Fórum Social Mundial 2010

Fórum Social volta à Capital em 2010

Evento surgido em Porto Alegre terá debates sobre economia e ambiente

Ambientalistas e defensores da justiça social iniciaram ontem os preparativos da edição 2010 do Fórum Social Mundial.

Em coletiva de imprensa promovida em São Paulo, os organizadores do encontro anunciaram que a edição que marcará os 10 anos do evento, criado em 2001, será realizada em Porto Alegre, que sediou o primeiro ano do maior fórum de discussões sociais da atualidade. O evento será chamado de Fórum Social 10 Anos Grande Porto Alegre.

No Rio Grande do Sul, as atividades ocorrerão em sete municípios da Grande Porto Alegre. Na Capital, serão promovidas 12 mesas de debates com nomes de grande expressão política.

O Fórum Social – que já foi chamado informalmente de Fórum de Porto Alegre – se autodenomina uma alternativa ao Fórum Econômico Mundial, realizado em Davos, na Suíça, e que reúne representantes das maiores economias e entidades financeiras do mundo

O encontro será promovido de 25 a 29 de janeiro, paralelamente ao Fórum de Davos, e trará como tema central a crise ambiental e os riscos do aquecimento global – “problemas gerados pelo atual modelo de desenvolvimento econômico, defendido em Davos”, ressalta Oded Grajew, um dos idealizadores do Fórum Social.

Além da promoção de diálogos sobre temas sociais, o FSM abrirá em 2010 fóruns de discussão sobre a história do encontro. Os debates irão focar conquistas alcançadas nos 10 anos de evento e dos caminhos que o Fórum deve adotar em suas próximas edições.

– Será uma forma de discutir o significado do movimento e ressaltar a sua importância no contexto mundial – acredita Grajew.

Crises econômica e ambiental serão tema de discussão

O evento, que contou com a participação este ano dos presidentes Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, Hugo Chávez (Venezuela) e Rafael Correa (Equador), pode ser prestigiado em 2010 pelas presidentes do Chile e da Argentina, Michelle Bachelet e Cristina Kirchner. Lula e Chávez foram os únicos chefes de Estado a participar das edições porto-alegrenses do Fórum.

– Ambas foram convidadas para ministrar palestras no evento – antecipou Grajew.

Além de uma análise das últimas edições, o Fórum Social 10 Anos Grande Porto Alegre se dedicará a fazer uma reflexão dos desafios do evento em meio às crises econômica e ambiental.

– O Fórum mudou muito nesses últimos 10 anos, mas o mundo também mudou – disse ontem José Corrêa Leite, um dos organizadores, em São Paulo.

Durante quatro edições, Porto Alegre sediou encontro que pretendia se contrapor ao Fórum de Davos
Foto:Júlio Cordeiro, BD - 28/01/01

Europa quer abaixar volume de iPods

Comissão Europeia quer reduzir o limite de tocadores MP3 para 80 decibéis. Volume atual chega em 120 db, o que está fora da margem de segurança/.../

Financial innovation: social prospect

A place in society

Sep 25th 2009 | NEW YORK
From The Economist print edition

You might suppose that financial innovation had done enough damage. But bankers, investors and philanthropists believe it can help the world’s poor

MANY nodded when Lord Turner, the City of London’s chief regulator, said recently that the financial industry had grown “beyond its socially useful size”. The idea that devices such as collateralised debt obligations and credit-default swaps have been a blessing, not least by allowing the less well-off to buy houses, is in tatters: lots of those new homeowners have lost their houses as well as their jobs. It is remarkable, then, that the crisis should have given fresh impetus to “social finance”, a movement based on the belief that financial innovation can be used directly to help society’s neediest people./.../

Heroes of the Environment 2009

Heroes of the Environment 2009

By SIMON ROBINSON

ILLUSTRATION FOR TIME BY CECELIA WONG

From saving wild mountain rivers in China to measuring the Arctic's icy expanse, from protecting the lush forests of Africa to conducting a feisty online debate, our green heroes are informed by this simple notion: We can all make a difference/.../

World Heart Day 27 September 2009

O que molda nossas cidades

ZH: 26 de setembro de 2009 | N° 16106AlerURBANISMO

De: LUIZ CARLOS DA CUNHA *

* Doutor e livre docente da Faculdade de Arquitetura da Ufrgs, ex-professor titutlar da Faculdade de Tecnologia da Universidade de Brasília, autor de “Dialética Urbana” (EdiPucrs)

