Eideard

Home on the Range

Federal drug regulators announced Wednesday that farmers and ranchers must restrict their use of a critical class of antibiotics in cattle, pigs, chickens and turkeys because such practices may have contributed to the growing threat of bacterial infections in people that are resistant to treatment.

The medicines belong to a class of antibiotics known as cephalosporins and include such brands as Cefzil and Keflex. They are among the most common antibiotics prescribed to treat strep throat, bronchitis, skin infections and urinary tract infections. Surgeons also often use them before surgery to prevent bacterial infections.

The drugs’ use in agriculture has, according to many microbiologists, led to the development of bacteria that are resistant to the drugs’ effects, a development that many doctors say has endangered the lives of patients.

Antibiotics are often added to animal feed and are used routinely to encourage rapid growth of livestock, but officials at the Food and Drug Administration have been increasingly vocal in their concerns that overuse of antibiotics in agriculture is endangering human health. The agency proposed rules in 2010 to slow the use of penicillin, tetracycline and other antibiotics simply to promote growth or prevent disease in feed animals, but those rules have yet to be made final…

Perish the thought we offend a drug company or the owners of cattle feed lots.

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OK, boys. Turn ‘em loose!

Trillions of bacteria with a taste for turkey fat and cooking oil are being unleashed in sewers to eat the annual onslaught of Christmas dinner grease that risks blocking pipes.

Yorkshire Water said it was deploying the “biological weapon” of bacillus bacteria – commonly found in the human gut – in its sewer network in an attempt to prevent blockages, which typically increase by 25pc over the festive season.

The company began pouring vats of water mixed with the bacteria down sewers at known trouble spots last week and is rolling out the treatment at 180 sites in Yorkshire.

Sewer blockages cost the water industry tens of millions of pounds a year, with many due to hot fat, oil and grease being poured down the drains and then solidifying. The fat also binds with non-biodegradable rubbish flushed down toilets, causing blockages which can make sewage flood back up into homes.

The fatty build-ups are usually cleared out manually with high-pressure water jets. With the likely increase in fat over Christmas, the company was turning to “new and innovative methods”.

Patrick Killgallon, pollution manager at Yorkshire Water said the utility was confident that the ” ‘good’ bacteria, literally feasting on solidified fat” would be cost-effective and could potentially end all such blockages.

“Because these bacteria constantly multiply in the right environment, we can leave them to get on with their job in our sewers, seven days a week, 24 hours a day, without the need for regular dosing,” he said.

Next up? Little nano-boats filled with bacteria volunteers to navigate your own body’s plumbing.

Japanese mobile phone giant NTT DoCoMo is developing a smartphone that will measure radiation levels. The design was inspired by worries over the health implications of the radiation leak at the Fukushima nuclear plant.

The phone will come with changeable “jackets” which will also be able to measure bad breath and body fat…

At the Combined Exhibition of Advanced Technology, hosted near Tokyo next month, DoCoMo will show off three smartphone ‘jackets” that are fitted with sensors, to monitor body mass as well as level of skin-damaging ultraviolet light.

But the shell that measures radiation levels is likely to prove the most popular.

“Many customers have been nervous about radiation since the Great East Japan Earthquake,” said DoCoMo’s spokesman Daisuke Sakuma.

“We had been thinking what services we can provide to address these needs as a telecom carrier,” he added.

Just think of the possibilities:

Record a speech from a political candidate and it will tell you the percentage of lies.

Scientists have found that a gene linked to diabetes and cholesterol is a “master switch” that controls other genes found in fat in the body, and say it should help in the search for treatments for obesity-related diseases.

In a study published in the journal Nature Genetics, the British researchers said that since fat plays an important role in peoples’ susceptibility to metabolic diseases like obesity, heart disease and diabetes, the regulating gene could be target for drugs to treat such illnesses.

“This is the first major study that shows how small changes in one master regulator gene can cause a cascade of other metabolic effects in other genes,” said Tim Spector of King’s College London, who led the study.

More than half a billion people, or one in 10 adults worldwide, are obese and the numbers have doubled since the 1980s as the obesity epidemic has spilled over from wealthy into poorer nations.

