabeth Jackson, a preventive cardiologist at the University of Michigan Medical Center."

An "explosion" two-fer! Ka-boom and Ka-ching!

The reality without drugs?

"'If you take away the people on medication, I don't think there's been as much of a meaningful improvement as we would like,' he said."

Congrats to us! We know how to win.

Drugs.

Another Study Finds Heart Risks in a Diabetes Drug

Oops redux.

And you fat Type 2-ers, you expect the drugs to save you.

Expect again.

"An independent analysis of thousands of older people with diabetes found that those treated with the widely used drug Avandia had significantly elevated risks of heart attack and death.

The finding, published on Tuesday in The Journal of the American Medical Association, could rekindle the debate about whether Avandia, a controversial treatment for Type 2 diabetes, should remain on the market. Earlier studies drew similar links between Avandia and cardiac risks.

The new study concludes that Avandia users had a 60 percent increased risk of heart failure, a 40 percent increased risk of heart attacks and a 30 percent increased risk of death compared with patients taking other oral diabetes medicines.

'Our study suggests that at least in this high-risk population, the harms of the drug may outweigh the benefits,” said the study’s lead author, Dr. Lorraine L. Lipscombe of the Institute for Clinical Evaluative Sciences in Toronto, an independent nonprofit group that evaluates treatments."

R.I.P. Or get fit.

Gaps remain in women's knowledge of cancer

Sad as it may be, it is nothing compared to the gaps that remain in the experts' knowledge of fitness.

FDA weighs over-counter cholesterol drug

Statins! Get your statins!

"Merck says selling a low dose of this long-used medication on drugstore shelves, next to the aspirin, could get millions of people at moderate risk of heart disease important treatment that they otherwise may miss."

It may also be placed close to the candy bars, chips, etc.

There is one advantage to this scheme.

If it becomes an out-of-pocket expense for fat folk who have been bleeding the rest of us poor with their fat people diet drug habits, then it is arguably worth it. (advantage lost, FDA rejected OTC status for this drug)

Still, the better approach is to get fit.

In fact, why don't all of you unfit and overweight folk take a moratorium from supporting the people at Merck who want to see you and keep you sick and visit here, here, here, here, here, and here where I want to see you well.

"Health is a function of participation. Participation is a function of fitness." (tm)

Obesity hurts a woman's chances of conception

So does ugly. Frequently the two track each other. Funny how that works.

"Obesity decreases the chances that a woman will get pregnant, and the more obese she is, the worse her prospects of conception, Dutch researchers said on Tuesday...

However, the researchers did not track the timing and frequency of sexual intercourse, which may have affected the results. Some studies have shown that obesity is linked with less frequent sex and reduced sexual desire."

"Reduced sexual desire"? Now how is that possible?

We need an answer. Now. Who are you going to call? Stedman.

The following is clearly mistaken and clearly self-serving:

"The researchers said the finding should be tested in further studies, especially given the rising rates of obesity.

'Owing to the fact that more women of child bearing age are becoming overweight and obese, this is a worrying finding,' they wrote."

It would be even more worrisome if they had more children since they would be almost certainly condemned to nutritional child abuse.

But when you are a fatness researcher you need to call for more research no matter who is hurt so long as you can make your money.

More activity linked with less body fat in girls

Duh.

Probably:

"Middle school girls who are more physically active have a lower percentage of body fat than their counterparts with lower activity levels, according to new study findings."

Probably not:

"'An additional 11 minutes of brisk walking or similar activity as girls age from the sixth to eighth grade appears to attenuate increased body fat,' lead author Dr. June Stevens told Reuters Health."

Obesity 'raises gum disease risk'

Enough with the inconveniences of heart disease, stroke, diabetes, hypertension and cancer. This should awaken the fat giant within and without.

Now things are getting serious.

We are talking periodontal disease!

"The rise in obesity may be going hand-in-hand with increases in severe gum disease, US research suggests."

Let us plead with the government to rescue fat people by adding dental coverage to their entitlements.

The thought of a bovine person is bad enough.

But the mental image of edentulous Oprah-like entities will send men, women and children screaming into the night.

God save us.

More Plant Based and Less Dairy Foods for American WIC National Nutrition Program

Neutral news, good news and bad news.

Neutral news:

"The US Department of Agriculture (USDA) said last week it is going to increase the amount of plant based (whole grains, vegetables, and fruit) foods and decrease the amount of dairy foods (milk, eggs, and cheese) in the country's Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children (WIC), following the recommendations of the Institute of Medicine and bringing it in line with current federal dietary guidelines."

This, of course, does nothing substantial. WICcans can still buy high fat dairy and other high fat, high Calorie products. (The IOM is worse than useless when it comes to nutrition, overweight and obesity.)

Good news:

"More than 8 million Americans receive services from the WIC every month, including 4 million children, 2 million infants, and nearly 2 million women."

At least some attempt is being made to control how our tax dollars are being spent.

It's about time.

"The new provision, the first major change since the inception of the WIC more than 30 years ago, must be in place across the board by August 2009, said the USDA."

And WIC is supposed to cover some fat people.

Bad news:

WIC still wrongly assumes overweight to be a "medically-based risk" and that "failure to meet the dietary guidelines" is a problem.