O que molda nossas cidades

Dando continuidade à discussão sobre a arquitetura de Porto Alegre, que teve início com texto do professor Luís Augusto Fischer (publicado no caderno Cultura de 8 de agosto) e prosseguiu com artigo do arquiteto Edson Mahfuz, o arquiteto Luiz Carlos da Cunha lembra que o aspecto de uma cidade reflete o nível cultural da cultural da sociedade

“Non alcior solis tolendus”

Esta epígrafe definia o princípio fundamental do urbanismo romano: “Não me tolhas o sol”. Roma obedecia esse imperativo legal no processo de ocupação do solo urbano. A liberdade de acesso à luz solar pressupunha o privilégio da anterioridade; isto é: a ordenação da sequência construtiva, impondo o resguardo ao “direito solar” da edificação já existente, por parte daquela subsequente. Era simples e objetiva. Tal princípio regia a altura. Como os romanos criaram o quarteirão, o traçado viário de quatros lados iguais ocupados pelas edificações, padronizava-se a altura a fim de atender ao preceito primordial. Se apreciarmos o traçado das cidades europeias e as do Novo Mundo, herdeiras culturais da civilização greco-romana, atesta-se a geometria quadrática da verve romana. A democracia solar assegurou-se pela padronização de seis pavimentos em Paris e Londres./.../

Novo Código de Ética

Médicos têm novo Código de Ética Por: Setor de Imprensa em: 24/9/2009 Foi publicado nesta quinta-feira, no Diário Oficial da União, o novo Código de Ética Médica. Documento dá mais autonomia ao paciente. Saiba mais

ESC 09 & TCT 09 Sintese SBHCI

Sinteze na tabela abaixo os ensaios, registros e conclusões mais consistentes lapidadas neste semestre, unindo o ESC 09 com as apresentações efetivadas no TCT 09.

De: Luiz Alberto Mattos

Obama calls on world to reframe the UN

September 24, 2009

TEXT

Obama’s Speech to the United Nations General Assembly

Following is a text of President Obama's speech to the United Nations General Assembly on Wednesday, as released by the White House.

Good morning. Mr. President, Mr. Secretary General, fellow delegates, ladies and gentlemen, it is my honor to address you for the first time as the 44th President of the United States. (Applause.) I come before you humbled by the responsibility that the American people have placed upon me, mindful of the enormous challenges of our moment in history, and determined to act boldly and collectively on behalf of justice and prosperity at home and abroad.

I have been in office for just nine months -- though some days it seems a lot longer. I am well aware of the expectations that accompany my presidency around the world. These expectations are not about me. Rather, they are rooted, I believe, in a discontent with a status quo that has allowed us to be increasingly defined by our differences, and outpaced by our problems. But they are also rooted in hope -- the hope that real change is possible, and the hope that America will be a leader in bringing about such change.

I took office at a time when many around the world had come to view America with skepticism and distrust. Part of this was due to misperceptions and misinformation about my country. Part of this was due to opposition to specific policies, and a belief that on certain critical issues, America has acted unilaterally, without regard for the interests of others. And this has fed an almost reflexive anti-Americanism, which too often has served as an excuse for collective inaction./.../

Performance measures for Primary Prevention of CVD

Recebido de Emílio Moriguchi

ACCF/AHA 2009 Performance Measures for Primary Prevention of Cardiovascular Disease in Adults. A Report of the American College of Cardiology Foundation/American Heart Association Task Force on Performance Measures (Writing Committee to Develop Performance Measures for Primary Prevention of Cardiovascular Disease) Developed in Collaboration With the American Academy of Family Physicians; American Association of Cardiovascular and Pulmonary Rehabilitation; and Preventive Cardiovascular Nurses Association Endorsed by the American College of Preventive Medicine, American College of Sports Medicine, and Society for Women’s Health Research

