Archive for May, 2009

WHO Update: 985 Swine Flu Cases in 20 Countries

Wednesday, May 6th, 2009

The World Health Organization says in its latest update that 20 countries have officially reported 985 cases of influenza A (H1N1) infection. The cases include 26 confirmed deaths – 25 in Mexico and 1 in the United States.

Mexico has reported 590 laboratory confirmed human cases of infection, including 25 deaths. The higher number of cases from Mexico reflects ongoing testing of previously collected specimens. The United States has reported 226 laboratory confirmed human cases, including one death.

The following countries have reported laboratory confirmed cases with no deaths – Austria (1), Canada (85), China, Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (1), Costa Rica (1), Colombia (1), Denmark (1), El Salvador (2), France (2), Germany (8), Ireland (1), Israel (3), Italy (1), Netherlands (1), New Zealand (4), Republic of Korea (1), Spain (40), Switzerland (1) and the United Kingdom (15).

The latest WHO update can be found here. WHO also has provided a map that shows the cases as of May 3rd. More h1n1 resources can be found here.

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Face Transplants Carry Psychological and Physical Risks

Tuesday, May 5th, 2009

The first partial face transplant was conducted in France in 2005. The 38-year-old female patient named Isabelle Dinoire had lost her had nose, lips and chin after being attacked by a dog. The transplant was a success but the French woman says she is “still struggling to come to terms with what she sees in the mirror every day.” CBS says the transplants are complex and they carry the risk of both physical and psychological effects. Wikipedia lists a few other face transplants done on patiented who had suffered severe face damage in thresher accidents. The first U.S. face transplant was recently done and the patient is said to be “very happy.” Julie Chen talks to a plastic surgeon in the clip below about facial transplation.


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Quit Smoking and Beat Nicotine Addiction

Sunday, May 3rd, 2009

Quitting smoking can be difficult and daunting due to the two sides of addiction that it presents. Every type of addiction has a chemical or physical side and a mental or psychological side. These two combine to present a powerful barrier when trying to free oneself from the particular addiction. One weapon that should be in every addicts arsenal when trying to beat addiction is knowledge of the enemy. This article specifically looks at nicotine addiction and the effect it has on every smoker. It also looks at the nature of nicotine itself, what effects it has on the body and how its grip makes quitting smoking a difficult task.

According to the 1996 National Household Survey on Drug Abuse, around 62 million people aged 12 and older in the United States smoke cigarettes. This makes nicotine one of the most heavily used addictive drugs in the US. When a smoker inhales cigarette smoke it takes about 7 seconds for the nicotine in the smoke to be absorbed into the blood stream and affect the brain. It takes up to two hours for enough nicotine to leave the body to cause a craving. Nicotine then starts to affect the body’s reward system similarly to other addictive drugs such as cocaine. It has the overall effect of increasing alertness and enhancing mental performance. Nicotine affects the cardiovascular system by increasing heart rate and blood pressure and restricting blood flow to the heart muscle. Nicotine also stimulates the release of the hormone epinephrine which is a “fight or flight” hormone with a powerful effect on the nervous system. Another hormone that nicotine promotes the release of is beta-endorphin which inhibits pain.

Nicotine itself is a colourless oily compound and if you were to inject it directly into your bloodstream you would die, as it is quite a strong poison, 40-60mg of nicotine would be a lethal dose to a human. In fact its natural function in plants of the nightshade family is as an anti-herbivore chemical to prevent the plant being eaten. This is why nicotine has been widely used in the past as an insecticide, bear this in mind next time you smoke a cigarette or as you try to quit smoking.

Nicotine content in cigarettes has actually slowly increased over the years, and one study found that there was an average increase of 1.6% per year between the years of 1998 and 2005. One could take this cynically and suggest that a smoking industry with so much hostility towards it in legislation and campaigning is fighting back by trying to drug its smokers into continued loyalty.

There is no doubt that nicotine is a powerful and addictive drug, according the American Heart Association “Nicotine addiction has historically been one of the hardest addictions to break.” It has their interest as nicotine has links to circulatory disease. As a stimulant it raises blood pressure and makes it harder for the heart to pump blood through the body. This causes the body to release fats and cholesterol into the blood stream possibly adding to the risk of failure in peripheral circulation.

Nicotine is only one of the 400 or so damaging substances in tobacco smoke, I think you will agree that it does enough damage on its own to warrant special attention. When you next think of quitting smoking, think about what nicotine does to you and what effect it has on your body, how nicotine keeps you addicted to smoking and how you can take steps to beat it.

