Monthly Archive for March, 2009

Study compares the risks of smoking with being overweight

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Jana
on March 10, 2009
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When the risks of obesity were compared with those of smoking, a substantial study performed in Europe over several decades has found that young overweight men at 18 were as likely to die at 60 as light smokers. Even more alarming is that obese teens, like heavy smokers, were at twice the risk of dying early.

While obesity is said to cause many health problems, these new discoveries conflict with a multitude of recent studies that revealed that people who are just overweight are not necessarily at an increased risk for an early death.

This new study, which was published in last week’s British Medical Journal, traced the death rates of 45,920 Swedish men over a period of 38 years. The researchers discovered that the obese men who signed up for the Swedish army in 1969  and 1970 were more than two times likely to be at risk of dying by age 60, than those of normal weight. This is almost the same accumulation in risk confronting those recruits who were of normal weight but smoked half a pack of cigarettes or more per day.

The study found that overweight recruits who did not smoke were about a third more likely to die early, an increase in risk that is almost the same as that for normal- weight men who smoked up to  10 cigarettes a day.

Martin Neovius, the first author of the study and a postdoctoral fellow at the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, said “We know that health behaviors are established early on in life” so the message for teens is “If you already are smoking, then smoking cessation combined with weight maintenance counseling would probably be a good idea.”

Regardless of the expansiveness of the new study, some experts say that the findings may overemphasize the risks of being overweight. The researchers alluded to the fact that the weight of the men was known only when they enrolled in the military at age 18. Dr. David Williamson, a visiting professor at Emory University who has studied obesity and it’s effect on health, said that because most people gain weight as they get older, the overweight teens most likely went on to become obese adults, so their deaths may be attributed to being obese, not overweight earlier in their life.

Workplace smoking ban is debated by N.C. legislators

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Jana
on March 10, 2009
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In a state that still produces the most tobacco in the country, N.C. legislators have started to discuss a ban on workplace smoking.

Leah Devlin, the State Health Director, told the House Health Committee on February 26 that smoking is extensively banned from offices, which protects the health of white-collar workers from secondhand smoke. It has been proven that secondhand smoke raises the risk for heart disease and cancer. The big effect of the bill will be on blue-collar and restaurant workers who are currently lacking the ability to force smokers to go outside to smoke.

In 2005 and 2007 a less influential form of the legislation was unsuccessful in getting passed. This month in Virginia, which is pretty tobacco-friendly, a limited ban on smoking in restaurants and bars was passed. Currently, the bill has been passed from the N.C. House Health Committee to the House Legal Issues Committee, so the bill is still in progression.

Healthy men encouraged to take prostate drug

Published
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Jana
on March 2, 2009
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Major medical groups are now recommending that healthy men, who are consistently checked for prostate cancer, to think about taking a drug called finasteride for prevention of the disease. This drug is sold in generic form as Proscar. Many men already use this drug for urinary problems from enlarged prostates, a common problem in older men. 

Despite that, this drug hasn’t been extensively used as a preventive measure for cancer, and it might even come with risks. The new guidelines suggest that men discuss with their doctors and then determine if it is the right decision for them.

Most doctors divulge that these suggestions are prone to be confusing. One one hand, it doesn’t pertain to men who decide not to be screened with PSA blood tests. By the way, no major medical group will advise this. But for men who are checked regularly, finasteride can reduce the chances of being diagnosed wtih prostate cancer by an astonishing 25 percent.

Dr. Barnett Kramer, a National Institutes of Health scientist and one of the authors of the new guidelines, claims that if a man is intrigued enough to be screened, he should definitely take advantage of the helpfulness of a discussion with a doctor about the pros and cons of taking the drug.

The expensiveness of the drug can be a big downside for many men. The drug finasteride, which must be taken on a daily basis, costs $2 to $3 a pill and it may not always be covered by insurance.

Discovery could mean end to yearly flu shot in future

Published
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Jana
on March 2, 2009
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Researchers have now developed antibodies that will protect against many strains of the flu. This includes the 1918 Spanish flu and the H5Ni bird flu. A discovery like this could significantly alter how society attacks influenza.

Experts claim that this breakthrough could usher the process of a flu vaccine that would not have to be altered annually. And they can fight the virus in ways that drugs such as Tamiflu can’t, with the antibodies that are already developed. One researcher estimated that within 3 years, clinical trials will commence to show evidence that the antibodies are safe for people.

On February 22, the study that was performed by researchers from Harvard Medical School, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Burnham Institute for Medical Research, was published in the journal Nature Structural & Molecular Biology.

Although one researcher said that they had found “a viral Achilles heel”, and a flu specialist called it “a big advance in itself, and one that shows what’s possible for other rapidly evolving pathogens,”, Henry Niman, a biochemist who tracks flu mutations is skeptical. He claims that immune systems of humans would have wiped out the flu virus a long time ago if the virus was as weak in one area like the discovery suggests. He also said that it took large amounts of antibodies to protect the mice in the study, which are costly and hard to infuse.

Alcohol may raise risk for some cancers

Published
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Jana
on March 2, 2009
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A study was done involving about 1.3 million British women that provided even additional proof that moderate drinking can raise the risk for a few cancers.

At breast cancer screening clinics, British researchers questioned middle-aged women about their drinking habits and observed their health for seven years.

One-fourth of the women said they did not drink at all. Almost all the others said that they drank less than three drinks a day, and the average had one drink a day. The lightest drinkers were compared with people who drank heavily.

On February 24, University of Oxford researchers reported in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute that for every extra drink each day, there is an increased risk of breast, rectal and liver cancer. In this study, it did not matter what kind of alcohol was consumed. In earlier research, consuming alcohol was associated with esophageal and oral cancers only when smokers drank.

However, moderate drinkers in reality had a smaller risk of thyroid cancer, non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma and renal cell cancer. The alcohol risk is minor for the average woman. About 118 out of every 1,000 women form any of these cancers in prosperous countries, but the study found that every added daily alcoholic drink affixed 11 breast cancers and four of the other types to that rate. The researchers deduced that 13 percent of those cancers in Britain can be blamed on alcohol.

So what is safe now? Well, moderate alcohol use has been believed to be heart healthy for a long time, although the new research doesn’t discuss it. This encourages more debate about what levels are safe. It is already established that U.S. health guidelines suggest that women should consume no more than a drink a day; two drinks per day are suggested for men, because they metabolize alcohol differently.

Because of all this, officials have been concerned about giving the wrong message – giving young people, pregnant women and those vulnerable to alcoholism – the green light to drink alcohol. It has been difficult for them to balance the declaration of the benefits of alcohol without influencing people to begin drinking or abusing it.

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