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By HealthWatch, November 17, 2009

Accounting for more than 10% of all tobacco products sold Africa is on the brink of what experts are referring to as a “Global Smoking Epidemic.” A recent report released by the American Cancer Society & the Global Smokefree Partnership claims that more than half of all African countries will double their tobacco use within 12 years if something is not done to curb the current usage trends.

What is being done to try and prevent an inevitable onslaught of new lung cancer victims? Currently countries like Niger & Kenya have been leading the way in this effort with bans on smoking in public places, however some critics are demanding that countries take further action similar to recent laws passed in Mauritius which have been described by the American Cancer Society as some of the most robust anti-smoking measures in the world. Why haven’t more countries taken action to try and prevent such an epidemic from occurring? The result might surprise you but most countries aren’t eagerly jumping on the bandwagon because they fear any harsh anti-smoking laws will be met with fierce opposition by the general population. That doesn’t mean that countries with a primarily pro-smoking majority aren’t trying though. In Egypt for instance, women have the right to divorce their husbands if their smoking affects their health according to a local fatwa (Islamic ruling), however there is no ban on smoking in public places yet. It’s been speculated that more than half of the population of Egypt regularly use cigarettes, water-pipes and other tobacco-related products making such a widespread law difficult to find support for.

Dr. Twalib Ngoma, president of the African Organization for Research and Training in Cancer (AORTIC), says advertising which targets African youth is partially to blame. “Tobacco companies are targeting poor, developing countries in Africa. If you drive from the airports to most towns you will see a lot of billboards promoting tobacco, saying that if you smoke you are going to be successful.” Like adding kerosene on an already-lit fire The American Cancer Society claims that the African tobacco industry has been busy trying to influence governmental agencies to support pro-tobacco initiatives. They go on to claim that the companies try to convince African governments that tobacco is important to economic activity and that raising taxes on cigarettes and implementing smoke-free laws will result in revenue and job-losses. An example of this can be seen currently in Kenya, where the local tobacco industry has filed a legal dispute to a recent anti-smoking law passed by the parliament. In Zambia there are corporation rumors surrounding a possible connection between the British American Tobacco group and what is being described as a “diluted proposal” for a smoke-free law. When contacted about these allegations British American Tobacco denied any ill-intent stating that they were only briefly consulted on the draft bill last year, pointing out that it has yet to be finalized.

Adam Spielman, a tobacco industry analyst with Citigroup, thinks that the African market forms around 10% or so of the profits for the biggest companies, but also adds that this area is growing.
He goes on to say that the tobacco companies aren’t too concerned with increasing the volume of cigarettes sold as much as the importance of being able to increase the price of tobacco products sold. “If a consumer is addicted to tobacco, then it is possible to put prices up and they will go without lunch.” But as with most global problems, Mr. Spielman speculates that increasing advertising restrictions and bigger health warnings will eventually come into place in African countries.

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By HealthWatch, October 17, 2009

The latest diet craze to sweet the nation involves a food item not typically seen in any traditional diet plan, Introducing Dr. Siegal’s Cookie Diet.

Dr. Sanford Siegal first developed the cookie diet in 1975 as a way to treat chronically obese patients (patients who are unable to keep off any weight lost due to exercise/dieting). He has treated more than half a million patients with the sugary diet and claims that there is less risk of obesity in the very low-calorie diet.

“I have yet to see the first case where anyone suffered any ill effect from eating a low-calorie diet,” said Dr. Siegal in an ABC News report.

The 1,000-calorie a day regimen, which ABC News has reported celebrities like Jennifer Hudson, Denise Richards and Kelly Clarkson have all reportedly tried is dangerously lacking in nutrients found primarily in vegetables and fruits.

Dr. Siegal’s Cookie Diet may result in quick weight loss, it’s nutritionally unsound and can even result in weight gain, experts say.

Cookie Diet followers drink water and eat six uniquely developed 90-calorie cookies each day, followed by a 500-calorie dinner of lean protein and sparse vegetables. With reports being mixed, there have been a bunch of documented success stories.

Josie Raper told “Good Morning America” that she went from being a size 24 to a size 6 in a little close to six months by following this diet.

“When I started the Cookie Diet, there was no splurging or sneaking little snacks,” Ms. Raper told “Good Morning America.”

I was very strict in keeping to the diet including waiting until the Monday of Thanksgiving to start this program so that I could get through every single holiday without snacking or caving in to my cravings.”

According to Josie Raper, she has been on the Cookie Diet for two years now and hasn’t regained the weight.

Weight loss experts say the Cookie Diet’s basic flaw is that it does not help dieters to retrain their eating habits, this results in a greater chance of the dieter falling off the diet or ‘cheating.’

“If you lose weight through diet and exercise alone and don’t change anything else in your life, you are probably going to gain the weight back,” says registered dietitian Anne Fletcher, author of “Thin for Life” and “Weight Loss Confidential.”

When you don’t deal with the underlying reasons for why you’re overeating, you’re definitely more likely to gain weight. This is like putting a band-aid on a gunshot wound, it fails to treat the core reason for why the individual is overweight in the first place.