Too bad. More good could have come from this.

Cancer Risks From Eating Red And Processed Meat

Playing both sides against the middle - Pigs vs. Cows.

"New findings provide evidence that people who eat a lot of red and processed meats have greater risk of developing bowel and lung cancer than people who eat small quantities."

Maybe. Maybe not.

"The researchers allowed for factors such as smoking that might have affected cancer incidence, but it remains possible that other life-style factors may have had an influence."

Now for the fun part - the cows vs. pigs cage match.

"The study's definitions of red meat and processed meat overlapped; bacon and ham, for example, were included in both categories. Thus, exactly which type of meat causes which type of cancer remains unclear."

Are you ready to rumble?

Products with good bacteria get popular

Moron madness.

"Bugs in baby food? Microbes in your milkshake? Relax, this is not the latest tainted food scare — it's a growing trend in foods designed to boost health, not make you sick.

These products contain probiotics, or "friendly" bacteria similar to those found in the human digestive system."

Want to eat "bacteria similar to those found in the human digestive system"?

It is cheaper to eat your own crap than buy theirs.

And you can eat the SAME, not similar, "bacteria...to those found in the human digestive system."

Why settle for ersatz when you can have the real thing?

How good are these products?

"In the meantime, the market is ahead of the science. It's all part of a burgeoning effort to capitalize on an obsession with health foods. Probiotics are already popular in Europe, Asia and South America."

"...the market is ahead of the science." This means there is no proof.

"And there are 'prebiotics,' too, which contain fiber and other nutrients that feed probiotic bacteria."

And other bacteria, too.

"So far this year, more than 150 probiotic and prebiotic commercial food products have been introduced in the U.S., compared with about 100 last year and just 40 in 2005, said Tom Vierhile of Datamonitor, a market research firm.

'It is definitely a growing trend,' Vierhile said."

So are overweight, obesity and stupid.

Then there is the testimonial of a moron "professional."

"Holly Maloney, a nutrition instructor at Chicago's Kendall College, eats new probiotic nutrition bars that claim to help digestion and the immune system. She's also a longtime fan of yogurt and kefir, a probiotic-containing fermented milk drink.

'It just makes me feel good,' Maloney, 32, said of the products. 'If I have a few days where I don't have it, I don't feel right.'"

There's "proof" for you.

Maybe if Holly were a fan of self-mutilation and had a nipple ring, she would not "feel right" if it were removed. She is clearly an actively involved participant in self-stupefication.

"Even without all the answers from science, probiotics are a multibillion-dollar global industry. In the United States alone, retail sales of probiotic-containing foods and supplements totaled an estimated at $764 million in 2005 and are projected to reach $1 billion in 2010, according to market research firm BCC Research."

Remember that 98% of the population is stupider than the top 2%.

P.T. Barnum would be proud every minute. (possibly others would be proud)

Study: Monthly fasting may help heart

This one is so stupid, even the researchers agree.

"Mormons have less heart disease — something doctors have long chalked up to their religion's ban on smoking. New research suggests that another of their "clean living" habits also may be helping their hearts: fasting for one day each month.

A study in Utah, where the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints is based, found that people who skipped meals once a month were about 40 percent less likely to be diagnosed with clogged arteries than those who did not regularly fast.

People did not have to "get religion" to benefit: non-Mormons who regularly took breaks from food also were less likely to have clogged arteries, scientists found.

They concede that their study is far from proof that periodic fasting is good for anyone, but said the benefit they observed poses a theory that deserves further testing.

'It might suggest these are people who just control eating habits better,' and that this discipline extends to other areas of their lives that improves their health..."

Duh.

High blood pressure ups risk of mental decline

A chicken or egg situation for fat people.

"People with a history of hypertension (high blood pressure) appear to be at increased risk of developing mild cognitive impairment, a condition that involves difficulties with thinking and learning, investigators at Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons report."

Fat people have an increased incidence of hypertension.

Fat happens over time, it is not a sudden development.

It is clear that fat people have a real cognitive impairment.

They either do not notice they are blimpifying or they are too stupid to stop.

Maybe once there, at fat and hypertensive, they get even stupider.

"Preventing and treating hypertension may have an important impact in lowering the risk of cognitive impairment," the investigators conclude.

A great way to inspire preventive behavior and get them "thinking and learning" is to cut off the flow of money spent on rescuing fat people from themselves while harming the rest of us.

Computer phone calls get people exercising

Useless.

"Telephone calls, whether from a person or a computer, may help motivate couch potatoes to get some exercise, new research suggests.

In a study of sedentary adults age 55 and up, researchers found that those who received periodic advice and encouragement over the phone were able to boost their exercise levels over one year. And it didn't matter whether the advice came from a human or a computer. >

The findings suggest that automated phone systems could offer a cost-efficient way to reach the legions of inactive Americans, according to the researchers."

Exercise is inefficient, almost universally ineffective and even in the context of this study there are no data to suggest that it made any difference in fitness. (See here, here and here.)

Also:

"After one year, men and women in the automated-phone group were averaging 157 minutes of exercise per week; those who spoke with a real person were getting an average of 178 minutes. Going into the study, the goal had been to get people exercising for 150 minutes per week -- or 30 minutes per day, five days per week."