WRITING COMMITTEE MEMBERS

Rita F. Redberg, MD, MSc, FACC, FAHA, Chair; Emelia J. Benjamin, MD, ScM, FACC, FAHA; Vera Bittner, MD, MSPH, FACC, FACP, FAHA*; Lynne T. Braun, PhD, CNP, FAHA, FAAN†; David C. Goff, Jr, MD, PhD, FACP, FAHA; Stephen Havas, MD, MPH, MS;Darwin R. Labarthe, MD, MPH, PhD, FAHA‡; Marian C. Limacher, MD, FACC, FACP, FAHA, FSGC; Donald M. Lloyd-Jones, MD, ScM, FACC, FAHA; Samia Mora, MD, MHS, FACC; Thomas A. Pearson, MD, MPH, PhD, FACC; Martha J. Radford, MD, FACC, FAHA§; Gerald W. Smetana, MD, FACP
; John A. Spertus, MD, MPH, FACC; Erica W. Swegler, MD, FAAFP¶

ACCF/AHA TASK FORCE ON PERFORMANCE MEASURES

Frederick A. Masoudi, MD, MSPH, FACC, Chair; Robert O. Bonow, MD, MACC, FAHA#; Elizabeth DeLong, PhD; David C. Goff, Jr, MD, PhD, FACP, FAHA; Kathleen Grady, PhD, RN, FAHA, FAAN; Lee A. Green, MD, MPH; Kathy J. Jenkins, MD, MPH, FACC; Ann R. Loth, RN, MS, CNS; Eric D. Peterson, MD, MPH, FACC, FAHA; Martha J. Radford, MD, FACC, FAHA; John S. Rumsfeld, MD, PhD, FACC, FAHA; David M. Shahian, MD, FACC

Cell-Phone Radiation Risks

Cell-Phone Radiation Risks:
Why the Jury's Still Out

By BRYAN WALSH Tuesday, Sep. 22, 2009

Roughly 270 million Americans do it several times a day: talk on a cell phone. Seems harmless. But when you make and re ceive calls, your cell phone emits low levels of radio-frequency radiation — a fact that has fueled heated and ongoing scientific debate on the health risks of mobile-phone use./.../

World CO2 emissions, Birth and Death

Recebi de Joice Cunha Bertoletti

Além de indicar quantos nascem e morrem no mundo a cada instante, indica a população de cada país e as emissões de CO2, colocando o cursor em cima. É impressionante o movimento na China e na India.

Se verificarem bem constatarão que a população da Europa quase não tem reposição. Em contrapartida a África e a Ásia não param de aumentar.

Clique no link: http://www.breathingearth.net/

Cardiovascular Effects of Noncardiovascular Drugs

(Circulation. 2009;120:1123-1132.) © 2009 American Heart Association, Inc. Circulation is available at http://circ.ahajournals.org

Satish R. Raj, MD, MSCI; C. Michael Stein, MB, ChB; Pablo J. Saavedra, MD; Dan M. Roden, MD

Most drugs are not used to treat heart disease. However, such “noncardiovascular” medications can often have cardiovascular effects. In this review, we discuss some cardiovascular manifestations of drugs used for noncardiovascular indications. We discuss these in the text according to the manifestations with which patients present; selected drugs are listed in Table 1 by their indication/drug class. The same medication may appear in different sections, reflecting the varied cardiovascular consequences of a particular drug. We also discuss cardiovascular effects of noncardiovascular drugs that arise indirectly from drug interactions that cause an increase or decrease in the concentration of a cardiovascular drug./.../

Atualidades em Tabagismo

Sessão Especial-Mesa Redonda

durante o 64o. Congresso da SBC

em Salvador - 14 setembro 2009

Participei, sob coordenação do Dr. Rui

Fernando Ramos (SP-FUNCOR) de uma

sessão especial sobre tabagismo, juntamente

com Dr. Aristótles Comte de Alencar Fo. (AM) que

foi um dos membros da SBC agraciados com

homenagem especial na abertura do Congresso.

Também Dra. Jaqueline Scholz Issa (SP) e

Dra. Silvia Maria Cury Ismael (SP).

Pretendo disponibilizar minha apresentação

através do site do GEECABE da SBC, a partir da

próxima semana. O endereço exato colocarei a

disposição dos AMICOR oportunamente.

