According to a July 2012 Gallup Poll, five percent of Americans report being vegetarians. Well, for those five percent, a new study published in JAMA Internal Medicine suggests that vegetarians may live longer than their carnivorous counterparts, although results were somewhat inconclusive. The study looked at the eating patterns of about 70,000 Seventh-day Adventists from [...]
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Not satisfied with demonizing soda, the New York City Health Department has announced that even more categories of beverages — sports drinks, energy drinks, sweetened teas, and fruit-flavored drinks — are bad for health because of their sugar content. In its press release, the DOH warns that such drinks may contain more sugar “than a [...]
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New cancer drugs have been a dime a dozen in recent years, as the pharmaceutical industry has drastically refocused its efforts in the area. In 2012 alone the FDA approved a record 11 oncology drugs. While on the surface, this may seem to be nothing but good news, in reality the results are mixed at [...]
The post Some real progress against cancer appeared first on Health & Science Dispatch.

Michael Douglas put himself in the spotlight this past weekend, with the claim that his throat cancer was caused by oral sex, and not smoking and drinking as he had speculated previously. On a related note, a new study suggests that throat cancers that result from the human papillomavirus (HPV) do not put domestic partners [...]
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A survey of general practitioners in the UK and Sweden revealed that a sizable fraction of them wrongly believed that it’s the nicotine in cigarette smoke that harms health. The online survey was undertaken by UK tobacco giant BAT, and they got responses from 100 British and 120 Swedish physicians. (The study itself is not [...]
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Obviously, bariatric surgery can help the obese lose large amounts of weight, thus improving their health and often their self-image. New research published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences and covered by USA Today indicates that when a woman undergoes such surgery and loses weight, children she has later may benefit as [...]
The post Mom’s surgery could help kids too appeared first on Health & Science Dispatch.

A new report out of the vast Cochrane Library database reveals that several of the commonly used products to help smokers quit actually do work! Or do they? These results are derived from a huge meta-analysis of 267 trials involving 101,000 study subjects who were given one or more nicotine-replacement treatments (NRTs) and/or drugs such [...]
The post Big (no) news: Cessation products work better than nothing! appeared first on Health & Science Dispatch.

ACSH’s Dr. Josh Bloom has had an op-ed in today’s Wall Street Journal, where he considers whether the U.S. government’s unprecedented move to give $200 million over 5 years to GlaxoSmithKline to aid in their antibiotic develop effort is a good idea. In an ideal world, this would be unnecessary, but thanks to misguided and [...]
The post Should the government be subsidizing drug companies? In this case, yes. appeared first on Health & Science Dispatch.

Josh Bloom in The Wall Street Journal, "A Welcome Boost in the Race for New Antibiotics"
The members of the "I hate the pharmaceutical industry" club must be beside themselves. And the anti-big-government folks are probably not terribly happy either.

It looks like the food and beverage industry is finally getting some acknowledgement for the positive role they are playing in the fight against obesity. Three years ago, sixteen of the major players in this industry including Coca-Cola, General Mills, Nestle, Kraft and ConAgra, partnered with Michelle Obama’s Partnership for a Healthier America as the [...]
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