The United States doesn’t seem to be the only country willing to acknowledge the medical or recreational benefits of using marijuana. Most recently, Ministers in Israel have recently endorsed a bill which, if approved, would allow the export of medical cannabis.

On Sunday, Israel’s Ministerial Committee for Legislation has endorsed the Knesset bill which would allow the export of medical cannabis. If approved, the legislation would provide local companies a lot of windfall, as they are widely regarded as research leaders in this field.

The Knesset bill was initiated by MK Yoav Kisch, which stated that his proposed legislation would provide the Israeli agriculture industry with a much-needed boost. He also noted that the export of medical cannabis would the push the economy forward and lead to the development and improvement of the agricultural sector.

The Knesset bill is the first one in Israel, which defines the entire field of medical cannabis and set the terms for regulating its export practices. If Israel passes the bill, it will join the list of other countries like Canada and Australia, which approved the export of medical cannabis and are enjoying the profits from the booming industry.

According to the bill’s initiator, recent research revealed that Israel can stand to gain over a billion NIS from the taxation of medical cannabis. However, before the country reaches that point, the bill would have to go to parliament, and the process could take several months.

Since 2012, around 28 states in the US have legalized the use of medical cannabis, with only a few approving it for recreational use. The industry is currently booming and could be worth over $50 billion in the coming decade.

The Knesset bill would allow Israel the reap some of the benefits of this industry, as it is already widely regarded as one of the research leaders of medical cannabis. The country’s domestic market is quite limited, as the Health ministry has issued around 23,000 permits for purchasing the drug for medicinal purposes. The medicinal cannabis market in Israel is valued at around $15 to $20 million.

What do you think about Israel’s recent initiative regarding the export of medical cannabis?

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Our brain needs to be stimulated every day if we want to decline the aging process. Although it might seem easy when you are young, the older you get the harder it is to keep your mind sharp. Brain-stimulating activities are the ones that can help seniors defeat the aging process.

A new study showed that older people who engage in brain-stimulating activities like using the computers are less likely to develop mild cognitive impairment in more than 4 years. Mild cognitive impairment is a medical condition that it is developed at an older age. People who develop MCI experience a decline in thinking skills and memory.

Despite the fact that they suffer from memory loss or decline of thinking skills, people who developed MCI are able to so their activities. Researchers from the Mayo Clinic mentioned that it is important to engage in brain-stimulating activities even when we are older because it helps us decline the risk of developing MCI.

There are many studies which focused on this topic but none of these studies followed the patients in the long run. This research was a long one that analyzed older people for a longer period of time. This way it is easier for researchers to see if these brain-stimulating activities have an effect on reducing the risk of MCI.

In order to conduct this study, researchers analyzed more than 2,000 elderly people. These people were from Minnesota and they had an average age of 77. Before starting the study the researchers tested all the participants to see if they have any cognitive problems. After that, the researchers made the same tests every 15 months.

Due to the fact that they repeated the same tests, it was easier for the researchers to see what changed in that period of time. The findings showed that the participants who engaged in a brain-stimulating activity at least once a week were 30% less likely to develop mild cognitive impairment during this study.

The researchers were not able to find out the reason for which these activities help seniors reduce the risk of MCI. This is why they mentioned that they are going to make more studies focusing on this topic.

What is your opinion about this study? Do you think that brain-stimulating activities can reduce the risk of MCI?

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The United States’ Food and Drug Administration has released a warning for any parents that have purchased homeopathic teething products, as they have found an inconsistent amount of poisonous belladonna. The FDA simply recommends that all the products must be discarded to avoid any further possible exposure.

Homeopathic teething products which contain small amounts of belladonna are widely used by parents who want to provide temporary pain relief to their babies just as their first teeth being to show. This type of products have been popular in the US ever since the 1900s.

However, a new report from the FDA’s Center for Drug Evaluation and Research, led by the Dr. Janet Woodcock, has revealed that the belladonna can cause an unpredictable response in the bodies of babies which are younger than two years. This puts the toddlers at unnecessary risk and the homeopathic teething products should be carefully avoided.