Intellectual Property Rights & Wrongs

South Bulletin (Issue 41, 22 September 2009) - Intellectual Property Rights & Wrongs

This issue of South Bulletin focuses on recent developments and controversies in the intellectual property rights area. We hope it will be timely because the WIPO General Assemblies will take place in Geneva starting on 22 September. The legitimacy and usefulness of the IP system depends on the correct balance between the public interest and the private privilege given to the IP holders as an incentive for innovation. This balance has been disrupted by a one-size-fits-all global regime in the TRIPS agreement. Yet TRIPS has some flexibilities that can be used to limit the damage that an inappropriate IP system can generate./.../

Work with Heart

From Alice: WHF

As World Heart Federation has worked within the World Economic Forum "Working Towards Wellness" initiative, we have worked to drive home the point that workplace prevention of CVD has to go beyond HG to include the factory workers in China, Malaysia and India....a point about diversity and inclusion that we tried to get in the imagery of the World Heart Day clip.

http://www.world-heart-federation.org/what-we-do/world-heart-day/work-with-heart-video

For World Heart Day this year we have collected examples of CVD prevention in different types of settings and will be presenting them in our online newsletter, Heartbeat. One of the themes that comes out strongly is the need to extend efforts to the "informal" work settings.

Since the workplace will also be the WHD theme next year, we hope this will stimulate people to send us information on different kinds of workplace interventions throughout the year, particularly those that are adapted to workplaces in low-income settings. So please keep us informed!

Alice

Alice Grainger Gasser | Project Manager | World Heart Federation | 7, rue des Battoirs | P. O. Box 155 | 1211 Geneva 4 | Switzerland | Phone +41 22 807 03 33 | Fax +41 22 807 03 39 | E-mailalice.graingergasser@worldheart.org | Web www.worldheart.org

Pnad 2008 - IBGE

Mercado de trabalho avança, rendimento mantém-se em alta, e mais domicílios têm computador com acesso à Internet

A Pesquisa Nacional por Amostra de Domicílios (Pnad) constatou diversos avanços no mercado de trabalho brasileiro, em 2008, especialmente nas regiões Norte e Nordeste do país. De 2007 para 2008, o contingente de trabalhadores cresceu 2,8%, totalizando 92,4 milhões de pessoas de dez anos ou mais de idade, impulsionado pelo setor da construção civil (crescimento de 14,1%), que gerou cerca de 900 mil novos postos de trabalho em todo o país. A formalização também foi destaque, com ampliação dos empregados com carteira assinada, de 33,1% dos ocupados em 2007 para 34,5% em 2008, ou seja, um acréscimo de 2,1 milhões de pessoas nessa categoria – o que resultou, por exemplo, numa elevação de 5,9% entre os contribuintes da Previdência. Também melhorou a escolaridade dos trabalhadores: o contingente de ocupados com 11 anos ou mais de estudo passou de 39,0%, em 2007, para 41,2%, em 2008./.../

Salt & Hypertension

Appointed by Professor Emilio Moriguchi

From Medscape Cardiology > Hypertension Highlights

Salt, Salt, Salt -- Plus Sleep and Job Stress: More Data to Share With Your Patients

Linda Brookes, MSc

Authors and Disclosures

Published: 09/09/2009

New position papers and research data from the American Society of Hypertension (ASH) and the American Dietetic Association highlight the role of patients' diets, especially salt intake, in controlling high blood pressure, the starting point for cardiovascular disease, the number 1 cause of mortality in the world today. And it's not just the patients -- over and over the deleterious role of societal forces (especially advertising) is also stressed by the researchers as a major negative factor in the overall health picture. The new data provide details about the effects of these factors in women, blacks, and other minorities; about the physiologic substrates (fluid retention, sleep deprivation); and about the hypertensive effect of job stress (managerial vs professional, differentiated by gender) -- it doesn't go away with retirement

CardioEsporte

Página Inicial Agenda Artigos CardioInfos Clínica Clipping Dicas Equipe Eventos Notícias Contato VIVA SAÚDE Desfrute de uma vida saudável, pratique exercícios físicos regularmente e mantenha uma alimentação adequada. Seu Coração sempre estará de bem com você! CLIMA TEMPO	NOTÍCIAS - Fique por dentro das últimas notícias CardioEsporte Nota Oficial da Sociedade Brasileira de Medicina do Exercício e do Esporte... Seminário sobre Transições na Carreira e Destreinamento, dias 18 e 19 de Fevereiro ... INCLUSÕES CARDIOESPORTE Excessos Físicos/Esportivos em Crianças - Veja a matéria completa Esforço excessivo em atividades físicas pode causar lesões e agravar problemas cardíacos em jovens e crianças - Veja a matéria completa Atestados médicos devem ser mais completos - Veja a matéria completa Frio, Coração e Atividade Física - Veja a dica completa Atestado médico para atividade física - Veja o artigo completo Chocolate é bom para o coração - Veja a matéria completa CLIPPING Veja:O Cigarro: Como Se Livrar Dele EVENTOS VIII Curso de Extensão Universitária ll Símposio de Cardiologia do Exercício que irá acontecer no Instituto Dante Pazzanese de Cardiologia, saiba mais CLÍNICA Saiba onde o Dr. Nabil Ghorayeb faz seu atendimento clínico,

