Early life stress 'changes' genes

By Victoria Gill Science reporter, BBC News A study in mice has hinted at the impact that early life trauma and stress can have on genes, and how they can result in behavioural problems. Scientists described the long-term effects of stress on baby mice in the journal Nature Neuroscience. Stressed mice produced hormones that "changed" their genes, affecting their behaviour throughout their lives. This work could provide clues to how stress and trauma in early life can lead to later problems. Mice that are abandoned as pups have behavioural problems later on life

Population Health: The New Agenda

Sunday, May 24, 2009 Filed in: Videos

What determines your health? Genetics? Doctors? Drugs? But what about the neighborhood you live in? Your job? The amount of money you earn? These are called the social determinants of health, and they can expose more than you think. /.../

CT scans will lead to new cancer death

Each year that today's scanners are used, 14,500 deaths could result, researchers say. When healthy people are exposed to the radiation, the imaging may create more problems than it solves.

• Related
• 4 patients say Cedars-Sinai did not tell them they had received a radiation overdose
• Cedars-Sinai finds more patients exposed to excess radiation

By Thomas H. Maugh II

December 15, 2009

• 
  

Widespread overuse of CT scans and variations in radiation doses caused by different machines -- operated by technicians following an array of procedures -- are subjecting patients to high radiation doses that will ultimately lead to tens of thousands of new cancer cases and deaths, researchers reported today.

Global Tobacco Epidemic, 2009

WHO Report on the Global Tobacco Epidemic, 2009: Implementing smoke-free environments The report is the second in a series about the extent of the global tobacco epidemic and measures to stop it. It includes the latest global and country figures on the prevalence of tobacco use and on the measures' impacts. The report's theme is "smoke-free environments". WHO chose the theme because of the serious harmful effects of second-hand smoke, which include about 600,000 premature deaths per year, numerous crippling illnesses and economic losses in the tens of billions of dollars. Download the full report | Further information and media materials | Press Release

Fome de ar, água e comida

Especial Fome de ar, água e comida Os donos do mundo e seus sábios reunidos em Copenhague ainda não se entenderam sobre como salvar o planeta. A COP15 já funcionou, porém, como uma martelada na cabeça dos líderes alertando-os para a superlotação da Terra e a dramática escassez de recursos naturais.Índice da edição

METHODOLOGICAL TOOLBOX ON THE RIGHT TO FOOD

The purpose of the Methodological Toolbox is to provide a practical aid for the implementation of the Right to Food Guidelines. It contains a series of analytical, educational and normative tools that offer guidance and hands-on advice on the practical aspects of the right to food. It covers a wide range of topics such as assessment, legislation, education, budgeting and monitoring. It emphasises the operational aspects of the right to food and contributes to strengthening in-country capacity to implement this right.

Download the pdf publications:

1. Guide on legislating for the right to food (4 MB)
2. Methods to monitor the human right to adequate food - Vol I (565 KB)
2. Methods to monitor the human right to adequate food - Vol II (1,2 MB)
3. Guide to conducting a right to food assessment (1.7 MB)
4. Right to food curriculum outline (2.3 MB)
5. Budget work to advance the right to food (3.9 MB)

'tempo real' desmatamento de florestas: Google

Ferramenta do Google permite que ambientalistas acompanhem em 'tempo real' desmatamento de florestas

Publicada em 11/12/2009 às 13h18m

O Globo

• R15

RIO - Cientistas e ambientalistas poderão acompanhar a destruição de florestas em todo o planeta quase em tempo real, graças a uma nova ferramenta revelada pelo Google nesta quinta-feira. A tecnologia, apresentada durante a convenção da ONU em Copenhague, permite a análise de imagens de satélite online e a medição de áreas degradadas ou mesmo reflorestadas em escala global./.../

Environmental and societal influences

Environmental and societal influences acting on cardiovascular risk factors and disease at a population level: a review

Clara Kayei Chow^1,*, Karen Lock², Koon Teo¹, SV Subramanian³, Martin McKee² and Salim Yusuf¹

¹ Population Health Research Institute, McMaster University and Hamilton Health Sciences, 237 Barton Street East, Hamilton, ON, L8L 2X2, Canada.
² LSHTM, Keppel Street, London WC1E 7HT, UK.
³ Department of Society, Human Development and Health, Harvard School of Public Health, 677 Huntington Ave, Boston, MA 02115, USA.