Sez who? There was no veracity check apparently. Only the word of the participants.

Good physical functioning tied to lower stroke risk

It's true: "Fitness is the only REAL preventive medicine." (tm)

"Middle-aged and older adults who manage to stay agile may be less likely to suffer a stroke than their less-nimble peers, researchers reported Monday.

In a study of more than 13,000 men and women, British researchers found that those who reported good physical functioning at the study's start -- having little problem climbing stairs or carrying groceries, for instance -- were less likely to have a stroke over the next seven years."

Get fit. (See here, here, here, and here)

Osteoporosis 'link to depression'

Another everything causes something article.

"Depression may increase the risk of the bone disorder osteoporosis in premenopausal women, a study suggests.

A US study found 17% of depressed women but just 2% of those not depressed, had thinner bone in a part of the hip."

But one thing does not cause osteoporosis, depression, overweight, obesity, overfatness, etc.

Plus, it leads to all things good or better:

Fitness.

Overweight asthmatics have more hospital admissions

Paying for fat people's diseases of choice is enough to take the breaths away from fit people.

"Excess pounds may increase the likelihood of being hospitalized for a severe asthma attack, a new study suggests.

Researchers found that among more than 400 patients who were seen in the emergency department for an asthma attack, those who were overweight or obese tended to have longer emergency department stays and were more likely to be admitted to the hospital."

If fat asthmatics got fit we and they would be better off.

Stop underwriting irresponsible behavior.

Weight gain hurts breast cancer survival

There are better ways to lose weight than mastectomy.

"Breast cancer patients might have a powerful incentive to avoid gaining weight: better odds of surviving the disease. New research suggests that for every 11 pounds a woman gains after being diagnosed with breast cancer, the chances of it proving fatal go up 14 percent.

The study is by no means definitive, but gives the strongest evidence yet that controlling weight — a good idea anytime in life — may be especially important after breast cancer...

'It's a large study, it was a very well-conducted study at several centers in the United States' by well-known researchers on this topic, said Joanne Dorgan, a breast cancer scientist at Fox Chase Cancer Center in Philadelphia."

Do yourself a favor.

It is bad enough having breast cancer.

Why compound matters?

And if you are unwilling to do it for yourself, think of your family.

But don't fall for the exercise excuse. It is a con.

"Doctors have long known that women who are overweight when they are diagnosed with breast cancer have poorer prospects.

'They're more likely to relapse and to die of their cancer than women who are thinner,' Dorgan said.

Previous research found that women who exercised after being diagnosed with breast cancer cut their chance of dying by as much as one-half, depending on how much exercise they did.

However, it is very common for women to gain weight after being diagnosed with breast cancer. One reason may be that chemotherapy can leave them tired and ill so they don't feel like exercising, Dorgan said."

It is always more efficient to control weight by Calories in than Calories out.

Your life is worth more than a lame, and deadly, excuse.

Body image concerns increasing among teen boys

Good news with a typical moron spin.

"It's not just teenage girls who worry about their body image and weight. A new study suggests that teenage boys are also increasingly worried about how they look and how much they weigh and many are practicing weight control measures, putting them at increased risk for eating disorders."

As if being a fat pig teen boy (or girl) is not already evidence of an "eating disorder."

"Teen boys similarly showed an increasing trend in their use of exercise for weight control over the 10-year period. Hispanic boys were the most likely to practice weight control, followed by black, then white boys.

The results, the researchers say, add to the growing evidence that boys and men, regardless of ethnicity, are at risk for developing harmful weight control behaviors."

"Practicing weight control" is a harmful behavior according to these morons.

It is clearly past the time for jettisoning this type of stupidity.

"Future studies need to investigate possible explanations for the different weight control practices among different ethnic groups of teenagers, as well as the increasing trend of weight control practices among male adolescents, the investigators conclude."

And past time to shut-off the research dollars spigot.

States Beginning to Experience Tighter Fiscal Conditions According to Latest Report

Keep eating your way to our national and your local sick care bankruptcy.

"Although states experienced stable finances in 2007, overall revenue growth has slowed and tighter fiscal conditions are expected in 2008, according to the National Governors Association (NGA) and the National Association of State Budget Officers (NASBO)...

States’ single largest expenditure for fiscal 2007 was health care, which accounts for nearly one-third of total state spending. Medicaid alone comprises about 22 percent of total state spending, and with a projected spending growth rate of 8 percent annually for the next decade, the program will continue to strain state budgets."

Demand a stop to the craziness.

Rx for Health Care: Pain

It is entirely possible that, unlike the rest of the sick care industry observers, this guy is not insane.

Unfortunately, his "fixes" are off-target. Perhaps he will smarten up.

For sane fixes, see here.

"We need to have a candid debate about health care in 2008, but the odds are against it. The fact that covering the 47 million uninsured already looms as the centerpiece of this debate is a warning sign that it won't be serious. We're told that the uninsured are our biggest health-care problem, but they aren't. Runaway health spending is. Although politicians pay lip service to that, what they really enjoy is increasing spending...

It's understandable because expanding benefits is so much more politically rewarding than trying to control them...

People need to see and feel health costs."

Yeah. If they can feel through all that flab.