Weight Loss Diet Program Failure Overcoming Two Leading Problems

Sunday, May 3rd, 2009

A large number of people around the world are overweight. Most of them have been following different programs that would help them to lose weight but they were not successful. If you ask any person for the reasons of their failure, one way or the other they will give you the following two problems:

1. They could not follow the program.

2. They lost some weight but could not maintain it.

These two problems are the biggest ones that most people face but this does not mean that they are the only ones. Both of these problems are related to the human mind and not human body. Your exercise plan or diet has got nothing to do with the failure. The main cause of this failure is the mind state of a human being; he is expected to follow the program with consistency which for some people is not possible. Another reason for this failure is the conflict between a person’s unconscious and conscious state of mind. These two are the reasons due to which a person fails to lose his or her weight. If you are not prepared then nothing can help you get the required results.

The only solution to this problem is to change the entire life style of a person. This will help his sub-conscious mind to accept it and he will be able to follow the plan with more consistency. This shift will solve all the problems and the person will adapt to the new settings. Now this will be more of an adopted life style than a forced on. Now the person will follow the whole diet and exercise program without any trouble. There are numerous advance mind trainings that can help you achieve this state of mind, magically slim being one of them. With the required mind state in place a person will easily follow all the weight loss programs and will be able to maintain it for a long period of time.

With the mind state in place you will need to find yourself a good diet and exercise plan. You can only lose your weight if you are able to burn more calories than you take in. For this reason you need to have a good diet plan. You can ask a doctor to tell you about healthy foods with low calories or you can ask your friends who are already following a plan. You can also use the internet yourself and then evaluate the food items. This way you can eat what you want and you will know how much calories it contains. With your diet plan in place it’s time to get yourself a good exercise plan. You can go for some basic exercises or advanced exercise but this depends on your level of experience. You can buy the necessary equipment or join a gym for this reason. You also have another option! If you don’t want to follow exercises then you can go out for walking, cycling, swimming or running. They don’t require any specialized equipment so they are much easier to adopt.

Weight Loss Diet Natural Stimulants

Sunday, May 3rd, 2009

A natural stimulant can be supposed as one of the best means to achieve admirable aglow and alive skin. Comparing it to a bubbler of youth will not be an overstatement. In this commodity we shall attending at the assorted kinds of natural stimulants alternatives that are accessible in the medicine industry.

There are abounding derma affliction articles getting alien by corrective companies, but a lot of them are articles that accept collagen as an additive in them. But in fact, there is no collagen access in the physique by the use of these so alleged “collagen stimulant” products. Your aboriginal footfall should be to lower your all-embracing analogous of anxiety. This abandoned will admonition to abate the abundance of your all-overs agitation attacks.

To lower your anxiety, pursue the afterward steps:

Reduce or bigger still annihilate altogether the natural stimulants in your diet. This includes caffeine, which can be beginning in colas, tea, coffee, amber and activity drinks. Even “healthy” drinks like blooming tea can accommodate caffeine. If you acquaintance an agitation attack, your physique is abounding with adrenaline, your body’s accustomed analeptic hormone. So you charge to accomplish abiding that you don’t accord your physique even added stimulants to cope with. Apprehension your accent levels afterwards bistro and analysis the capacity of the aliment you accept just eaten if you alpha to apprehension an acceleration in all-overs afterwards bistro assertive foods.

Herbs are one of the best accustomed remedies for agitation attacks and back they’ve been acclimated for bags of years, you can be abiding they accept little or no ancillary effects. One of the easiest means is to pour them in a tea. Or if that’s a bit too awkward, a lot of them can be begin in drops or abridged format.

Once you’ve abandoned natural stimulants, you should alpha to cover abstracted herbs in your circadian diet. Other abstracted herbs you could investigate are valerian, kava and passionflower. Naturally, you should consistently yield your doctor’s admonition if you are demography any decree drugs in case there are any ancillary effects. Purchasing weight loss supplements after accomplishing your analysis is the agnate to just lighting about to your money.

WHO Raises Phase of Pandemic Alert to Level 5

Saturday, May 2nd, 2009

The World Health Organization raised the alert for swine flu to level five. This is one level short of a full pandemic and suggests a pandemic is imminent.
Dr. Margaret Chan, WHO’s director-general, said, “It really is all of humanity that is under threat during a pandemic.”

There are at least 91 cases in the United States and one death. There are also a growing number of countries with mounting swine flu cases. Schools are closing in the United States in an attempt to stop the spread of the swine flu.
A vaccine is in the works but won’t be available until September, at the earliest. You can find links to some swine flu resources here.

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