FDA: BPA no longer allowed in baby bottles

The federal government announced Tuesday that baby bottles and sippy cups can no longer contain the chemical bisphenol-A, or BPA.

The U.S. chemical industry's chief association, the American Chemistry Council, had asked the Food and Drug Administration to phase out rules allowing BPA in those products in October, after determining that all manufacturers of bottles and sippy cups had already abandoned the chemical due to safety concerns.

It is illegal for companies to use substances not covered by FDA rules.

"Consumers can be confident that these products do not contain BPA," FDA spokesman Allen Curtis said in a statement, adding that the agency's action was based on the bottle industry's phase out of the chemical. "The agency continues to support the safety of BPA for use in products that hold food."

The chemical industry's request may help curb years of negative publicity from consumer groups and head off tougher laws that would ban BPA from other types of packaging because of health worries.

Legislation introduced by some members of Congress would ban BPA nationwide in all canned food, water bottles and food containers. Chemical makers maintain that the plastic-hardening chemical is safe for all food and drink uses.

BPA is found in hundreds of plastic items from water bottles to CDs to dental sealants. Some researchers say ingesting the chemical can interfere with development of the reproductive and nervous systems in babies and young children. They point to dozens of studies showing such an effect from BPA in rodents and other animals.

But the FDA has repeatedly stated that those findings cannot be applied to humans. The federal government is currently spending $30 million on its own studies assessing the chemical's health effects on humans.

About 90 percent of Americans have traces of BPA in their urine, mainly because the chemical leaches out of food and beverage packaging. The vast majority of canned goods in the U.S. are sealed with resin that contains BPA to prevent contamination and spoiling. Canned food manufacturers have used the chemicals since the 1950s. The practice is approved by the FDA.

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Fiber Intake Linked to a Longer Life and Healthier Arteries

The importance of adequate fiber intake as a part of a healthy diet has been driven home by two studies published this month in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition.  One study proves that fiber helps you live longer, and the other shows that consistent fiber consumption over many years is linked to healthier arteries.

The first study involved 452,717 European men and women followed for 12 years, comparing fiber intake to causes of death.  Fiber was inversely associated with mortality risk.  For each 10 gram increase in dietary fiber intake there was a 10 percent risk reduction in death from all causes.  Fiber offered a 39 percent risk reduction for digestion-related mortality, a 23 percent risk reduction for respiratory-related mortality, and a 15 percent risk reduction for inflammatory disease mortality. 

A second study of 373 people evaluated their fiber intake over a 24 year period, from ages 13 – 36.  At age 36 the participants had their arteries evaluated for stiffness using ultrasonography.  Those with stiffer carotid arteries had lower intakes of fiber over the 24 years.  This study speaks to the importance of a good diet throughout life and makes the point that a low fiber diet results in measurable adverse decline in the health of arteries at the relatively young age of 36.

Fiber is one of the most lacking components in the Western diet, one of several key nutritional substances that when lacking sets the stage for early disease and a shorter life. 

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Fear of Childbirth Linked to Longer Labor, Study Says

HealthDay – 31 mins ago WEDNESDAY, June 27 (HealthDay News) -- Women who are afraid to give birth tend to have longer labor than women who are more relaxed about the process, new research suggests.

Researchers in Norway found women fearful of giving birth spent about an hour and a half longer in labor than other women (about eight hours compared to six and a half hours).

Fear of giving birth was also associated with a greater likelihood of an instrumental vaginal delivery or an emergency Cesarean section.

The study was published June 27 in BJOG: An International Journal of Obstetrics and Gynaecology.

Researchers surveyed more than 2,200 women pregnant women, about half of whom were going to be first-time mothers, about their attitudes toward childbirth. About 7.5 percent of the women were afraid of childbirth.

Even after taking other factors into account that could prolong labor, such as epidural anesthesia and labor induction, labor for the women who feared childbirth was longer than for more relaxed women.

But, the study authors pointed out that even though women who feared childbirth labored longer, 89 percent managed to deliver vaginally, compared to 93 percent of women who did not fear giving birth.

"Fear of childbirth seems to be an increasingly important issue in obstetric care," study co-author Samantha Salvesen Adams, of Akershus University Hospital, said in a journal news release.

"We found a link between fear of childbirth and longer duration of labor," Adams said. "Generally, longer labor duration increases the risk of instrumental vaginal delivery and emergency caesarean section. However, it is important to note that a large proportion of women with a fear of childbirth successfully had a vaginal delivery and therefore elective Cesarean delivery should not be routinely recommended."

Experts note that while this study found an association between fear of childbirth and longer labor, it didn't prove that anxiety about giving birth caused the longer labors.

More information

The U.S. National Institutes of Health provides more information on childbirth.

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Females, Young Athletes Take Longer to Get Over Concussions

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Coffee buzz: Study finds java drinkers live longer

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Joggers Live Longer, Study Finds

DUBLIN -- For those who diligently lace up their running shoes and brave the elements to jog at least an hour a week, there is a very real reward -- an average of six more years of life, Danish researchers found.

Jogging was associated with a 44 percent reduction in the relative risk of death over 35 years compared with deaths among non-joggers, according to Dr. Peter Schnohr, chief cardiologist from the Copenhagen City Heart study.

And the benefit was observed for both men and women.

That reduction translated into an "age-adjusted survival benefit of 6.2 years in men and 5.6 years in women," Schnohr reported here at EuroPRevent 2012.

Read this story on www.medpagetoday.com.

