Apr
16
2012
New Flu Virus Making Headlines: Influenza A (H3N2)v
Just as we all thought the flu season was coming to a nice and peaceful conclusion, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has issued a warning about a new strain of influenza A (H3N2) virus-labeled “A (H3N2)v”. Apparently there have been 12 reported infections with this new strain. Whats interesting is that influenza A (H3N2)v is composed of genes from avian, swine and human viruses. Children under the age of 10 are the most vulnerable. The 2011-2012 influenza vaccination does provide some protection against A (H3N2)v and there is a specific vaccination that is being manufactured that will provide direct protection.
Obesity Epidemic Report: Waistlines Continue to Expand!
Here we go again-one day the obesity epidemic is solved. The next day we wake up and read that “by the year 2020, one in five American children will be obese.” What do we believe? Well, recent research coming out of Columbia University’s School of Public Health (Claire Wang, MD, ScD-American Journal of Preventive Medicine), suggests that by analyzing weights of children from 1971 to 2008 (NHANES), the average weight of these children will increase by 2 kilograms, if no action is taken. This translates into the following: 21 % of children ages 2 through 19 would become obese. And by “action” Wang and her associates came up with the following:
Just to stay at ...
Posted in: Editor's Page, Home
Jan
13
2012
Okay my friends, I don’t want to be the “I told you” type but I did! The “you’re fat” tax is coming soon. So you ask, what in the world is a “fat tax”? I am glad you asked. As we all are aware, obesity is growing at an alarming rate. Most of us are already overweight and some of us are way overweight-yes face it we are obese. Come on, take a look at your waist line. Look down there now. You can see it as plain as day. Yes, say it with me, I am overweight. Good-that’s a start. You have tried dieting, exercising and nothing seems to work. Well, our government seems to think that it is now up to our elected public officials to help correct an epidemic. How, you may ask? How does the government respond to issues that threaten public safety-by making new laws and regulations and yes, you know it, it’s on the tip of your tongue-yes, taxes! Of course, taxes-a penalty for this indiscretion. Only this time, the indiscretion is being overweight. As many friends of mine point out, when injuries and fatal accidents as a result of car crashes became major issues, wearing seatbelts was advised. However this advisory didn’t help. So the next step was a law and regulation that made it mandatory for everyone to buckle-up. And it’s working. ...
Posted in: Editor's Page, Home
Oct
30
2011
STAY AWAY FROM BLACK LICORICE
As a kid, I loved licorice. The red swirly sticks were always a big hit in my group of friends. And once in a while we would eat the black licorice and even the chocolate ones. But ever since finding out that black licorice has a chemical that can cause high blood pressure, I have been advising my friends and family to stay away. Yes, the chemical is called “glycyrrhizin” and according to the FDA, if it is consumed in a large enough quantity-more than 2 ounces a day for two weeks, or more, glycyrrhizin has the potential to cause high blood pressure and irregular heartbeats. How does it do this? Well, first of all it can cause your kidneys to lose more potassium than usual and as a result, this imbalance (when the potassium is lower than it should be) may make the conditions in your heart vulnerable to set up an irregular heart rhythm. Secondly, the glycyrrhizin may cause your body to retain more salt and water-which can result in the body having a higher blood pressure and even a set up for heart failure (too much salt and water for the heart to handle). Thirdly, eating black licorice can interfere with other medicine that you may be taking including digoxin (a medicine used to control heart rhythms), laxatives and diuretics (a medicine that ...
Posted in: Editor's Page, Home
Jul
11
2011
Hello my fans and yes, we are getting fatter. A report released this past Thursday, July 7th, 2011
F as in Fat: How Obesity Threatens America's Future*, reveals that the obesity rates across America are increasing. That’s right, there are more obese individuals in 16 states than in 2010. And there was no state in the United States, that reported a decline in obesity rates. Yes, we are all getting fatting-well most of us!