Calcium a Dud for Averting Hip Fracture

Another sacred cow-lcium bites the dust?

"Neither calcium from food nor from supplements prevented hip fractures in men and women, and supplements may even increase the fracture risk, investigators found."

Better reconsider how much we really know about "healthy" food, supplements, etc.

Try real fitness instead. (See here, here, here, here, here, and here)

Fighting Diseases Of Aging By Wasting Energy

Global warming, the salvation of the fat.

"By making the skeletal muscles of mice use energy less efficiently, researchers report in the December issue of Cell Metabolism, a publication of Cell Press, that they have delayed the animals' deaths and their development of age-related diseases, including vascular disease, obesity, and one form of cancer. Those health benefits, driven by an increased metabolic rate, appear to come without any direct influence on the aging process itself, according to the researchers...

'When you make the mitochondria inefficient, the muscles burn more calories,' a metabolic increase that could be at least a partial substitute for exercise, said Clay Semenkovich of Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis. 'There are a couple of ways to treat obesity and related diseases,' he continued. 'You can eat less, but that's unpopular, or you could eat what you want as these animals did and introduce an altered physiology. It's a fundamentally different way of addressing the problem.'"

Global warming will cause areas that are now dry to become under water.

Water will offer resistance to movement.

This will burn more Calories. In effect, making muscles less efficient.

Problem remains getting fat people to move.

The researchers did not address this.

"Given the difficulty of validating strategies to increase life span in humans and the possible dissociation between aging and age-related diseases, the researchers said, identifying a simple intervention affecting several age-related diseases is an attractive approach to decreasing the morbidity of growing old. They suspected that treatments designed to alter the efficiency of mitochondrial respiration might be one way to accomplish this."

"Simple intervention"?

They just have not researched it well enough to understand how it will harm you.

And it will.

The simplest and most effective interventions:

Lose weight
Stop paying to rescue fat people

Guaranteed results.

Chronic Disease Interventions Work And Are Cost Effective

Cost effective for Big Pharma and the sick care industry.

"Low income, developing, and developed countries have shown that chronic disease interventions, such as...multidrug regimens for high-risk cardiovascular disease patients are cost effective and should be increased, according to Dr Thomas Gaziano, Brigham & Women's Hospital, Harvard Program for Health Division Science, Boston, MA, USA, and team, authors of the second paper in The Lancet's Chronic Diseases Series."

You decide.

One In Ten Suffers Medical Error, UK

And there is much more malpractice here in the USA than gets reported.

So, fat people, with your diseases of choice, think twice before you look to sick care for your salvation.

Of course, if you were capable of thinking twice before doing something, you might have thought twice before overfilling your mouths and bellies.

Myth of Vitamin E Benefits Perpetuated in Peer-Reviewed Journals

An homage to Sonny and Cher's , "And the Beat Goes On"

"Do you ever wonder
That to win, somebody's got to lose...

And the myth goes on...
And the myth goes on you'd better believe it
Still moving strong on and on"

You lose.

Here's the truth about your myth and how it is perpetuated by "cutting edge" ignoramuses:

"Although randomized clinical trials have discredited any purported cardiovascular benefits of vitamin E, peer-reviewed medical journals keep citing old disproved epidemiologic findings, found researchers here...

They said the same pattern -- citing observational findings from epidemiologic studies that have been solidly countered by randomized trials -- also continued for studies of beta-carotene and estrogen.

This trend wastes time, effort, and money and can 'also perpetuate a literature of false impressions that can affect future scientific efforts by providing a misleading starting base,' said Dr. Ioannidis and colleagues. They did not cite the offending journals by name."

Who you gonna believe?

Try here, here, here, here, here, and here.

How long has this been going on?

Years.

"Two articles touting the benefits of vitamin E were published in 1993, but the HOPE trial, which was published in 2000, found that vitamin E did not reduce the risk of cardiovascular events...

Clinical trials published in 1994 and 1996 found no evidence that beta-carotene supplements prevent cancer, but 10 of 16 articles published in 2006 cited a 1981 review of epidemiology research, which suggested the antioxidant may help reduce the risk of developing the disease."

Just like with weight loss, you've been duped. See here and here.

Here's another homage.

To Gene Chandler's "Duke of Earl."

"Duped, Duped, Duped, You’ve been duped
Duped, Duped, You’ve been duped
Duped, Duped, You’ve been duped
Duped, Duped, You’ve been duped

Duped, Duped, You’ve been duped
Duped, Duped, You’ve been duped
Duped, Duped, You’ve been duped
Duped, Duped, You’ve been duped"

Overweight kids prone to heart disease later on

More real child abuse.

"As a child's weight increases, so does their risk of having heart disease as an adult, according to a report in The New England Journal of Medicine.

Stop Nutritional Child Abuse.

Stop killing the children.

Go here (the Fit To Parent (tm) Program) and here.

Sharp increases in child obesity foreseen: studies

The future of child abuse is here now.

STOP Nutritional Child Abuse.

Waistline Growth On High-carb Diets Linked To Liver Gene

Behind the times - they forgot to read the latest research.

"Experts have been warning for years that foods loaded with high-fructose corn syrup and other processed carbohydrates are making us fatter. Now, a University of Wisconsin-Madison study has uncovered the genetic basis for why this is so."