Priorities in Health Equity Research

Commissioned by the World Health Organization - September 9, 2009

The discussion paper is available as PDF file [38p.] at

http://www.globalhealthequity.ca/electronic%20library/Priorities%20for%20research%20on%20equity%20and%20health. pdf.

“…The report of the WHO Commission on Social Determinants of Health was released in August, 2008. Subsequently, a group led by Sweden’s Piroska Östlin, comprising 14 researchers who were actively involved with the Knowledge Networks that supported the Commission, was commissioned by WHO to update an earlier (2005) report on priorities for health equity research. The new (September 9, 2009) discussion paper observes that:

“The bulk of global health research has focused on biological disciplines, to develop medical solutions, to be provided through clinical, individual patient care. The past two decades have witnessed a rise in a new public health paradigm, enlarging disciplinary perspectives, stakeholder analysis, and recognition that health systems can be designed more effectively through new knowledge. This paradigm shift represents a second wave of global health research. With the 10/90 gap embraced by many organisations as an objective to be reversed and the CSDH's report widely distributed, among other contemporary efforts, this paper argues that we are on the cusp of a third wave in global health research, one that explicitly links broader social, political and economic determinants with improvements in equity in health, within and across countries………”

GLOBALIZATION KNOWLEDGE NETWORK:
WORLD HEALTH ORGANIZATION COMMISSION ON SOCIAL DETERMINANTS OF HEALTH

World Congress of Cardiology

Abstract based programme

We are pleased to introduce you to the online abstract submission system for the World Congress of Cardiology Scientific Sessions 2010.

IMPORTANT: Authors that have already submitted their abstract(s) and received their log-in details please click here to add another abstract or make modifications.

Abstracts can only be submitted online. Abstracts received by fax, mail, email or even handwritten will not be accepted.

FINAL SUBMISSION DEADLINE EXTENDED TO 30 SEPTEMBER 2009

All submitted abstracts will be graded and reviewed by the Scientific Programme Committee (SPC) in order to make the final selection and allocation into the different formats. You will be contacted in early 2010 for the outcome notification.

All the accepted abstracts will be published in “Circulation”, journal of the American Heart Association. To learn more about “Circulation” please refer to www.ahajournals.org / www.americanheart.org

To submit your abstract(s):

• Select above and kindly complete the form

Guia Internet 2009

Governo do Estado de São Paulo, por meio do Centro Paula Souza, vem intensificando ao longo dos anos a utilização de novas metodologias de aprendizado, com a internet cada vez mais presente nas salas de aula e laboratórios, não apenas como ferramenta de trabalho, mas também de pesquisa.

Porém, em uma época marcada pelo excesso de informações (principalmente oriundas da rede mundial de computadores), cabe aos educadores avaliar a credibilidade das fontes e apontar os caminhos para a informação de qualidade.

Desde a sua criação, há nove anos, este Guia da Internet se propõe a auxiliar professores e alunos na busca de sites de instituições de ensino, institutos de pesquisas, bibliotecas e museus, entre outros.

Estão disponíveis 669 endereços, selecionados por nossa equipe depois de cuidadosa avaliação. A novidade desta edição é a inclusão de blogs assinados por profissionais ligados a veículos de comunicação tradicionais, que trazem notícias e análises principalmente sobre os setores de educação, ciências e tecnologia./.../

The Working Person's Diet

The Working Person's Diet: Too Busy to Eat Right

By Alice Park Thursday, Sep. 10, 2009

Getty

If you've ever gotten so busy at work that you skipped lunch and ended up staring at your hungry reflection in the vending machine glass in the late afternoon, then you're familiar with this gastro-economic catch-22: Losing your job may mean cutting back on food bills, but gainful employment could result in poor eating habits overall./.../

Diet Books

Full List

New Year, New Diets (2008)