Here are the percentage of obese adults in all 50 states-see it for yourself**:
|
State
|
%
|
|
State
|
%
|
|
Mississippi
|
34.4
|
|
Maine
|
26.5
|
|
Alabama
|
32.3
|
|
Washington
|
26.4
|
|
West Virginia
|
32.2
|
|
Florida
|
26.1
|
|
Tennessee
|
31.9
|
|
Alaska
|
25.9
|
|
Louisiana
|
31.6
|
|
Virginia
|
25.9
|
|
Kentucky
|
31.5
|
|
Idaho
|
25.7
|
|
Oklahoma
|
31.4
|
|
New Hampshire
|
25.6
|
|
South Carolina
|
30.9
|
|
New Mexico
|
25.6
|
|
Arkansas
|
30.6
|
|
Arizona
|
25.4
|
|
Michigan
|
30.5
|
|
Oregon
|
25.4
|
|
Missouri
|
30.3
|
|
Wyoming
|
25.4
|
|
Texas
|
30.1
|
|
Minnesota
|
25.3
|
|
Ohio
|
|
...
Posted in: Editor's Page, Home
May
25
2011
The 2011 American Fitness Index (AFI) report was released this week by the American College of Sports Medicine. Meant as a report of the Health and Community Fitness Status of the 50 largest metropolitan areas in the United States, the AFI was developed in 2008 as a measure of the fitness of various cities and communities across the United States, using “ a composite of preventive health behaviors, levels of chronic disease conditions, health care access, as well as community resources and polices that support physical activity, “and allows officials, residents and potential residents to see the health statistics in their community. This can help identify ways to improve the health and “quality of life and well-being” of the residents of that particular community. In addition to the fitness components of the community, violent crime statistics are also shown for each community. The index uses the 50 largest metropolitan areas of the United States as determined by the U.S. Office of Management and Budget (from data supplied by the U.S. Census). High AFI scores indicates “strong community fitness,” and are analogous to an individual’s strong personal commitment to physical fitness. Low scores can be interpreted as the reverse.
So let’s go to the results and see where your city’s fitness ranks:
2011 Rank/ City/ 2010 Rank
1 Minneapolis, MN -3
2 Washington, DC - 1
3 Boston, MA - 2
4 Portland, OR - 5
5 Denver, CO - 6
6 San ...
Posted in: Editor's Page, Home
Mar
28
2011
As you all know, my pal Nerdel and I are big supporters of the Presidents Challenge and First Lady Michelle Obama’s Let’s Move programs. The intent of both of these fantastic programs is to get all Americans, young and old, into better shape. Both programs encourage you to eat healthier meals and snacks at school, at home, at work and whenever you go out to eat! And both programs emphasize the need to perform some type of physical fitness activity each and every day. The Presidents Challenge program has many individual activity categories based on age and lifestyle and you can earn many cool awards and medals by registering your fitness performance.
Here’s a little history: On September 14th, 2010, the United States Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Kathleen Sebelius along with the co-Chair of the President’s Council on Fitness, Sports & Nutrition-Dominique Dawes and Let’s Move Executive Director Robin Schepper, launched the Million PALA (President's Active Lifestyle Award) Challenge. The goal of the Million PALA Challenge is to get 1,000,000 youth and adults, from all over the United States, to sign up and participate in the Presidential Active Lifestyle Award (PALA) over the year. The ending date is slowly approaching-September 2011.
How does the Million PALA Challenge work? “The Presidential Active Lifestyle Award, or PALA, can be earned by taking part in 60 minutes of physical activity for kids ...
Posted in: Editor's Page, Home
Mar
12
2011
I Just got back from the March 4 Hunger which took place on a beautifully cool morning on the Broad-walk in Hollywood, Florida. Over 400 runners, walkers and joggers took part in this great event which raises money for Feeding South Florida. People from all over the country including vacationers, residents, boot camp workoutsters , and kids ran walked and jogged the 5K (3.1 mile) course in temperatures starting in the fifties and ending in the 60’s. With the ocean breezes, salt air and sunshine, the conditions couldn’t have been better!