They discovered the gene that does nothing related to high-carb waistline growth, possibly.

But they will try to invade your genetics to fix the non-problem:

"Blocking SCD's action in the liver could therefore offer another means to help people lose weight, Ntambi says, especially since obese people appear to have higher levels of the enzyme than do thin people."

Who to believe?

None of them, if you are smart.

Besides nothing will increase the size of your waistline, nutritionally speaking, without more Calories in than out.

Encouraging Baby To Like Fruits And Veggies

Early child abuse alert!

"According to new research from the Monell Center, if you're breast feeding, you can provide baby with a good start by eating them yourself...

'Vegetable and fruit consumption is linked to lower risks of obesity and certain cancers,' says senior author Julie A. Mennella, PhD. 'The best predictor of how much fruits and vegetables children eat is whether they like the tastes of these foods. If we can get babies to learn to like these tastes, we can get them off to an early start of healthy eating.'"

I smell lawsuits coming.

Moms who do not eat adequate fruits and vegetables (to be determined with further research) while nursing clearly have condemned their offspring to suffering from overweight, obesity and cancer.

There is a business opportunity here for wet nurses who only eat "healthy" foods.

Tits for Tots, Inc. Let's incorporate.

Perhaps we can get surrogate breasts from abroad. (I know what you are thinking. Wet nurse breasts can only come from a broad. Not necessarily true. See below.)

Slogans?

"Healthy Tits for Healthy Tots" (tm)
"Why Do You Think We Call Them Grapefruits?" (tm)
"You Are What You Suck" (tm)
"We Don't Call Them Melons For Nothing" (tm)

And the fathers who are complicit in this heinous crime are the accomplices. After all, they should have influenced the mothers to eat their fruits and vegetables.

And if the mothers did not listen? Dads, document your attempts so you have an alibi. And prepare to explain why you did not breastfeed.

Glucose Affects Our Ability To Resist Temptation

More silliness.

"New research from a lab at Florida State University reveals that self-control takes fuel - literally...

The sugar group performed better..."

Here is the bottom line: candy bars for self-control to prevent people from overeating candy bars.

Or...

"The results as reported in the December issue of Current Directions in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science, suggest the possibility of psychological interventions for helping people achieve greater self-control."

Therapy, e.g., drugs.

Difficult Choice: Low-Calorie Or Low Prices?

More useless research.

"High-calorie foods provide the most calories at the least cost, the researchers found in a survey of more than 370 food items at three Seattle-area supermarket chains. The lowest calorie-dense foods include fresh fruit and vegetables, while foods highest in calories include candy, pastries and other baked goods and snacks."

Small homes in the boonies can still provide good shelter, even if they are not mansions.

It is almost never a choice between cost and low Calories or eating healthily.

More excuses for irresponsible behaviors.

Obesity behind over half UK maternal birth deaths

The dangers of an obese behind.

"More than half of British mothers who died during child birth were overweight, a report found on Tuesday...

In its annual report, 'Saving Mothers' Lives: reviewing maternal deaths to make motherhood safer,' it found that of the almost 300 women who died during childbirth between 2003 and 2005 from pregnancy-related conditions, more than half were obese. The deaths left 520 children motherless, it added.

Obese pregnant women are more at risk of dying, suffering heart disease, miscarriage, diabetes, infections and blood clots...

About 40 percent of deaths were preventable, it added."

Get Fit to Parent (tm) before you parent.

Do it for your self, your kids and your family.

Avandia may raise osteoporosis risk

Another perk from being fat and with Type II diabetes. Brittle bones.

"The popular diabetes drug marketed as Avandia may increase bone thinning, a discovery that could help explain why diabetics can have an increased risk of fractures..

The assumption had been that more brittle bones in diabetics were the result of a reduced bone-building activity, not increased bone removal.

'Considering the widespread use of these drugs and the known action in people it is surprising that such a key observation had been missed,' he said."

Oops.

And it gets better.

You can have heart failure, too.

"Avandia recently was labeled with warnings about the risk of heart failure in some patients."

Eat hearty.

Exercise pill hope for depression

Exercise is the opiate of the people. So let's make a drug!

"The natural 'high' produced by exercise could one day be available in a pill that targets a gene in our brains.

The Yale University experts say that experiments on mice could show why regular exercise can help people suffering from depression.

Writing in the journal Nature Medicine, they say it could lead to more effective drugs."

More Yale crap. (See here, here, here and here.)

Shut the place down.

Stop making drugs to do what can be done without them.

'Burned foods' linked to cancers

Everything you eat is wrong.

"Women who eat crisps or chips every day may double their chances of ovarian or womb cancer, say scientists.The fears surround acrylamides, chemicals produced when you fry, grill or roast a wide range of foods.

Dutch researchers quizzed 120,000 people on their eating habits, and found that women who ate more acrylamide appeared more at risk."

Or not.

"UK experts say other factors could be to blame, and urged women there was not need to panic."

Still think anyone has any idea about what a "healthy" food is?

But if you want to eat healthily, which is a different concept, see here.

Anorexia visible with brain scans

Finding new ways to drug, surgerize of otherwise violate you, needlessly.