As an alternative, the FDA recommends that parents should consult their health care professionals to safer options and ways to provide the same relief to babies, but without any dangers. Furthermore, in cases where the babies start to experience seizures, lethargy, difficulty breathing, muscle weakness, constipation, or agitation after using teething products, parents should immediately seek medical care.

The FDA previously warned parents about the danger of teething products in 2016, after it received a few dozen reports about babies experiencing adverse effects like seizures or even in extreme cases, infant deaths.

Furthermore, the homeopathic teething products have not been approved nor properly evaluated by the FDA for their proposed effectiveness to provide relief for babies or their overall safety standards.  Thus, the agency has not confirmed the supposed health benefits of such products.

The homeopathic teething products targeted by the warning of the FDA are mainly produced by a company based in Los Angeles known as Hyland, which outsource the actual manufacturing to the Standard Homeopathic Company. At this point, the company did not issue a recall of their products despite the FDA’s suggestion. However, in the past, companies like Raritan Pharmaceuticals have recalled several of their teething products due to the levels of belladonna.

What do you think about the FDA’s warning regarding the homeopathic products?

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HIV infections have seen a drastic increase in several countries like South Africa, where the epidemic is out of control. However, a new study reveals that a combination of three antibody drugs is effective in suppressing the HIV virus.

Researchers from the Rockefeller University published their findings in the journal Science Translational Medicine. They revealed that when the antibody combination is administered in the HIV patient, the virus eventually dies despite its ability to mutate and becoming hard to eliminate.

Antiretroviral drug treatments have been essential in suppressing the HIV virus from developing into AIDS. Without these types of treatments, the body of the infected patient tends to eventually lose the power to control the virus.

Other promising HIV treatments resulted mostly in failure due to the fact that the virus mutates and escapes the grasp of the immune system. However, the new antibody combination treatment claims to actually trap the virus for good.

For their study, the researchers administered HIV-infected mice a combination of three antibodies. They discovered that the treatment leads to the complete suppression of the HIV virus in the respective mice. The study was performed at the Laboratory of Molecular Immunology at The Rockefeller University.

The researchers developed the antibody combination treatment by administering BG18, BG1, and NC37 antibodies to the mice. The combined drug attaches itself to a part of the virus and each antibody supports the other in the endeavor to shut down the HIV virus.

According to the scientists, some HIV-infected people produce the three antibodies, but eventually, the virus manages to escape thanks to its mutation. The researchers then compared the association between the antibodies and the virus. The newly developed antibody combination determines the virus to mutate and escape but after several such attempts, the virus runs out of options and it is eventually shut down.

For their study, the researchers used the blood serum of a man who contracted HIV 30 years ago, to create the antibodies used in their experiment.

What do you think about this new antibody combination treatment? Do you know anyone infected with HIV? What treatments do they undergo to suppress the virus?

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Heart attacks have a variety of causes, the most common being a high cholesterol diet, smoking, and being overweight. However, the wellbeing of our body is closely linked with the state of our mental health. A new study has found that depression can pose as many dangers to your heart as much as all other more common factors.

For the study, a team of researchers from Germany analyzed the health records of more than 3,400 men from Europe, with ages between 45 to 74. All the participants were followed up to 10 years. After the extensive analysis, the researchers observed that death from various types of cardiovascular disease during the study was very strongly associated with the mental health state of the patients just as much as it was affected by other heart disease factors.

More specifically, the researchers looked at how depression, determined by a checklist of several mood symptoms including fatigue and anxiety, affected the rate of heart disease in the participants. They found that depression accounted for around 15 percent of all deaths from coronary heart and cardiovascular disease. The other high risk factors like cholesterol and obesity a 8 to 21 percent chance of death, while diabetes only had 5 to 8 percent of heart disease death.

Only smoking and high blood pressure accounted for more heart disease deaths than depression. The findings of the study were published in the journal Atherosclerosis and revealed that patients with suffering from depression and exhaustion have a higher chance of dying from heart disease, despite not having any of the other risk factors.

The researchers reached this conclusion after the results for each variable had been adjusted for all the other risk factors. This suggests that depression is independently linked to heart disease death, and not caused in combination with other risk factors.

The researchers recommend that patients with classic heart disease factors should undergo routine mental-health screenings. Depression must be addressed as serious as all other risk factors, despite the current stigma that patients face. Furthermore, treating depression can have a much more noticeable effect and sooner than treating other risk factors.

