Lose Fat, Get Smarter, Live Longer?

Mice, which have relatively short life spans, provided details about fasting's lifelong effects. Yeast, which are simpler organisms, allowed Longo to uncover the biological mechanisms that fasting triggers at a cellular level. And a pilot study in humans found evidence that the mouse and yeast studies were applicable to humans.

'Strict fasting is hard for people to stick to, and it can also be dangerous, so we developed a complex diet that triggers the same effects in the body,' said Longo, Edna M. Jones professor of biogerontology at the USC Davis School of Gerontology and director of the USC Longevity Institute. Longo has a joint appointment at the USC Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences. 'I've personally tried both, and the fasting mimicking diet is a lot easier and also a lot safer.'

The diet slashed the individual's caloric intake down to 34 to 54 percent of normal, with a specific composition of proteins, carbohydrates, fats and micronutrients. It decreased amounts of the hormone IGF-I, which is required during development to grow, but it is a promoter of aging and has been linked to cancer susceptibility. It also increased the amount of the hormone IGFBP-, and reduced biomarkers/risk factors linked to diabetes and cardiovascular disease, including glucose, trunk fat and C-reactive protein without negatively affecting muscle and bone mass.-Diet that mimics fasting appears to slow aging

Prostate Screenings Hold No Benefit

Watch out baldies...

Oh, and "the Prostate Cancer Charity disagrees with the new study." What a surprise! Didn't see that one coming!

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Multisource political news, world news, and entertainment news analysis by Newsy.com

Food Coloring Linked to ADHD

“Everything has dye in it, I mean any kind of food, how do you pull out the dye? Unless you buy all natural, all organic, and that’s not always easily done.”


As an amateur nutritionist, I've been against the use of artificial colors in foods for a long time. There simply isn't any really good reason for them. They don't add to taste or serve a function such as a preservative. I'm not a fanatic who opposes all additives in food (though eating fresh, whole foods as much as possible is preferable) but our corporate food companies care more about shallow appearances and profits than about wholesomeness and the health of the millions consuming their processed crap.

pp

Multisource political news, world news, and entertainment news analysis by Newsy.com

Alzheimer’s Game

One-by-one, the men and women are led to a computer room where they sit in front of a screen and play a new game designed to maintain and improve memory in people afflicted early- and middle-stage Alzheimer’s. Alzheimer's disease causes loss of memory and other cognitive functions, and, ultimately, death.

“You’re going to build a circle with three pieces, so which piece goes over here?” an instructor asks one patient. The woman, an elderly immigrant from Switzerland, begins using the computer to assemble the circle.

While there is no cure for Alzheimer’s, Israeli researchers have developed a computer game that say can slow down the progress of the disease. It’s called Savyon, and Israel hopes to export it to treat Alzheimer’s patients around the world.

Computer game helps Alzheimer’s patients retain memory

Almost No Drugs to Treat India Superbug

U.S. health officials said on Wednesday there had been three cases so far in the United States -- all from patients who received recent medical care in India, a country where people often travel in search of affordable healthcare.

NDM-1 makes bacteria highly resistant to almost all antibiotics, including the most powerful class called carbapenems. Experts say there are no new drugs on the horizon to tackle it.

"It's a specific mechanism. A gene that confers a type of resistance (to antibiotics)," Dr. Alexander Kallen of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta said in a telephone interview.

With more people traveling to find less costly medical treatments, particularly for procedures such as cosmetic surgery, Timothy Walsh, who led the study, said he feared the new superbug could soon spread across the globe.

Scientists find new superbug spreading from India

"I'll Have the Bacon Statin Drug Cheeseburger"

A doctor from Imperial College London whose study was published in the American Journal of Cardiology has proclaimed that people who eat burgers and milkshakes at fast food restaurants should be given free statin drugs (like ketchup packets) to counteract the cholesterol effects of eating burgers.

"Fast food outlets could provide statin drugs free of charge," says Dr. Darrel Francis, lead author of study, who goes on to complain that statin drugs shouldn't be prescription drugs at all. People should be able to get them as easily as asking for a packet of ketchup: "It makes sense to make risk-reducing supplements available just as easily as the unhealthy condiments that are provided free of charge," Francis says, calling statins a "supplement" instead of a drug. Yeah, as if it were a nutrient or something.

Doctor urges fast food restaurants to hand out pharma drugs like ketchup packets




The Cholesterol Myth

Cholesterol could easily be described as the smoking gun of the last two decades.

It's been responsible for demonizing entire categories of foods (like eggs and saturated fats) and blamed for just about every case of heart disease in the last 20 years.

