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Donald Trump's wall is non-stop fodder for the ceaseless political conversation surrounding the election. But, it may have some use, especially in keeping addicts alive. Even if completely useless, it is still better than our current plan of severely restricting opioid prescriptions to people who really need them.

Mark Bittman's cookbooks and column in The New York Times are well known in the foodie community. But success in his new role, shaping food policy on the faculty at Columbia University, will require him to stretch beyond his old ideas and to a more inclusive view of what healthy eating means for all people -- not just the readers at his former job.

The average cell phone holds an estimated 25,000 germs — in every square inch — making it one of the nastiest things you touch daily. And marketers, to sell you stuff, want to obtain a swab sample from it to analyze, then compare what's found to an archive of particles. But what about those who handle their phones on the toilet? Yuck.
 
 
 

Homeopathic products are a scam. It's a multi-billion dollar business pedaling its goods for any ailment imaginable, despite any evidence that they're effective. But this sketchy enterprise took a hit this week, one that may result in a change in the industry. The Federal Trade Commission announced several changes as to how homeopathic products must be labeled for marketing. 
 

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On a recent trip, a flight attendant announced that a passenger had a severe peanut allergy and if anyone had food containing peanuts that it be stored away for the entire flight. The apparently widespread belief that re-circulated peanut-tainted air can harm unsuspecting children is wrong, and based on several myths.

If you follow the thinking of some activists, you'd think that the only way to get consumers to make better food and beverage choices is to tax the less healthy ones — usually sugar-sweetened beverages. But Maryland's Howard County just may have found a better way to influence (and educate) consumers.

The process to become a naturopath has been packaged to resemble actual medicine. The degree earned even contains the word "doctor," as in Doctor of Naturopathic Medicine. But in comparing the education that physicians and naturopaths obtain in order to prepare for their professions reveals a significant difference.

The arbitrary nature of many school requirements can be baffling. Cancel soft pretzel day out of caloric concern, but permit pie bake sales. Our public demands organic food in lunchrooms, but providing the skills necessary to intervene on a choking victim produces silence. We think, CPR training should be mandatory in schools.

In the study of human behavior, individuals gravitate towards familiar things. That idea also extends to the realm of facial recognition. A new study indicates that those who observe and come into contact with a wider range of different faces are more prone to instantly accept an unknown person based solely by their facial features.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is on a recent publishing push. It involves cancer prevention efforts, promotion of current statistics and encouragement of comprehensive plan implementations -- on all governmental, personal and public fronts.

http://theincidentaleconomist.com/wordpress/does-industry-money-skew-nu… findings suggest but do not establish that industry sponsorship of nutrition studies is associated with conclusions that favor the sponsors ...
How did the results support this conclusion? Perhaps the authors have a bias not captured in their conflict of interest disclosures. Conflicts of interest are not solely financial.

Outside of the Western world, insect consumption is common. The Chinese, for instance, will eat just about anything that crawls on six (or more) legs. Centipedes and fried scorpions appear on the menu. Not only is entomophagy widespread, it's also probably healthier for people -- and the planet -- than eating other animals.

The announcement of the results of a small Phase I clinical trial of Rational Vaccines' Theravax herpes vaccine generated tremendous excitement and many questions. Especially, this one: "Where will subsequent clinical trials be held?" There was (and still is) no answer, but there's now a clue. It may be Mexico. 

In search of a topic that is both health-related and apolitical, we felt that maybe focusing on intentional, unintentional injury could be informative and distracting. Whether recently elated, neutral or forlorn, you'll likely step away from this piece with knowledge of what not to do. Let’s examine further what it means to be human.

In its latest issue of the Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, the CDC estimates the worldwide impact that vaccination against measles. The results are both encouraging and breathtaking. What would happen if there was no measles vaccine? Roughly 1.5 million people would die of the disease every single year.

Florida is in the middle of a major 'not in my backyard' brouhaha at the moment and biotechnology is at the center of the debate.

Richard A. Lawhern, Ph.D. is a long-time advocate, and online research analyst, for chronic pain patients, their families and their doctors. He spoke with the American Council about the fundamental flaws in opioid restrictions that U.S. residents are increasingly falling victim to.

Data from emergency room visits shows that over a four-year period roughly 30,000 of them, each year, were for sports-related eye injuries. And that a majority -- two-thirds of females and 60 percent of males -- involved patients under age 18. Injuries were also categorized by sport or activity, to better understand how they occurred, providing information that can help parents.

The Epstein-Barr virus has always been a bit mysterious. It is responsible for mononucleosis, and is suspected of being a cause of chronic fatigue syndrome, although this disease remains poorly understood. The concept of viruses causing cancer is not new.

In the 1970s, an assay was developed by Dr. Bruce Ames that revolutionized the ability to test if a compound causes cancer or not. Since then, the Ames test has been used on everything from food dyes to pesticides. The test's power is not only that it is incredibly efficacious, but also that it's inexpensive and relatively easy to do. 

We're excited to report that a new study in Health Affairs provides us with another metric that we have previously known and repeatedly been shown in the literature (and in medical practice): Life expectancy and well-being are positively linked.  

There are some unanswered questions about the long-term health safety of e-cigarettes. Studies have suggested that "vaping" is safer than smoking because it doesn't expose a person to the inhaled toxins found in cigarette smoke that can cause cancer. A recent study published in Mutation Research has furthered this thinking, showing that e-cigarettes do not cause mutation in DNA. 

Anyone remotely familiar with the scientific method understands that just like a ruler or a telescope, statistics is a tool. Scientists use the tool primarily for one purpose: To answer the question, "Is my data meaningful?" Properly used, statistics is one of science's most powerful tools. But used improperly, statistics can be highly misleading.

Is there really a wrong way to eat Nutella? Spread it on bread, eat it by the spoonful.... but depending on the way you consume it, the nutrition content may differ. And because of how the Ferrero-made product has evolved over the years, now the FDA is taking a second look at its calorie content per serving.