Hold the salt
'Tis the season to be jolly … and pig out. But while you're gobbling that turkey feast, you might want to go light on the salt (not to mention, the fat and sugar). The American Medical Association (AMA) and public health advocates are urging the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to require food makers to cut the amount of sodium in their products. Salt intake has been been linked to high blood pressure, which is the the leading cause of heart attacks, stroke and kidney failure. According to the AMA, if the amount of salt dumped in processed and restaurant grub was halved, it could save 155,000 lives annually. "This is truly urgent,'' AMA's Stephen Havas told the Associated Press. "We need to act.'' Government guidelines call for consumers to limit their daily sodium intake to 2,300 milligrams, max. Yet, the average American reportedly consumes between 3,300 and 4,000 milligrams of salt a day. "Reducing the amount of salt in processed foods and restaurant foods is perhaps the single most important thing we could do to reduce blood pressure and the incidence of heart attacks and strokes in this country and around the world,'' Michael Jacobson, executive director of the Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI), said after a recent confab of food industry and health reps designed to help consumers limit their salt intake. "It's something that the food industry and government regulators are taking increasingly seriously.'' The FDA is set to hold a hearing on the issue next week in response to a CSPI petition that asked that it use its authority to keep a lid on sodium levels in the food supply. (BusinessWeek, FOX News)

Fetuses exposed to arsenic suffer genetic damage
A new study shows that prenatal exposure to arsenic in drinking water may cause genetic changes that could lead to cancer or other diseases later on. The findings, published in PLoS Genetics, stem from tests of 32 mothers and their children in a province of Thailand that experienced heavy arsenic contamination from tin mining; similar levels of arsenic are also found in many other regions, including the southwestern U.S. Massachusetts Institute of Technology researchers analyzed umbilical cord blood collected at birth and found a group of about 450 genes that had been switched on or off (become more or less active ) in babies exposed to arsenic in the womb compared with unexposed children. "We were looking to see whether we could have figured out that these babies were exposed in utero'' by screening stored blood samples, says Leona Samson, director of M.I.T.'s Center for Environmental Health Sciences. "The answer was a resounding yes.'' The team found that just 11 of these genes could be used to reliably gauge exposure during pregnancy, which could lead to a test for screening in high-risk areas. Most of the genetic changes were linked to inflammation disorders, which can increase cancer risk. It's not clear how long the gene expression changes may last. This is the first time such a response to prenatal arsenic exposure has been found in humans, although mice offspring of moms exposed to arsenic in drinking water while pregnant were found to be more cancer?prone as adults. Researchers say they will study ways to reverse or prevent damage, perhaps through diet, nutritional supplements or drug treatments designed to block the genetic switches. (press release, U.S. News & World Report)

Walk it off —but bring a pedometer
Overeat over the holidays? Take a walk. But it might be a good idea to clip on a pedometer (also known as a step counter) for good measure. A new analysis shows that using the handy-dandy gadget—which you can pick up for anywhere from $5 to $60—encourages people to go an extra mile—literally. "Our results suggest that the use of these small, relatively inexpensive devices is associated with significant increases in physical activity and improvements in some key health outcomes, at least in the short term,'' internist Dena Bravata of Stanford University and her colleagues report in the Journal of the American Medical Association. The researchers sifted through more than two dozen studies (from the U.S., Canada, Japan, Europe and Australia) that include data on 2,767 subjects observed over an average of 18 weeks. The average age of participants was 49 and 85 percent of them were women. The studies show that pedometer users took an additional 2,491 steps (2,000 steps being about a mile), lowering their body mass index as well as their blood pressure. Keeping a diary of steps taken also helped, as did setting a step goal for themselves. (JAMA, New York Times)

1 Comments

1. 1. explorsion 08:41 PM 11/27/07

   I saw a t.v. program about tracking down the descendants of Jesus, some participants of the study involved mailed their cheek swabs in to some facility and found out which other people on the planet shared that DNA. Is this the very same $1000 a pop facility or is their an affordable or (dare I say) free way to analyze and trace my genealogy?

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