"Sophisticated scans have revealed the eating disorder anorexia is linked to specific patterns of brain activity."

Sophisticated. Yeah, right.

"Even young women recovering from anorexia who have maintained a healthy weight for over a year had vastly different brain activity patterns.

The findings in the American Journal of Psychiatry point to a brain region linked to anxiety and perfectionism."

"Perfectionism" - "a personal standard, attitude, or philosophy that demands perfection and rejects anything less."

Clearly a standard to which researchers do not hold themselves.

"The University of Pittsburgh authors said the understanding might help with the development of new treatments."

Read "income" for docs and other treaters.

"A spokeswoman from the eating disorders association 'beat' said: 'This demonstrates how complex eating disorders are and underlines that they should be treated as a serious mental illness and not a silly diet gone wrong.'"

Note there is no cause and effect. Only observation.

It's more as if being a spokeswoman or a researcher is a "serious mental illness."

Obesity Clue In The Birds And The Bs

Actually, the article supports a "Stupidity Clue In The Birds And The Bs."

"Research by scientists at The University of Nottingham suggests adult health related disorders, particularly in males, could originate from the events that take place at the point of our conception."

Some people call this "genetics."

"Working in close collaboration with scientists from the Rowett Institute and SAC in Aberdeen, Dr Kevin Sinclair and colleagues at The University of Nottingham have shown that male offspring of B-deprived mothers were 25 per cent fatter and had significantly higher blood pressure than offspring of sheep given a healthy diet."

All they have to demonstrate is how weight gain is possible in the absence of more Calories in than out.

Perhaps their benefactors will pay for the research.

"The study received £556,000 in funding from the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (USA) and their findings have been published in the journal PNAS (Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America)."

The only problem these researchers face is that this is impossible to prove.

But they, and their underwriters, are clearly too stupid to realize this.

A defect in thinking this profound is likely from "the point of their conception," i.e., of genetic origin.

Higher-Than-Expected Suicide Rate Following Bariatric Surgery

Just when you (stupidly) thought it was safe.

"Extremely obese Pennsylvania residents undergoing weight loss surgery over a 10-year period had a higher-than-expected mortality rate from suicide, according to a new study appearing in the October issue of Archives of Surgery. The study also uncovered an excess of deaths due to coronary heart disease among these surgery patients."

It is of some note that "therapeutic complications" are considered "natural deaths." As if dying from the cure is natural. You just gotta love sick care.

"Therapeutic complications accounted for 38 of 150 natural deaths within 30 days, including pulmonary embolism in 31 (20.7%), coronary heart disease in 26 (17.3%), and sepsis in 17 (11.3%)."

For some, it is dead if you do and dead if you don't:

"There were 16 deaths listed as suicides, but the actual suicide rate was likely higher, since some of the 14 deaths listed as drug overdoses on death certificates may have been suicides as well. Based on statistics for the general US population, only 2 suicides would have been expected in this number of people. 'There was a substantial excess of suicide deaths, even excluding those listed only as drug overdose,' the authors write."

Apparently addiction to food was replaced with an addiction to drugs.

Here is the counterpoint:

"However, the deaths in the study should be viewed in context, said Dr. Courcoulas who, as an epidemiologist, says she is familiar with studies such as this one and their limitations. She noted that it might not be so much the surgery that is killing these patients but their obesity."

Excuse me, but wasn't preventing death from obesity why the surgery was done?

Cholesterol seen tied to heart disease, not stroke

Call the police! Some truth has escaped!

"Researchers aiming to establish whether high cholesterol raises the risk of stroke said on Thursday they were baffled by findings indicating lower cholesterol levels were not linked to reduced stroke deaths...

'I think all we can say is that we don't really understand what's going on here. And we need to know more about cholesterol and more about stroke sub-types to find out what's going on,' Lewington said in a telephone interview."

They know even less about fitness and weight loss and healthy eating.

Wise up. Get fit. Do not listen to the sick care industry, Big Pharma, the government or diet gurus.

See here, here, here, here, here, and here.

Walking speed tied to older adults' longevity

Well what do you know?

"Older adults who are able to boost their walking speed over time may live longer lives, a study suggests."

Sounds like the difference between exercise (useless) and training (useful).

"The reasons for the findings are not clear..."

Sounds like the researchers are morons. Nothing new here.

"'Further research is needed..."

Correction. The researchers are greedy morons. Nothing new here. My bad.

Train. Don't exercise.

Patients may expect too much of heart procedures

Even heart surgery won't fix the fat you.

"In a study of 633 patients considering heart bypass surgery or angioplasty, researchers found that the patients typically expected the procedures to be more beneficial than their doctors did."

This is likely to be true:

"Moreover, there was often a discrepancy between what the patients said their doctor told them about the procedures' benefits and what the doctor actually believed."

I really do believe it is because docs oversell what they can do.

"Fitness is the only REAL preventive medicine." (tm)

Estimates of U.S. HIV cases rise 50 percent: reports

Are obesity rates really leveling off?

"The government is raising its estimate of how many Americans are becoming infected with the AIDS virus every year by 50 percent..."

More lies, damned lies and statistics.

No matter.

If you are fat, you are fat.

No stat will change that.

