Although Nestle has recalled some 300,000 cases of its refrigerated Toll House cookie dough from store shelves, as of June 22, 2009, none of their product had actually tested positive for the E. coli that’s caused illness in at least 70 people in 30 states. And since it’s highly unusual for E. coli, an intestinal bacterium of cattle (i.e., it’s in their feces) to be present in something like cookie dough, investigators are so far at a loss to explain exactly what is going on. But, since all of the people who became sick ate the same raw cookie dough product, it seems obvious that it’s the cookie dough that’s to blame. The question is, from where did the E. coli come? If it were inadequately cooked hamburgers that were responsible, it would be easy to link E. coli with beef mishandled during processing.
In fact, according to an article in […]
Original post by admin and weightlossopinions.com
Although Nestle has recalled some 300,000 cases of its refrigerated Toll House cookie dough from store shelves, as of June 22, 2009, none of their product had actually tested positive for the E. coli that’s caused illness in at least 70 people in 30 states. And since it’s highly unusual for E. coli, an intestinal bacterium of cattle (i.e., it’s in their feces) to be present in something like cookie dough, investigators are so far at a loss to explain exactly what is going on. But, since all of the people who became sick ate the same raw cookie dough product, it seems obvious that it’s the cookie dough that’s to blame. The question is, from where did the E. coli come? If it were inadequately cooked hamburgers that were responsible, it would be easy to link E. coli with beef mishandled during processing.
In fact, according to an article in […]
Original post by admin and weightlossopinions.com
You may have heard or read news reports, such as the one in the Washington Post, announcing the findings of a Centers for Disease Control (CDC) survey, which found that obesity “is as much of a risk factor for serious complications from the [swine] flu as diabetes, heart disease and pregnancy, all known to raise a person’s risk.” But I suggest you take the CDC report with a large grain of salt because the survey was based on a very small number of patients and was not designed to provide data from which such conclusions could be drawn.
The survey looked at only 30 patients hospitalized with swine flu in California. Of those, only four were obese. So the conclusion that obesity might be an independent risk factor for severe swine flu was based on four patients! Not only that, but according to the data table contained in the CDC report, […]
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Although the World Health Organization (WHO) has elevated their swine flu pandemic alert to phase 5, the number of confirmed cases as of April 29, 2009 remains extremely low, with most cases mild and rarely fatal. In fact, although you may hear about some 2,500 cases in Mexico with 152 deaths, only 26 cases and 7 deaths have actually been confirmed as being due to swine flu. Around the world only 148 cases are confirmed. The one death of the 91 cases in the United States was in a Mexican child who contracted the illness in Mexico before visiting the U.S. The only thing newsworthy about these numbers is that they are so low and yet the reaction to them so high.
It’s important also to remember that “pandemic” simply means worldwide spread. An epidemic is a localized outbreak of an illness and a pandemic means that it’s spread to more […]
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The current swine flu outbreak has many people worrying, and even more wondering, about how to avoid getting sick. And because of all the media photos and videos of people in Mexico walking around wearing face masks, people in this country naturally want to know if these are an effective means of prevention? Unfortunately, however, as with many aspects of this unusual epidemic there aren’t adequate answers for all the questions. It turns out, that there just haven’t been enough studies to say whether or not wearing a face mask would help prevent infection.
Some people will doubtless say that it’s obvious that wearing a mask would reduce the chance of your inhaling a respiratory virus that can be spread by coughing and sneezing. But it’s not nearly as obvious as they would have you believe. There are several reasons why you could still become infected in spite of wearing a […]
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As I wrote earlier if you’re an average person living in the U.S. there’s absolutely no reason now to panic about the current swine flu situation in spite of the media hysteria. That may change as time passes, but it could just as easily go the other way and not become a full-blown pandemic. That’s what happened in 1976, when a swine flu scare led to emergency vaccination of some 40 million Americans in 10 weeks but the feared pandemic just never panned out. The Los Angeles Times has a nice piece on that story.
But many people have questions about the flu vaccine right now. Does this year’s vaccine cover the current swine flu strain? Why doesn’t the flu vaccine cover all strains? Why do I need to get a new flu immunization every year when I don’t have to do that for most of the other illnesses I got […]
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The news of Natasha Richardson’s tragic death after a skiing accident has shocked us all; especially because of the apparently minor nature of her injury and that she was quickly up and about and talking immediately afterwards. Unfortunately, however, Ms. Richardson suffered a near textbook case of what’s called epidural hematoma. I say near because she was 45 and epidural hematoma is more likely to happen in younger adults with the average age being 20-30 (it’s rare after 50). But the rest of the awful story is only too typical. The only positive thing about epidural hematoma is that it is a rare event. In fact, it only is found in about one to four percent of traumatic head injuries.
It is also a cruel irony that March is Brain Injury Awareness Month (BIAM). And doubly so because, according to the Brain Injury Association of America, the focus of BIAM in […]
Original post by admin and weightlossopinions.com
The news of Natasha Richardson’s tragic death after a skiing accident has shocked us all; especially because of the apparently minor nature of her injury and that she was quickly up and about and talking immediately afterwards. Unfortunately, however, Ms. Richardson suffered a near textbook case of what’s called epidural hematoma. I say near because she was 45 and epidural hematoma is more likely to happen in younger adults with the average age being 20-30 (it’s rare after 50). But the rest of the awful story is only too typical. The only positive thing about epidural hematoma is that it is a rare event. In fact, it only is found in about one to four percent of traumatic head injuries.
It is also a cruel irony that March is Brain Injury Awareness Month (BIAM). And doubly so because, according to the Brain Injury Association of America, the focus of BIAM in […]
Original post by admin and weightlossopinions.com
Most women are aware of the need to follow certain nutrition and lifestyle guidelines after they become pregnant, but did you know that it’s actually important to begin these regimens well before you begin to start a family? Most likely you knew about recommendations to take pre-natal vitamins and not to drink alcohol or smoke cigarettes during pregnancy, but it’s equally important to start these behaviors much earlier, before you plan to become pregnant, so that you’ll be “covered” from the moment pregnancy occurs. But recent research has found that few women follow pre-pregnancy recommendations. In fact, a study just published online in the British Medical Journal found that only three percent of women who became pregnant were taking the recommended vitamins and limiting alcohol intake during the three months prior to conception.
One of the most important nutritional needs before and during pregnancy is folic acid. The American College of […]
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A nationwide outbreak of Salmonella caused by tainted peanut butter has already resulted in the recall of hundreds of products with more being added to the list every day. Consumers are being advised not to consume any peanut butter containing products until more information becomes available on which brands may be affected and to destroy any that already have been identified. The majority of affected products are packaged prepared foods such as cookies, crackers, cereal, candy and ice cream. To avoid consuming tainted foods you should take the following precautions:
Go to your pantry or any other food storage areas and look carefully for packaged products that might contain peanut butter.
Be sure to check the labels of any product with “nuts” in the name to see if they contain peanut butter.
Gather […]
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