And that longer life is often a happier life, he said, since joggers reported an overall sense of well-being.

"This is definitely good news, especially for those who have questioned whether simply jogging could be beneficial," said Dr. Ian Graham, of Dublin's Trinity College, who co-chaired the program committee for the meeting.

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Longer sleep times may counteract genetic factors related to weight gain

ScienceDaily (May 1, 2012) — Toss out another old wives' tale: Sleeping too much does not make you fat. Quite the opposite, according to a new study examining sleep and body mass index (BMI) in twins, which found that sleeping more than nine hours a night may actually suppress genetic influences on body weight.

See Also:Health & MedicineObesitySleep Disorder ResearchDiet and Weight LossMind & BrainSleep DisordersInsomniaObstructive Sleep ApneaLiving WellReferenceCircadian rhythm sleep disorderOverweightBody mass indexSleep deprivation

The study looked at 1,088 pairs of twins and found that sleeping less than seven hours a night was associated with both increased BMI and greater genetic influences on BMI. Previous research has shown that genetic influences include things like glucose metabolism, energy use, fatty acid storage and satiety. In this study, the heritability of BMI was twice as high for the short sleepers than for twins who slept longer than nine hours a night.

"The results suggest that shorter sleep provides a more permissive environment for the expression of obesity related genes," said principal investigator Nathaniel Watson, MD, MSc, of the University of Washington. "Or it may be that extended sleep is protective by suppressing expression of obesity genes."

Watson and colleagues determined that for twins sleeping less than seven hours, genetic influences accounted for 70 percent of the differences in BMI, with common environment accounting for just 4 percent and unique environment 26 percent. For twins averaging more than nine hours of sleep, genetic factors were attributed to 32 percent of weight variations, with common environment accounting for 51 percent and unique environment 17 percent.

More research is needed, Watson said, but these preliminary results may suggest that behavioral weight loss measures would be most effective when genetic drivers of body weight are mitigated through sleep extension.

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Eyelash Growth Serums Make Longer Eyelashes Easy

April 7, 2012 by admin

There certainly are a number of ways that you can make use of for attaining longer eyelashes. One of the best parts is that to promote eyelash growth you just dont have to try and make use of eyelash curler. For a number of years I have tried to curl my eyelashes from the convenience of my home and have managed in obtaining best results. You just have to keep in mind that the thicker and longer eyelashes you are having the more convenient it is to try and curl them. This is also one of the most effective ways to try and change your looks completely.

There are a number of girls around the globe who are just not blessed with thick and longer eyelashes and so they find it impossible to curl them easily. When performing your search you certainly might come across a perfect answer to this problem which is in the form of growth serum that is made for your eyelashes. You just have to keep in mind that in the present market you certainly can manage to find a number of such magical products that are very much effective. The best part is that the moment you are making use of these enhancer products you certainly might be able to notice the changes within few days of application. Some of the best products available certainly help in attaining eyelash growth very much effectively within few days of application. You can always try and search around for some of the best growth serum products that are made up of natural or herbal ingredients such that they might not harm your eyelashes or eyes.

After using these products for a few days you certainly might find that it gets very much easy to curl your thick eyelashes. In case you are just not aware of the right method to make use of these products then you certainly can try and search the internet for different types of videos that offer you with perfect demonstration. So even if you are just not having longer eyelashes still there are chances that you can try and grow them using the natural growth serum. The moment you are watching the video, you might realize that making use of such products might in fact take only about five minutes and the task can be performed with any help from professional beautician. I hope you have just found that this article is very much helpful for most girls who want to attain good looking eyelashes.

So by making use of eyelash growth serum you can always try and attain the perfect eyelash growth within few days. So in case you just have not yet tried out any such product then it is the right time for you to search for effective growth serum.

Hair Loss

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U.S. Women in Labor Longer Than They Were 50 Years Ago

HealthDay – 1 hr 46 mins ago FRIDAY, March 30 (HealthDay News) -- American women today are spending about two hours more in labor during childbirth than women did 50 years ago, a new report says.

The report's authors said several factors helped to explain the longer labors.

"Older maternal age and increased BMI (body-mass index, a ratio of weight to height) accounted for a part of the increase. We believe that some aspects of delivery-room practice are also responsible for this increase," lead author Dr. Katherine Laughon, an epidemiologist with the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, said during a Friday afternoon news conference.

For the study, Laughon's team collected data on nearly 40,000 women who gave birth between 1959 and 1966, and compared those findings with nearly 100,000 women who delivered between 2002 and 2008.

The researchers found women in the 21st century were in labor 2.6 hours longer for first births and two hours longer for subsequent births than women from the 1960s.

Mothers in the 2000s also were older, heavier and used painkillers more during labor, and were more likely to have a Cesarean delivery than women in the 1960s.

Other differences that might explain the increase reflect changes in later-stage delivery practices. For instance, in the 1960s the use of episiotomy (a surgical incision to enlarge the vaginal opening during delivery) and forceps (surgical instruments used to extract a baby) were more common, the researchers noted.

The use of epidural injections to ease the pain of delivery is more common now than 50 years ago. Epidurals were used in more than half of recent deliveries, compared with 4 percent of deliveries in the 1960s, the study authors said, adding that epidural anesthesia is known to increase delivery time.

The study also found that Cesarean deliveries are four times more common today than 50 years ago -- 12 percent vs. 3 percent.

"Women are in labor longer

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Moderate Drinking Might Help Men Live Longer After Heart Attack

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