What do you think about the study’s findings?

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Being overweight has been the source of prejudice for many people and it is a big problem in itself without accounting a study’s new findings which show that fat shaming can lead to greater health risks. The findings are especially troubling for the United States which a pervasive obesity problem and a bullying culture. These two factors can lead to serious mental health issues for already unhealthy people.

Overweight persons have been stereotyped in the United States as being either too uneducated to know how the quality of the food affects their bodies or too lazy and incompetent to lose the weight and maintain a healthy lifestyle. People who usually perform acts of fat shaming don’t take into account the whole life of the person into account when they make their snap judgments.

Now, a team of researchers from the University of Pennsylvania’s Perelman School of Medicine, have discovered conducted a study which shows that fat shaming can lead to greater health risks for the victim. Besides the psychological impact of fat shaming, the emotional state that fat shaming induces can lead to increased risk of metabolic and cardiovascular disease.

The study was led by Rebecca Pearl, an assistant professor of Psychology in collaboration with her colleagues from the Penn Center for Weight and Eating Disorders.  She stated that the idea that fat shaming people motivates them to lose weight actually has the opposite effect.

This type of bullying actually leads the victim to feel more depressed, unwilling to exercise or to adopt a healthier diet. The researchers also found an association between the internalization of weight bias and the metabolic syndrome, which is an indication of declining health.

For their study, the scientists examined 159 obese adults which were part of a larger clinical trial test for weight loss medication. Most of the participants were black women and were required to fill a questionnaire which measured their depression and the internalization of the weight bias, which consists of applying negative stereotypes to themselves.

The researchers found that only participants with high levels of weight bias internalized were actually associated with a higher risk of metabolic syndrome and cardiovascular disease. However, further research is needed to show a direct link between the two factors.

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Although states officials are trying to figure out a way to make people cut down the sugary beverages they are not succeeding. A new study shows that almost 70% of children in the United States are consuming at least one juice or other sugary drink every day.

The study also shows that more than 30% of kids tend to drink more than 2 sugary beverages every day. This is concerning because the amount of sugar can damage their health. This is even more concerning because we are talking about children, who are more sensitive than adults.

This study was made between 2011 and 2014. It was completed by the CDC this Thursday. The biggest problem here is the number of calories that are added to the diet of these children. If they drink two sugary drinks every day they consume almost 15% of their daily calories.

These children then tend to eat a lot and when they combine it with the sugar from these drinks they have a higher risk of obesity. Once they start to get used to the sugary beverages they are going to drink them every day and want even more.

The US dietary guidelines also recommend that people should take less than 10% of their daily calories from sugary drinks or other sweets. Doctors mentioned that sugary beverages should not be consumed with regularity; they should only be served once in a while. This is because sugary beverages can damage the health.

Some of the conditions that can be caused by the high consumption of sugar include dental caries, Type 2 diabetes, and weight gain. All of these have a negative impact on the health. People with high cholesterol and Type 2 diabetes can develop other health problems as well.

This is why everybody is concerned about the level of sugar that children consume. It is important for parents to know that children need to get their calories from vegetables, fruits, and meat. This is why they need to stop buying sugary beverages and letting their children drink so often.

What is your opinion about this study? Do you think that it is normal for children to drink so many sugary beverages?

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Everybody wants the best for their baby. This is why more and more companies are developing devices that can help parents look after their children. The new trend when it comes to baby devices is the wearable smartphones baby monitors.

These devices are new to the market and some of them are still not approved by pediatricians. This is why doctors advise parents not to buy them. The wearable baby monitors might not be as effective as some may think.

These devices are made from electronic sensors which are attached to the clothes of the baby. Some are attached to the sock other to buttons or onesies. These baby monitors are supposed to monitor the baby’s vitals like oxygen levels, breathing, and pulse rate.

The wearable baby monitors sent a notification on the smartphone of the parents when something is wrong with their child. Doctors warn parents to be careful when buying devices for their children because some of them are not approved by the FDA.

Another problem with these wearable baby monitors is that they might send false alarms that can concern the parents. Then the parents will take the baby to the doctor to see if something is wrong with it. The problem is that unnecessary tests will be made and the child is the one that suffers.