Yet when I first opened my medical practice in the mid 80s, cholesterol, and the fear that yours was too high was rarely talked about.

Somewhere along the way however, cholesterol became a household word – something that you must keep as low as possible, or suffer the consequences.

You are probably aware that there are many myths that portray fat and cholesterol as one of the worst foods you can consume. Please understand that these myths are actually harming your health.

Not only is cholesterol most likely not going to destroy your health (as you have been led to believe), but it is also not the cause of heart disease.

The Cholesterol Myth That Is Harming Your Health

'SUPERBUG' Spreads to U.S.

Musicians Are Better Than Non-musicians!

I knew it all the time. I've been composing music in the shower for a long while (and I actually wrote some songs that were better than anything by Led Zeppelin). Too bad I never recorded any of them for posterity. But since playing music seems to be key, I'm going to have break out the old bongo drums (where did I see them last?)...

Northwestern University scientists have pulled together a review of research into what music -- specifically, learning to play music -- does to humans. The result shows music training does far more than allow us to entertain ourselves and others by playing an instrument or singing. Instead, it actually changes our brains.

...

The bottom line to all these studies: musical training has a profound impact on other skills including speech and language, memory and attention, and even the ability to convey emotions vocally.


Music benefits the brain, research reveals

A Green Grass-roots Approach to Illness

Doctors and surgeons were very baffled. The kidney transplant patient at Dulwich Hospital in London had developed an infection in the operation incision that would not clear up. Then a young doctor remembered a remedy he had seen native doctors, practicing traditional medicine, use successfully in South Africa. He laid strips of a papaya fruits across the infected wound. The wound healed.

Read more: http://healthmad.com/alternative/green-medicine-a-grass-roots-approach-to-illness/#ixzz0tVvjdSyC

Gary Null vs. Gary Null's Ultimate Power Meal

A controversial alternative health guru is suing after a taste of his own medicine nearly killed him.

Gary Null - described on quackwatch.org as "one of the nation's leading promoters of dubious treatment for serious disease" - claims the manufacturer of Gary Null's Ultimate Power Meal overloaded the supplements with Vitamin D.

The buff "Joy of Juicing" author, whose products include Red Stuff Powder and Gary Null's Heavenly Hair Cleaner, claims he suffered kidney damage and was left bloodied and in intense pain from two daily servings of the supplement.

Gary Null suit vs. supplement manufacturer claims Gary Null's Ultimate Power Meal nearly killed him

Mike Adams On "Skeptics"

If you really look closely at the beliefs of "skeptics," you discover their skepticism is selective. They're really skeptical about some things -- like vitamins -- but complete pushovers on others such as the scientific credibility of drug company studies.

Here are some of the many things that "skeptics" should be skeptical about, but aren't:

• Skeptics aren't skeptical about the corruption and dishonesty in the pharmaceutical industry. They believe whatever the drug companies say, without asking a single intelligent question.

• Skeptics aren't skeptical about medical journals. They believe whatever they read in those journals, even when much of it turns out to be complete science fraud.

• Skeptics aren't skeptical about the profit motive of the pharmaceutical industry. They believe that drug companies are motivated by goodwill, not by profits.

• Skeptics aren't skeptical about the motivations and loyalties of the FDA. They will swallow, inject or use any product that's FDA approved, without a single reasonable thought about the actual safety of those products.

• Skeptics aren't skeptical about the safety of synthetic chemicals used in the food supply. They just swallow whatever poisons the food companies dump into the foods.

• Skeptics aren't skeptical about the enormous dangers of ionizing radiation from mammograms and CT scans. They have somehow convinced themselves that "early detection saves live" when, in reality, "early radiation causes cancer."

• Skeptics aren't skeptical about the mass-drugging agenda of the psychiatric industry which wants to diagnose everyone with some sort of "mental" disorder. The skeptics just go right along with it without asking a single commonsense question about whether the human brain really needs to be "treated" with a barrage of mind-altering chemicals.

• Skeptics aren't skeptical about mercury fillings. What harm could mercury possibly do anyway? If the ADA says they're safe, they must be!

What 'skeptics' really believe about vaccines, medicine, consciousness and the universe

Raw Milk Criminals

Imagine being watched by two undercover cops as you engage in an illicit deal in a deserted parking lot. The buyer hesitantly hands you some cash. You flash a look over your shoulder, just to make sure the coast is clear, then you hand over the contraband. Neither of you says a word. You just nod, acknowledging the deal is done, then you head back to your car and buckle up for the drive home.