1. Weighing the New Diet Books
2. Eat This, Not That!
3. How to Eat Like a Hot Chick
4. Skinny Bitch in the Kitch
5. Slim for Life
6. The GenoType Diet
7. The All-New Atkins Advantage
8. The No-Crave Diet
9. The Spectrum
10. The Ultimate TEA Diet
11. Women's Health Perfect Body Diet

Questioned routine aspirin: type 2 diabetes

Experts question routine aspirin for patients with type 2 diabetes

September 8, 2009 | Fran Lowry

Barcelona, Spain - The widespread recommendation for the routine use of low-dose aspirin in primary prevention of cardiovascular events for all patients with type 2 diabetes should be revisited, experts said at the European Society of Cardiology 2009 Congress.

Currently, most of the major scientific bodies, including the American Heart Association (AHA), American College of Cardiology (ACC), European Society of Cardiology (ESC), and the European Association for the Study of Diabetes (EASD), uniformly recommend giving aspirin to these patients. The lone exception is the Canadian Diabetes Association, which says that the decision to prescribe aspirin should be left to the discretion of the individual physician. Yet there is inadequate trial evidence for the efficacy and safety of low-dose aspirin in this setting, Dr Carlo Patrono (Catholic University, Rome, Italy) told meeting attendees.

"If a patient has had a prior event, there is no question that he or she should be on aspirin, regardless of whether the patient is or is not diabetic, because we have plenty of evidence there," Patrono commented to heartwire. "But we don't have evidence for the efficacy and safety of low-dose aspirin in diabetics without a prior vascular event or without overt vascular disease. We need direct randomized evidence."

Heart-Healthy Diets May Reduce Risk of Kidney Stones

Findings Suggest Heart-Healthy Diets May Reduce Risk of Kidney Stones

Mike Mitka

JAMA. 2009;302(10):1048.

A diet that is intended to improve blood pressure and cardiovascular health may also reduce the risk of kidney stone formation.

A new study found that individuals whose food consumption best reflected the Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension (DASH) diet were up to 45% less likely to develop kidney stones compared with those whose eating habits were least reflective of DASH (Taylor EN et al. J Am Soc Nephrol. 10.1681/ASN.2009030276 [published online August 13, 2009]). The DASH diet, which is associated with reduced risk of stroke and cardiovascular disease, emphasizes eating high levels of fruits, vegetables, nuts and legumes, low-fat dairy products, and whole grains, and low levels of salt, sweetened beverages, and red and processed meats./.../

A Century After Chagas Disease Discovery

A Century After Chagas Disease Discovery, Hurdles to Tackling the Infection Remain

Rebecca Voelker

JAMA. 2009;302(10):1045-1047.

Early in the 20th century, the State of Minas Gerais in southeastern Brazil was rife with malaria. So severe was the epidemic that it sickened hundreds of railroad workers, threatening government efforts to expand Brazil's railway system from the mouth of the Amazon River south to Rio de Janeiro. The government needed a malaria mastermind, someone who could halt the spread of disease and help railway construction resume.

2009 marks the centennial of the discovery of Chagas disease, named for Carlos Chagas, MD (left), a Brazilian physician who linked clinical symptoms, an insect vector, and an infectious parasite to the syndrome. Triatomine bugs (right), also called kissing bugs because they bite near the lips and eyes, carry the parasite that causes Chagas disease. (Photo credit: Photo credit: Casa De Oswaldo Cruz/Fiocruz)

Government officials contacted Oswaldo Cruz, MD, Brazil's famed infectious disease fighter and director of the Manguinhos Institute (now the Oswaldo Cruz Institute), a vaccine and sera production center in Rio de Janeiro. Cruz sent a young researcher from the institute, Carlos Chagas, MD. By age 28 years, Chagas already had 2 successful antimalaria campaigns under his belt, and he prevailed once again in Minas Gerais. But it was not his fight against malaria that eventually placed his name in the history books of infectious disease, epidemiology, and tropical medicine.