The diet also worries Dr. Louis Aronne, director of the Comprehensive Weight Control Program at the New York-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell Medical Center, because it lacks in serious good nutrition.

“I am concerned that if someone were to follow this over the long term, there are many different nutrients that they would be missing that you would normally get by eating regular food,” he told “Good Morning America.”

Cookie consumption as a weight-loss strategy is just another fad diet, says Dr. Stuart Fischer, who wrote “The Park Avenue Diet.”

“Every study shows that when people change foods only and rely on that to lose weight, they have a 95% failure rate. This cookie diet relies heavily on sweets but to lose weight you need to forget what sweet tastes like. When you lose your sweet tooth, you are about a fourth of the way to reaching weight-loss success.”

“It just doesn’t exist.” But Fischer says the diet is so low in calories that followers won’t have the energy to do any of the necessary exercise, which he says is important to maintain good heart health. He also added that staying on a cookie-heavy diet will most-likely result in dieters falling into a rebound phenomenon.

“The body goes into a starvation state,” Fischer explains. “And it holds onto every morsel and calorie until the person’s weight goes higher than it was before.”

Dr. Siegal is frequently in the news. Over the years he has been featured on ABC’s Good Morning America, New York Daily News, CNN, and the Fox News Channel. Thanks to the recent resurgence of interest in hypothyroidism (“super-foods”) that was sparked by Oprah Winfrey, multiple media outlets have aired features on Dr. Siegal and his work.

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By HealthWatch, September 11, 2009

Between natural growth spurts and hormonal spikes, a tween’s skin will take on a mountain of abuse. Problems with acne or other skin blemishes are so common that there’s a billion dollar industry dedicated to treating the symptoms. With so many products on the market these days, its hard to find a reputable source for reviewing which treatments actually work, and which are just marketing campaigns. One of the most commonly overlooked resources to fight teen acne actually can already be found in most homes. There are many home remedies that work just as well without the expense found using any of the commercial products advertised on TV. Now while your grandmother might have her own opinions as to which home remedies you should try, here are a list of proven do-it-yourself acne treatments. Most can be accomplished for under $3 (and in some cases for free).

1. Wash your skin regularly. This also means using the correct type of soap/product for your particular skin type. Wash your face after you wake up in the morning, after any sports practice or strenuous exercise and then once more before you go to bed at night. This is the most important step to fighting acne, though you don’t want to over-wash. Your best bet is to just stick to the morning, post-exercise and night washing routine. If you don’t break a sweat then you should wait to wash your face until bedtime.

2. Learn what type of skin you have. Blot your face with a Kleenex/tissue-paper. If you see oily residue, your skin is oily. No residue, you have dry skin. Little of both? You have combination skin.

3. Use a facial scrub at least once a week to rid your skin of blackheads. Pay attention to the active ingredients, you don’t want to use anything that uses bleach.

4. Aloe Vera has been used all over the globe as a topical ointment for the treatment of burns, rashes and many other skin ‘ailments.’ When applied to the skin, it helps by preventing scaring and stretch marks. It’s also been proven to help speed along the healing process.

5. Eat a healthy diet complete with daily vitamins and minerals to keep your skin looking good from the inside out. A simple ‘one-a-day’ multi-vitamin can take care of this step.

6. Warm Salt Water. This works best for those of you who have really oily skin. Use warm (not hot) salt water to wash your face. The mixture of warm salt & water works well to remove any excess oil. You don’t need to spend a lot of money for this one, in fact regular table salt works just fine (but if you happen to have some sea salt in the pantry, that will work even better).

7. Drink plenty of water. Take soda out of your daily diet, you’ll be patting yourself on the back for doing this when you start to notice less skin blemishes.

8. Use a masque on your face once a month. Try these recipes for your skin type:

For Dry Skin: Mash a banana, mix with a tablespoon of honey and apply it directly to your face. Rinse with cool water after five to ten minutes and you should be able to see how soft your skin has become.
For Oily Skin: Mix oatmeal, lemon juice and one egg white until slightly wet. Apply directly to your face and leave on until dry. Rinse with cool water.
For Combination Skin: Grind a potato and collect its juice. Apply the juice directly on your face and leave to dry. Wash it after 10-15 minutes. This method helps removes ugly acne marks from the skin as well.

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By HealthWatch, August 7, 2009

You can usually tell how old someone is by looking at their eyes. They’re more than just ‘Windows To The Soul’ but also a way to show your age. Why is this so? Your area around your eyes will typically be the first to start sagging and becoming wrinkled which is natures sign of aging. You have to keep in mind that the body has three main types of skin on it. The skin around your eyes is the thinnest, most delicate skin. The skin on your face is more like the paper found in business cards and the skin on the rest of your body is more like file folder paper.

Think about how easily tissue paper is damaged or wrinkled. The very same type of thing happens to the thin skin around your eyes, which is why you should not treat the skin around your eyes the same way you would treat the skin on the rest of your face, or especially the skin on the rest of your body! Have no fear, there are simple routines that are easy to start and if you do them often (once a day is recommended) you can prevent and even reverse some of these signs of aging!