Chimps Do Better on Memory Test Than Humans

Champ chimps.

"Japanese researchers pitted young chimps against human adults in two tests of short-term memory, and overall, the chimps won."

But they do worse on one memory test. They apparently forget to continue eating until they are too fat.

Go humans!

BTW, notice what the chimp is eating.

"Fifi" eats carrots as she joins Sydney's Taronga Zoo's chimpanzee family, Monday, May 21, 2007. (Mark Baker/AP Photo)

FDA faces damning report on science expertise

Are you sure you want to take diet pills?

"Lives are at risk because the U.S. Food and Drug Administration is woefully behind in the latest scientific advances and is underfunded for its vast responsibilities, an expert panel will tell the on Monday.

In a 56-page report titled 'FDA Science and Mission at Risk,' which has been posted online, officials will hear that inadequate staffing and poor retention, out-of-date technology and a general lack of resources mar the agency's ability to do its job.

The FDA regulates products ranging from pharmaceuticals and medical devices to food and cosmetics, representing about $1 trillion, or a quarter of every dollar spent in the U.S..."

C'mon, do yourself a favor, drop a few pounds, eat better and get fitter the right way.

See here, here, here, here, here, and here.

Extreme Weight Loss Experiment Takes Heavy Toll

Another Clark Kent/Superman article. Still instructive, though.

A lot of the filler in this article is true trash. This is to be expected of ABC, the network of Oprah Winfrey, David Katz and Jorge Cruise.

In fact, the results described in this article are from diets less severe than those promoted by Katz, Cruise, Oprah, Mehmet Oz, Art Agatston, Dave Zinczenko, Consumer Reports and others.

"In the film, called "Super Skinny Me," two average-size British journalists, Louise Burke and Kate Spicer, agree to a radical experiment -- drop five dress sizes in just five weeks."

Like so many people who listen to fat Oprah or read her rag "O":

"She turned to magazines for the latest fad diets."

What happened? The same as it always does on expert diets:

" In just one week, though, both women saw dramatic results. But the experiment began to take a drastic physical toll."

Now for the predictable overeating when you have an opportunity:

"A dinner out with friends led to bingeing.

'I can't stop eating," Spicer said in the movie. "I don't know if all that hunger has made me eat all of this food in a strange anxious way but it's not right.'''

Here is where one of them gets a bit full of herself instead of food:

'''Basically I proved that not eating enough makes you go mental,' Spicer said.

Unfortunately for her, basically, she proved nothing. All she did was confirm what had already been proven decades ago.

"'I believe in journalism," Spicer said. "The best ways to understand something is to become it.'''

Too bad she doesn't believe in doing competent research. She could have saved herself a lot of grief.

The other just got full of depression, also well-described.

Burke also said losing that much weight so quickly 'sent me into depression really, and I've never been like that before, ever!'

Burke lost 14 pounds over five weeks."

That is much less than the diets of Cruise, Katz, Agatston, Atkins, Oz, Oprah and the rest would have you lose.

Are you ready to wake up and recognize your real enemies?

And make them pay for the harm they cause? Not just to you, but kids, too.

If so, see here, here, here, here, here, and here.

Many gene tests a waste of money: experts

A lucid moment.

"Genetic tests to assess disease risk are proliferating but many are a waste of money and tell people little...

'My message is you are wasting your money,' she told a news briefing."

Fat people: take note.

Not only is there no genetic cause or solution to your self-control problem, there is also no test that will save you from yourself.

This advice is sure to be ignored.

Do not ignore this:

If you want to get fit and do yourself and your kids a favor, see here, here, here, here, here, and here.

Fosamax users seek class-action status

Diet drugs anyone?

"Lawyers for Fosamax users who believe their jaws were damaged by the osteoporosis drug on Friday asked a federal judge to order Merck & Co. to provide a dental monitoring program for the drug's users.

The lawyers made the suggestion to U.S. District Judge John F. Keenan as they argued for the case to be certified as a class-action, in order to pursue claims by users who believe the drug caused osteonecrosis of the jaw, a condition in which portions of the jaw bone die, sometimes leaving the bone exposed.

Timothy M. O'Brien, a lawyer for plaintiffs, said hundreds of thousands of patients..."

Maybe diet drugs should only be indicated for the scheming fat folk who want to get compensated for the harm they will suffer.

Tough way to make a living.

Smoking bans most beneficial to non-smokers' health

A good result. A good lesson.

The good result:

"Non-smokers gain the most from public smoking bans, while smokers will likely see few health benefits, a new study suggests...

These observations provide evidence that any health effects of smoking bans are due to non-smokers being exposed to less second-hand smoke, rather than smokers cutting down on cigarettes or quitting, the researchers say."

The good lesson:

"'Smokers would continue to smoke regardless of a public smoking ban,' Seo pointed out. 'For the non-smokers, it's a totally different situation.'"

Remember both the next time you want to reduce salt or implement "healthy" food programs in an away from home setting.

When led by ignorant people, you can only end up in an ignorant place.

Fight back here and here.

Food Costs Take A Big Bite Of The Income Pie For Low-income British Columbians, Canada

Raping people with food.