But before you can even put the car into drive, a screeching formation of police cars, surrounds you, sirens wailing. Armed officers leap from their vehicles, guns drawn and sunglasses glaring. "Come out with your hands up!" they shout.

You slowly open the driver's door of your car and inch out of your seat with both hands raised in surrender, cowering behind the open door. "What did I do, officer? What's my crime?"

Their answer comes back loud and intimidating: "SELLING RAW MILK!"

Undercover Sting Operations Against Families Selling Raw Milk


Once again, the state and its enforcement agents, the evil clowns commonly called cops, prove that they are the REAL criminals.

When I was a kid I lived with my dad on a ranch (so-called, it was more of an alfalfa farm) where he was working and at every meal we were served raw goat's milk. I never suffered any harm from it, it never made me sick and it tasted great.

But if you want to provide raw milk (cow or goat) to others in a free uncoerced exchange it's a crime (not a real crime, mind you, but one of the government's fake "crimes").

From the article: In case you're not yet sure what you're reading here, note carefully that these daughters were not caught selling crack, meth or crank. Of course, even if they were, that isn't a real crime either (what anyone chooses to put into their body is none of the government's business), any more than selling booze during prohibition was a real crime.

And here we also see at work the fact that government puts obstacles in the way of individuals, families and small businessmen trying to earn a living and instead favors the large over the small, the commodity producer over the artisan.

So, at this time of year, for families who may not live where they can buy the milk they prefer legally, Santa may find an alternative offering waiting for him near the Christmas tree.

As old as the pyramids?

They had heart disease in ancient Egypt? That still doesn't mean our modern processed food diet isn't less healthy, does it?

Toss Out the Myths With the Embalming Fluid



In the above cartoon I see a little problem with the "politically correct air", as the critics of the "food police" aren't advocating not eating at all, just that the case for so-called "healthy eating" is overstated. A correct analogy would be with the issue of air pollution. In Mexico City you can live while breathing the awful air, you just might not live as long if that's all you breathe your entire life.

In which the state kidnaps my spotter...

Welp, it looks like my gym buddy is going to jail for six months (for a ridiculous victimless crime, of course). This sucks. He's basically my own personal trainer, except I don't pay him anything.

Damn you, government! Damn you!

An honest question

Are there any readers here who take boxing lessons/training? I'm considering doing so in the next couple months (as if I didn't have enough eccentric hobbies).

It looks like great fun, it isn't excessively popular, and from what I hear, it's an amazing workout. Sounds rad!

Down with public rec centers

I just finished buying membership at a private fitness club, and couldn't be happier.

I've had it with my local public rec center. Being open to the entire damn community (and every last member's screaming, sobbing children), the public rec center is a loud, annoying, inconvenient, disgusting mess.

It is appallingly crowded and overstuffed every second of every day. It closes far too early. It attracts people who want to goof around, at the expense of those trying to conduct a serious workout. Its low-quality machines and equipment are quickly deteriorating. And its pool sucks.

No more! No more, I say!

A Salad a Day

Eating healthier is not that hard, but you do have to make some changes and put in a little effort. It's easier to just do as you've been doing, but if you want to feel better about your food choices some change in diet has to take place. One simple thing I've started is eating a salad every day. In the book 50 Secrets of the World's Longest Living People they talk about the benefits of adding more raw foods to your diet.

People changing to raw food diets (including fruit and nuts and seeds, besides vegetables) have reported finding that their skin looks tighter, puffiness is removed, their eyes become clearer, and grey hair starts to grow back dark...

Studies show that salads and other raw food can help you to lose weight, without suffering any of the agonies and failures of going on a diet. Raw food expert Dr. John Douglass has said, "For many years I struggled with obesity and was frustrated in treating patients because nothing ever seemed to work...Then I discovered the potential of uncooked foods and found that the more uncooked foods patients used, the less they wanted to eat. These foods are more satisfying for patients and they lose weight on them."

Now, you don't have to switch to eating only raw foods (I'm certainly not going to) but you can start by adding more of them to your plate. I'm eating a salad in place of one of my regular meals (I just started) and I'm enjoying it more than I would a burger and fries (hard to believe for some of you, I know) and feeling better about taking steps to eat better. Try topping your salad with a homemade dressing of extra-virgin olive oil, apple cider vinegar and a little garlic.

Someone in this months Reader's Digest writes: "For three years, I've been eating a mostly raw-food diet. No meat, dairy, sugar or processed foods. I feel great, look great and have incredible energy."

I myself am not inclined to cut out all meat and go completely veggie, but the benefits of eating more fruits and vegetables are, I think, obvious.

Now, if you just want a very simple weight loss plan, try this.