Feeding South Florida is an amazing not-for-profit organization that is devoted to “empowering and assisting people in need and improving their lives”. They provide food and other grocery products to the hungry and educate the community to fight hunger and poverty. With one in six adults and one in four kids in the United States alone in the hunger column daily this organization has its work cut out for it. The poverty numbers have increased over the past few years with this current economic slow down. Almost 60 million Americans are at the poverty level. There are over 21 million kids (children 18 and under) at the poverty level. In Florida alone, there are over 1 million children( 18 and under) and 2 million adults (age 19 and older) in the poverty classification.
In 2009/2010, Feeding South Florida provided over 24 ...
Posted in: Editor's Page, Home
Feb
28
2011
Okay, so you survived day one on The Best Diet In The Universe. This is a really simple program to help you lose extra, added weight and get back into shape. This is a plan to get you back into your tight clothes. This is a plan to let you open your eyes in front of the mirror again. This is a program that you can follow forever. After experiencing most of the major (and minor ones also) diets out there today, I found that you can lose weight on all of them. That’s right-all of them. Whether it’s a low fat, low carb (Atkins, South Beach), high protein, complex carb, Zone, Glycemic Index, organic, raw foods, juice or starvation diet-the answer is yes, all of them work. But, what about re-gaining the lost weight? In fact, the statistics from research (Traci Mann- Associate Professor of Psychology-UCLA) on people that go on diets show that 2/3 of all dieters re-gain the weight and over 80 percent gain extra weight on top of those pounds they initially lost! What! That’s startling. It's called the yoyo effect. Up and down, back and forth, gain and loss and gain more. I am sure you all have heard this term. Yes, my friends, we can lose those unwanted pounds on virtually any diet plan we follow-but don’t you want to keep the excess baggage off? ...
Posted in: Editor's Page, Home
Feb
11
2011
Well, there it is my friends. The reports are finally out-over a half billion of us-that’s right us-the people and residents of planet Earth, are obese. And this represents a doubling since 1980. These studies, led by researcher Majid Ezzati of the Imperial College of London and Harvard University, were published recently in the Lancet journal. And you know what happens with 500 million people with obesity? You are right again-a rise in the secondary medical problems that result from the obesity like heart disease, diabetes, and high blood pressure. Can you imagine a rising population of people with heart problems and diabetes? Our medical system will be overloaded with new patients. Not to mention-seeing many young obese individuals that develop secondary problems earlier and prior to adulthood. It’s catastrophic. What can be done? Cutting portion sizes and increasing exercise will help. Our medical treatment for elevated blood pressure and high cholesterol is getting better. But that won’t stop the tidal wave of kids and adults that will develop these problems. Maybe we should all feel better that we can treat these secondary problems effectively. But we really need to focus on primary prevention. We need to start the nutrition and fitness education at an early- preschool age and continue this until adult hood. We need to teach our young generation of kids how to eat, what to eat that ...
Posted in: Editor's Page, Home
Feb
05
2011
Hello fans of mine, and welcome back to The Best Diet in the Universe. It’s what you all have been waiting for. It’s what you have been preparing for. It’s time to get started. It’s time to get fit and healthy. It’s time to get into shape! So all of you that have read the last two blog columns-you are ready!
Let’s take a moment and review all the major points that got you this far:
The junk food in your kitchen is gone-hasta la vista baby! It’s replaced by healthier items. Don’t worry-I will give you a list of the healthy items you should stock up on.
You got on the scale and now you know! Had to be done! This is your starting weight. And we all need a starting point. You will weigh yourself every few days and watch the weight fall off.
You made a realistic weight loss goal. This is so important. So many times we say-I am going to lose 20 pounds, or 30 pounds.” Never happens. This goal needs to be something you CAN actually reach. This doesn’t have to be the only goal. Once you reach this weight target, you reassess and look at the next goal. One of the major problems that we all face is once we achieved the first goal-we don’t sustain it and we gain back the weight. So a realistic weight ...
Posted in: Editor's Page, Home