* Corresponding author: Dr Clara Kayei Chow, Senior Research Fellow, Population Health Research Institute, Hamilton General Hospital, 237, Barton Street East, Hamilton, ON L8L 2X2, Canada. E-mail: clara@phri.ca

	Abstract

It has long been known that cardiovascular disease (CVD) rates vary considerably among populations, across space and through time. It is now apparent that most of the attributable risk for myocardial infarction ‘within’ populations from across the world can be ascribed to the varying levels of a limited number of risk factors among individuals in a population. Individual risk factors (e.g. blood pressure) can be modified with resulting health gains. Yet, the persistence of large international variations in cardiovascular risk factors and resulting CVDincidence and mortality indicates that there are additional factors that apply to ‘populations’ that are important to understand as part of a comprehensive approach to CVD control. This article reviews the evidence on why certain populations are more at risk than others./.../

Saúde emprega milhares no país

De MARIA INÊS REINERT AZAMBUJA

Até que enfim este país começa a se dar conta que saúde não é só consumo, mas também é produção, que, aliás é a fase que gera saúde.

Do Correio do Povo de hoje

Saúde emprega milhares no país

ANO 115 Nº 71 - PORTO ALEGRE, QUINTA-FEIRA, 10 DE DEZEMBRO DE 2009

Saúde emprega milhares no país

Pesquisa do IBGE indica que o segmento da saúde vem se destacando no mercado de trabalho brasileiro. Em 2007, o setor ocupou 4,2 milhões de pessoas no país, aproximadamente 400 mil a mais que em 2005. A saúde pública é a que mais emprega na área, envolvendo, em 2007, 1,4 milhão de trabalhadores. Outras atividades relacionadas com atenção à saúde aparecem com 1,1 milhão de ocupações, seguido do comércio de produtos farmacêuticos, médicos, ortopédicos e odontológicos, que registrou 786,4 mil trabalhadores. O segmento comercial foi o que mais abriu postos desde 2005, sendo responsável por 105,3 mil novas vagas. Mais da metade das ocupações na área são feitas por meio de vínculo formal e o número de autônomos chegou a 638 mil. Os remédios foram os protagonistas das importações do segmento de saúde, atingindo R$ 5,7 bilhões do total de R$ 11,6 bilhões registrado em 2007. Os aparelhos e instrumentos para usos médico-hospitalar e odontológico representaram R$ 2,7 bilhões e, os produtos farmoquímicos, R$ 2,1 bilhões.

------------------------

Infelizmente continuamos promovento políticas que aumentam a consumo cronico de medicamentos, com os quais transferimos para o exterior mais do que gastamos com todos os trabalhadores empregados no setor.

A solução tem que ser outra. Praças, bicicletas e ciclovias, transporte coletivo de boa qualidade, esporte, estímulo à produção local de alimentos saudáveis, restaurantes comunitários, ou seja, tudo o que faça o dinheiro ficar aqui.

Maria Inês Azambuja

Consumo na saúde 2007 BR

Consumo na saúde representou 8,4% do PIB em 2007

A renda (valor adicionado) gerada pelas atividades econômicas ligadas à saúde cresceu 8,9%, entre 2005-2007 no Brasil. A participação do setor no total da economia brasileira passou de 5,5%, em 2005, para 6,0% (R$ 137,9 bilhões) em 2007. Desse total, R$ 48 bilhões corresponderam à Saúde Pública, incluindo hospitais universitários federais e militares.

O consumo de bens e serviços de saúde, em 2007, representou 8,4% do PIB. A despesa das famílias com bens e serviços de saúde chegou a R$ 128,9 bilhões (4,8% do PIB), dos quais R$ 69 bilhões representaram gastos com serviços de saúde e R$ 45 bilhões com medicamentos. Já a despesa da administração pública com saúde passou de 3,3% para 3,5% do PIB, entre 2005 e 2007./.../

25 Sites We Can't Live Without

Time Magazine

From Amazon and Google to Craigslist and Wikipedia, here are the sites that we keep bookmarked year after year

Full List

SITES TO BOOKMARK

1. Amazon.com
2. BBC.co.uk
3. Citysearch.com
4. Craigslist.org
5. Del.icio.us
6. Digg.com
7. Ebay.com
8. ESPN.com
9. Facebook.com
10. FactCheck.org
11. Flickr.com
12. Google.com
13. HowStuffWorks.com
14. The Internet Movie Database
15. YouTube
16. Kayak.com
17. National Geographic.com
18. Netflix.com
19. Technorati.com
20. TMZ.com
21. USA.gov
22. Television WithoutPity.com
23. WebMD.com
24. Wikipedia.org
25. Yahoo.com

the cause of influenza lethality and its variations in 1918–1919 and 2009

Copyright © 2009 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved.