"Imagine spending 42% of your income after taxes on food. That's how much a family of four receiving income assistance in BC would need to spend to purchase enough healthy food."

Forget the "healthy" foods myth perpetrated on an unsuspecting public and progressed by these dangerous dietitians.

The concept of "healthy" food for weight loss is a lot of crap from the get-go. Even suggesting it to poor (or rich) people is a violation.

There is no comfort from this violence being inflicted by "professionals."

Real violence also occurs in the diet program food industry where lies, over-pricing and bull are the real things that are fed.

Diet program foods can and do cost over 10 times more per Calorie than real food.

And the programs are doomed to fail.

Caveat Emptor.

Obesity Rate In American Adults No Longer Increasing, CDC

Wrong. Misleading.

"A new study by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) released yesterday, 28th November, said that the rate of obesity among adults aged 20 and over in the US appears to be levelling off..."

Merely "appears to be levelling off."

"For men, there has been a steady rise in obesity rates between 1999 and 2006, but for women, since 1999 there appears to be a levelling off. The gap that used to exist between male and female obesity rates (more obesity among women) has gradually closed, with the effect looking as though men have caught up with women, said lead author of the study, Cynthia Ogden, who is a researcher with the CDC."

You go, boy!

Here is one of the "main results of the study":

"There was no statistically significant change between the 2005-06 figures and the 2003-04 figures."

There are lies, damned lies and statistics.

Maintaining Physical Activity In Middle Age Results In Better Basic Physical Abilities As We Age

Proving the obvious.

"Researchers from the Peninsula Medical School in Exeter, UK, have concluded a study that proves a direct link between levels of physical activity in middle age and physical ability later in life -- regardless of body weight."

Proving what has already been proven.

" Findings showed that being overweight or obese was associated with an overall increased risk of physical impairment..."

Proving what has already been proven. Again.

"Dr. Lang commented: 'There are three truly interesting results from this research. The first is that our findings were similar from the US and the UK, which suggests that they are universal...'"

Proving that a lot of this research is worthless.

Proving it is time to stop funding this garbage.

Brain wiring link to paedophilia

Getting what you deserve.

Years ago I predicted that once we got on the slippery slope of making excuses for people's bad behavior re: unfitness, by conjuring up the bogeymen of genetics, infections, etc., it was only a matter of time before we would start to use them for criminal behaviors.

Here goes:

"Researchers used sophisticated MRI scans to compare the brains of paedophiles and non-sexual criminals.

Paedophiles had significantly less of a substance called 'white matter', responsible for wiring the different parts of the brain together.

The study, by the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health in Toronto, appears in the Journal of Psychiatry Research."

And look who is implicated in this.

"The study follows work by Yale University which uncovered differences in the thought patterns of paedophiles."

Yale. The same people who bring you David Katz and Kelly Brownell and who refused to act promptly when Jorge Cruise and David Katz, perhaps dishonestly (you decide), appropriated its name for a faux endorsement. (see here and here.)

"However, Dr Cantor stressed the latest study did not suggest that paedophiles could not be held criminally responsible for their actions.

He said: 'Not being able to choose your sexual interests doesn't mean you can't choose what you do.'"

Wanna bet?

Just ask a criminal defense attorney.

Enjoy your slope.

Don't say I didn't warn you.

Corn syrup may not boost appetite, food intake

Now what will you believe?

"Though some have blamed the U.S. obesity problem on the corn syrup ubiquitous in processed foods, a new study casts some doubt on this idea.

Researchers found that high-fructose corn syrup did not differ from regular table sugar in its effects on people's appetite and food intake later in the day. They say the findings counter the argument that high-fructose corn syrup is contributing to the rise of obesity and type 2 diabetes...

"'These studies,' Akhavan and Anderson conclude, 'do not support the hypothesis that the replacement of sucrose with high-fructose corn syrup as a caloric sweetener has contributed to overeating and obesity because of differences in their short-term physiologic (effects).'"

How about these: here, here, here, here, here, and here?

More proof that we have no idea about what is a "healthy" food.

FDA debates stricter regulation of salt in food

First Big Pharma. Now Big Shaker.

"U.S. health regulators on Thursday debated a consumer group's bid to boost regulation of salt in food and revoke the ingredient's "generally recognized as safe" status...

'Clearly, salt should be considered generally recognized as dangerous, not safe,' said Michael Jacobson, executive director of the group, which has petitioned and sued the agency over the years."

Okay. Get it out of the food.

How will you get it off the table or out of the kitchen?

You can see the success of low/reduced Calorie foods on the shelves and as options in restaurants.

This will likely meet with similar success, though I believe it to have a slightly greater chance of not failing completely.

Can't help but wonder when knives, cars, etc., will also "be considered generally recognized as dangerous, not safe."

One in 10 suffers 'hospital harm'

More from the people who brought you diet pill, diet surgery and diet advice.

"Accidents, errors and mishaps in hospital affect as many as one in 10 in-patients, claim researchers."

And some uncharacteristically good advice:

"'Our research does confirm though that hospitals are not completely safe places, and that people should try to steer clear of them unless absolutely necessary.'"

I could not have said it better myself.

"Fitness is the only REAL preventive medicine." (tm)

Fitness will do more to keep you out of harm's way than all the sick care in the world.