One hundred years ago, in the spring of 1909, Chagas reported on one of the most remarkable feats in public health and tropical medicine of the 20th century. In Minas Gerais, he came across nocturnal blood-sucking triatomine insects, also known as kissing bugs, that bite human victims on the face near the lips and eyes. Chagas wanted to know more about the bugs' biology and whether they were capable of transmitting disease. He suspected that triatomines might be associated with unexplained cardiac abnormalities he found in many railroad workers, regardless of their malaria status./.../

Paleolithic, hunter-gatherer type diet

Original Article

European Journal of Clinical Nutrition (2009) 63, 947–955; doi:10.1038/ejcn.2009.4; published online 11 February 2009

Metabolic and physiologic improvements from consuming a paleolithic, hunter-gatherer type diet

L A Frassetto¹, M Schloetter¹, M Mietus-Synder¹, R C Morris Jr¹ and A Sebastian¹

¹Department of Medicine, University of California San Francisco School of Medicine, San Francisco, CA, USA

Correspondence: Dr LA Frassetto, San Francisco School of Medicine, Campus box 0126 505 Parnassus Avenue, room 1202M San Francisco, CA 94143, USA. E-mail: frassett@gcrc.ucsf.edu

Received 25 July 2008; Revised 20 November 2008; Accepted 30 December 2008; Published online 11 February 2009.

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Abstract

Background:

The contemporary American diet figures centrally in the pathogenesis of numerous chronic diseases—'diseases of civilization'. We investigated in humans whether a diet similar to that consumed by our preagricultural hunter-gatherer ancestors (that is, a paleolithic type diet) confers health benefits.

Methods:

We performed an outpatient, metabolically controlled study, in nine nonobese sedentary healthy volunteers, ensuring no weight loss by daily weight. We compared the findings when the participants consumed their usual diet with those when they consumed a paleolithic type diet. The participants consumed their usual diet for 3 days, three ramp-up diets of increasing potassium and fiber for 7 days, then a paleolithic type diet comprising lean meat, fruits, vegetables and nuts, and excluding nonpaleolithic type foods, such as cereal grains, dairy or legumes, for 10 days. Outcomes included arterial blood pressure (BP); 24-h urine sodium and potassium excretion; plasma glucose and insulin areas under the curve (AUC) during a 2 h oral glucose tolerance test (OGTT); insulin sensitivity; plasma lipid concentrations; and brachial artery reactivity in response to ischemia.

Results:

Compared with the baseline (usual) diet, we observed (a) significant reductions in BP associated with improved arterial distensibility (-3.12.9, P=0.01 and +0.190.23, P=0.05);(b) significant reduction in plasma insulin vs time AUC, during the OGTT (P=0.006); and (c) large significant reductions in total cholesterol, low-density lipoproteins (LDL) and triglycerides (-0.80.6 (P=0.007), -0.70.5 (P=0.003) and -0.30.3 (P=0.01) mmol/l respectively). In all these measured variables, either eight or all nine participants had identical directional responses when switched to paleolithic type diet, that is, near consistently improved status of circulatory, carbohydrate and lipid metabolism/physiology.

Conclusions:

Even short-term consumption of a paleolithic type diet improves BP and glucose tolerance, decreases insulin secretion, increases insulin sensitivity and improves lipid profiles without weight loss in healthy sedentary humans.

Keywords:

paleolithic diet, blood pressure, glucose tolerance, insulin sensitivity, lipids

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RESEARCH

Effects of a short-term intervention with a paleolithic diet in healthy volunteers

European Journal of Clinical Nutrition Scientific Correspondence

CV benefits of fish oil

New review endorses CV benefits of fish oil

AUGUST 3, 2009 | Lisa Nainggolan

New Orleans, LA - A new review concludes that there is extensive evidence from three decades of research that fish oils, or more specifically the omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs) contained in them, are beneficial for everyone [1].

This includes healthy people as well as those with heart disease—including post-MI patients and those with heart failure, atherosclerosis, or atrial fibrillation—say Dr Carl J Lavie (Ochsner Medical Center, New Orleans, LA) and colleagues in their paper published online August 3, 2009 in the Journal of theAmerican College of Cardiology.

"We reviewed everything that was published on omega-3 that was clinically important, and the major finding is that there are a tremendous amount of data to support the benefits of omega-3, not just as a nutritional supplement—people have known that for years—but evidence that it prevents and treats many aspects of cardiovascular disease," Lavie told heartwire.

The omega-3 data may not be as impressive or as plentiful as [statin data] but it should be 'promoted' to clinicians.

Lavie said he believes physicians are not as familiar with the omega-3 studies as they should be: "Clinicians know the findings of many statin trials even if they do not know all the details—they know that there are a ton of statin data. The omega-3 data may not be as impressive or as plentiful as this, but it should be 'promoted' to /.../