A parsimonious hypothesis to the cause of influenza lethality and its variations in 1918–1919 and 2009

M.I. Azambuja^{, a, AMICOR}

^aDepartment of Social Medicine, School of Medicine, Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul, Rua Ramiro Barcelos 2600, 4/420 Porto Alegre, 90035-003 Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil

Received 11 September 2009;

accepted 31 October 2009.

Available online 4 December 2009.

Summary

Current explanations to the high 1918–1919 mortality involve either a higher pathogenicity of the virus or bacterial super-infection in the absence of adequate therapeutic resources. However, neither of these hypotheses accounts for the age-distribution of severe cases and deaths, or for the geographic and other variations in rates and explosiveness of mortality during the Pandemic. It will be shown here that, alternatively, the epidemiology of the influenza lethality could be completely explained by a combination of two determinants: (1) acquired immune-differentiation of birth-cohorts, within populations, through developmental epigenetic adaptation (and selection) secondary to maternal or early-life episodes of influenza infection and (2) a triggering context – emergence of a new sub-type/strain, and its co-circulation (competition?) with seasonal viruses immunologically related to ones that had circulated in the past and primed particular population birth-cohorts. This article (1) presents age, geographic, and temporal variations in 1918–1919 and 2009 influenza severity, (2) presents and discusses ecologic evidence in favor of the hypothesis to influenza lethality advanced here, (3) suggests biologic mechanisms capable of explaining it, (4) retrospectively, proposes co-circulation between the Pandemic and a 1918 seasonal (H3?) influenza virus as the context for the increased lethality during the second wave of the 1918 Pandemic, and (5) predicts an increase in influenza severity in the northern hemisphere as the 2009–2010 season advances and H3 circulation increases./.../

Socialism and Healthcare Reform

Socialism and Healthcare Reform
By David B. Nash, M.D., M.B.A., F.A.C.P., and Richard Jacoby, M.D. | December 07, 2009

---

The healthcare reform debate is, all too often, confusing. The subject is multifaceted and is generally not presented in a logical, orderly fashion.

One reason is because, when we approach an issue as large as healthcare reform, we tend to focus on the segments about which we have strong personal feelings. Emotions come into play, often vigorously, making objective discussion difficult or impossible.

Often, the basis for these strongly held beliefs is rooted in misunderstanding of a principle, a definition, or how things work in the real world. Such understanding is fundamental to a logical debate.

In the current healthcare reform discussions, a single word -- "socialism" -- seems to have triggered the most emotional responses. It is used almost pejoratively, as if it is the worst thing that could possibly happen in America./.../

BMI, Waist Size Predict Risk of CV Death

By Crystal Phend, Senior Staff Writer, MedPage Today Published: December 07, 2009 Reviewed by Dori F. Zaleznik, MD; Associate Clinical Professor of Medicine, Harvard Medical School, Boston. Action Points Note that the population-based study relied on measurements taken by trained staff rather than self-reports, but included only adults under age 65. Abdominal obesity and excess weight add up to major risk of cardiovascular disease and death from cardiovascular causes in younger adults, researchers reported. Overweight and obesity account for one in seven cases of cardiovascular disease and one-third of all cardiovascular deaths at the population level, Ineke van Dis, MSc, of the Netherlands Heart Foundation in the Hague, and colleagues estimated. In their population-based study, elevated waist circumference and obesity each were associated with three- to four-fold higher rates of cardiovascular death and nearly a doubling in nonfatal cardiovascular disease over 10 years in those under age 65, they reported in the November issue of the European Journal of Cardiovascular Prevention and Rehabilitation./.../

The Economics of Eating Well

December 7, 2009, 7:37 PM

Food Stamps: The Economics of Eating Well

By THE EDITORS

Andrew Henderson/The New York TimesUsing a food stamp card in Brooklyn.

A recent article in The Times by Jason DeParle and Robert Gebeloff detailed the effects of the soaring dependence on government food stamps in the United States. The social stigma of using them has faded, the Times writers found, yet judgments are still made.

If people buy fresh vegetables or other relatively expensive though nutritious foods, they are considered to be living high on the hog at the taxpayers’ expense. But if they buy cheap foods like hot dogs they are criticized for poor health habits.

Despite these common complaints, does the system work? Are the current rules fair in regulating what people can buy and not buy? Or should the requirements be changed? Should un-nutritious products like soda be banned? Is there a better way to distribute free food and promote nutrition in this country?

• Tom Laskawy, food policy blogger
• Caryn Sweeney, “A Mile in Another’s Shoes” blog
• Adam Drewnowski , obesity researcher, University of Washington
• Julie Guthman, University of California, Santa Cruz
• Marion Nestle, author of “Food Politics”
• Christopher Greenslate, author of “On a Dollar a Day”/.../