1. Do not rub your eyes!!. Rubbing your eyes either with your fingers or a wash cloth can wrinkle the skin around your eye area. When your are touching your eye area, use the pad of your ring finger, which is the weakest, softest finger on your hands and pat the area, instead of rubbing it. This holds true for applying moisturizer, concealer, or any other eye product. Eye makeup should ideally be applied with an appropriate cosmetics brush. When removing your eye makeup, use a cotton ball to prevent the pulling and tugging that may occur with a wash cloth or your fingers.
2. No Regular Soap For The Face. Most soaps are made to clean the “file folder” skin on your body and are not always gentle enough for your eye area. In addition, many soaps have a high ph, which can lead to irritation or dryness for normal to dry skin or even increased oil for combination to oily skin. Many soaps also contain lards or fats that can block pores and lead to increased acne. Be sure to use a gentle cleanser, specific to your skin type on your face and an eye makeup remover formulated specifically for your eye area.
3. Apply daily moisturizer around the eye area daily. It’s important to use a moisturizer on your face to help trap the moisture so your skin looks more like a firm grape than a weathered tennis ball! Since the skin around your eyes is so thin and doesn’t have much fat, it’s important to use an eye cream that not only moisturizes, but strengthens and firms the skin in that area and also encourages collagen and elastin production. Your body stops producing any significant amount of collagen on it’s own after the age of 16, but thankfully, there are moisturizers on the market that can actually help this process along and diminish and prevent wrinkles. If you already have poor skin try using something like Res-V Youth, it’s been promoted on many popular TV programs as a relatively inexpensive way to get rid of wrinkles and other signs of aging.
4. Get your beauty sleep. Researchers say that your body ideally needs 8 hours of sleep per day. While your sleeping, your body is working to repair sick and damaged skin cells. So, the more sleep you get, the more time you’re giving your body to naturally fight the signs of aging. It is literally the least expensive, most natural way to get that fresh, relaxed glow we’re all after.

These basic tips, if followed, can help reverse (also prevent) the area around your eyes from a lot of the damage that time will cause. The “Before” picture in this article is a picture of my eyes when my daughter was 4 months old, I wasn’t getting enough sleep and I wasn’t taking care of my skin. Flash forward to the “After” picture, just 8 months later on my daughter’s first birthday. This was taken after I’d been fully rested and happily back on my daily skin-treatment routine. If I can do it, anyone can!  Start following these 4 simple steps and I guarantee you will notice a difference. This is safe for all ages, all skin tones, all body types! Don’t show your age!

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By HealthWatch, August 3, 2009

The latest treatment in the prevention of chronic migraine headaches might surprise you. No, it’s not some sort of drug you’ll have to be prescribed, nor is it a new form of exercise or diet. To participate in this new medical breakthrough you’ll have to do something that you probably never thought to associate with a cure for anything other than old age, you just have to go get a facelift.

Using cosmetic surgery (or in most cases just Botox injections) to correct migraine is a fairly new idea to hit the scientific community.

According to WebMD, some 30 million Americans suffer from migraines with a large number of them being women.

The study enrolled 75 patients with moderate to severe migraine headaches. Migraine trigger sites in the forehead, cheek and back of the head/neck were identified, then injected with the face-lifter Botox to see if the drug “disarmed” them.

If the trigger sites responded to the Botox, which lasts about six-to-eight weeks, then the patients underwent surgery to remove the trigger areas.

Forty-nine patients were randomized to receive “real” surgery and 26 to “sham” surgery.

The surgeries differed depending on the trigger points.

“For the patients with forehead headaches, we removed the frowning muscles. That’s why they look better, more cheerful,” explained Dr. Bahman Guyuron, lead author of the study and professor and chairman of the department of plastic surgery at University Hospitals Case Medical Center in Cleveland.

Those with temple headaches underwent an operation on a small nerve, which also lifted their eyebrows.

And, for those with a back-of-the-head trigger, Guyuron replaced a small amount of muscle around the occipital nerve with fatty tissue to shield the nerve from being squeezed by the muscle.

After one year, almost 84 percent of patients receiving actual surgery reported a reduction in migraines of 50 percent or more while slightly more than 57 percent said that their migraines had completely disappeared, versus 57.7 percent and 3.8 percent, respectively, in the sham group.

Some patients did experience temporary numbness in parts of the face, said Guyuron, but it usually went away.

“One thing that’s impressive is the migraine-free rates,” Lipton said. “The other thing that was impressive is they did a year of follow-up. Usually, everything is placebo-responsive but those responses are usually short-lived. A year is really impressive.”

Guyuron believes the procedure, which he has already performed on more than 400 individuals, could benefit a wide range of migraine sufferers. “It really is not invasive surgery. It takes about an hour to do the operation for each trigger site, three-and-a-half hours is the maximum,” he said. “They go home right after the surgery and go back to work within a week.”

But Lipton wants to see another study, and feels surgery should be reserved for the most intractable cases.

“This is obviously not for everyone. This is for people who are really suffering, who’ve had adequate trials of medical therapy and who have an identifiable trigger point and get better following a Botox injection,” Lipton said. “There are a lot of hurdles someone would have to jump over before I would send them for surgery.”