Doctors mentioned that there are some normal fluctuations that could be seen by these baby monitors as a sign of alarm. This is because the baby monitor is set to alert the parents when the vital are not in the normal state. This could happen a lot because babies tend to have a lot of fluctuations.

“I worry about the unnecessary care and even potential harm to babies that can be associated with alarms from these devices,” Christopher Bonafide, from the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia said. “There’s not a role for these devices in the care of healthy infants.”

These devices are marketed as great baby monitors that can help parents avoid SIDS, a condition that kills more than 3000 infants every year in the US. Doctors mentioned that the wearable baby monitors are not effective in reducing the risk of SIDS.

What is your opinion about these devices? Would you buy one for you baby?

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High levels of stress can be quite dangerous for the wellbeing of a person. While many people already believe and use meditation as a way to reduce stress, only now has its benefits been confirmed by science thanks to a new study.

This is not the first time that scientists were interested in confirming the impact of meditation on a person’s mental state, but testing its effectiveness in an objective manner has been quite difficult due to the subjective nature of the experiment. However, scientists were able to design a rigorous clinical trial to test the impact of mindfulness meditation.

The study was sponsored by the National Institutes of Health and was published in the journal Psychiatry Research by a team of researchers led by Dr. Elizabeth A. Hoge, an associate professor at Georgetown University’s Medical Center, the Department of Psychiatry.

For their study, the searchers recruit 89 patients diagnosed with a general anxiety disorder, characterized by chronic and excessive worrying. This type of disorders affects around 7 million people in the US alone. The researchers then randomly divided all the patients into two groups. One group took part in a mindfulness meditation stress reduction course for eight weeks. The other group participated in a stress management education course, which offered them general tips about nutrition, sleep, as well as a variety of other wellness aspects.

Previous mindfulness meditation studies compared the results to that of an untreated control group. This allowed the patients to know if they are being treated or not, and thus skew the results of the study.  Furthermore, the clinical trial also involved testing the results by measuring the stress levels of patients by asking them to speak in public, while researchers monitored several blood-based markers for stress responses.

The researchers discovered that the control group experienced a modest rise in stress levels after the clinical trial, while the group which practiced mindfulness meditation had a dramatic drop in stress after the experiment. This led scientists to confirm the benefits of meditation. Therefore, scientists believe that this type of treatment can be an effective tool in combating anxiety in all types of patients.

What do you think about the study? Do you practice mindfulness meditation?

Image source: Paulding County Area Foundation

Humans like to keep as pet various animals, from the conventional dog or cat to more exotic creatures. However, some can more dangerous than others. A new report from the CDC has revealed that the recent Seoul virus outbreak in Wisconsin and Illinois has been caused by pet rats.

The United States is not entirely unfamiliar with the disease as previous outbreaks in the country have been caused by wild rats. However, the recent outbreak occurred due to pet rats. An outbreak with a similar caused has also occurred in Europe.

The first identified patient to come in contact with the virus was in Wisconsin. He visited a hospital with symptoms similar to that of flu. However, the doctors decided to test for hantavirus, as he was breeding rodents in his house, and the virus is often carried by rats, both wild and domesticated.

The results of the test came back in the last days of December and confirmed the fact that patient was infected with the hantavirus. The doctors decided to send the CDC a sample of the patient’s blood together with another sample from one of his family members who also worked with the pet rats.

A few days later, on January 11, the CDC reported that both individuals have been infected with the Seoul virus which is hantavirus commonly found in rats and can cause chills, fever, nausea, and abdominal pain.

The patients infected with this virus tend to develop symptoms as soon as one or two weeks after contact. However, there have been cases where the symptoms started to show even eight weeks after. Fortunately, most patients infected with the Seoul virus can recover, but there have been rare cases where patients have developed a hantavirus pulmonary syndrome. This condition starts with fatigue, fever, and acute pain, and can even become fatal.

Besides the two initial patients, which made a successful recovery, doctors have also identified six other patients working at various other rat breeding facilities in Illinois. Among the six patients, only one has experienced the symptoms of the illness. Health authorities continue to investigate and will very likely find more patients infected with the Seoul virus.

What do you think about the outbreak caused by the pet rats?

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