In the United States, obesity-related diseases already account for nearly 10 percent of medical spending — an estimated $147 billion a year.

Type 2 diabetes, which is often linked to poor diet and lack of exercise, is also reaching epidemic levels worldwide as rates of obesity rise…

The differences between predilection, tendencies, behavior – voluntary and involuntary – mesh together in a health dialectic that overwhelms societies still relying upon ideologies that think some magic bullet or heavenly prophet will cure all their ills.

Understanding complexity is difficult enough to be off-putting for most. But, simplistic and oversimplified answers rarely provide lasting solutions. But, that’s what people and politicians always want.

The next time children in some elementary schools in Texas try to sneak extra french fries onto their tray in the cafeteria line, the eye in the sky will be watching them.

Using a $2 million grant from the Department of Agriculture, the schools in San Antonio are installing sophisticated cameras in the cafeteria line and trash area that read food bar codes embedded in the food trays.

“We’re going to snap a picture of the food tray at the cashier and we will know what has been served,” said Dr. Roberto Trevino…”When the child goes back to the disposal window, we’re going to measure the leftover.”

The goal of the program is to cut down on childhood obesity by providing parents and school nutrition specialists with information on what types of food elementary students are eating…

“We will be able to determine whether current programs that are aimed at preventing obesity work, and whether they are really changing students’ behavior,” Trevino said…

The technology will identify the food, capture the nutrient levels and measure the food that children eat, according to Dr. Roger Echon of the center, who designed the program…

He said the program can break down the data into total monounsaturated fatty acids, soluble dietary fiber, and more than 100 other specific measures.

Trevino said the children will not be photographed, and only children who have the permission of their parents or guardians will be allowed to participate.

He said that if the effort is successful in San Antonio, the plan is to implement similar programs in elementary schools nationwide.

Even though the food police have permission, even though their goal is admirable – the Big Brother aspect is troubling. Especially with Texas’ history of morality police.

If it works at cafeteria checkouts and trash cans, where’s the next place, the next reason for spying on the little angels, eh?

What do you suppose the odds are that your surgeon is going
to show you these “before and after” illustrations?

THE woman’s hips bulged in unsightly saddlebags. Then she had liposuction and, presto, those saddlebags disappeared.

Photo after photo on plastic surgery Web sites make liposuction look easy, its results transformative. It has become the most popular plastic surgery, with more than 450,000 operations a year, each costing a few thousand dollars.

But does the fat come back? And if it does, where does it show up?

Until now, no one knew for sure. But a new study, led by Drs. Teri L. Hernandez and Robert H. Eckel of the University of Colorado, has answered those questions. And what he found is not good news.

In the study, the researchers randomly assigned nonobese women to have liposuction on their protuberant thighs and lower abdomen or to refrain from having the procedure, serving as controls. As compensation, the women who were control subjects were told that when the study was over, after they learned the results, they could get liposuction if they still wanted it. For them, the price would also be reduced from the going rate.

The result, published in the latest issue of Obesity, was that fat came back after it was suctioned out. It took a year, but it all returned. But it did not reappear in the women’s thighs. Instead, Dr. Eckel said, “it was redistributed upstairs,” mostly in the upper abdomen, but also around the shoulders and triceps of the arms…

It turns out … that the body controls the number of its fat cells as carefully as it controls the amount of its fat. Fat cells die and new ones are born throughout life. Scientists have found that fat cells live for only about seven years and that every time a fat cell dies, another is formed to take its place…

As for the women in the control group, when the study ended and they knew the results, more than half still chose to have liposuction.

A jury has found a Joliet man guilty of first-degree murder for fatally shooting a man during a 2009 melee after the victim told his pregnant girlfriend she looked fat in a photograph…

Tyrone Henderson, 31, also was found guilty of home invasion, criminal trespass to residence, aggravated unlawful use of a weapon and being an armed habitual criminal.

Henderson shot Michael Amos, 21, on Aug. 26, 2009 at the victim’s home in Joliet, according to the Will County state’s attorney’s office. Amos had teased Henderson’s girlfriend that evening. She called Henderson, who arrived at Amos’ house a short time later armed with a .45-caliber weapon.

Henderson punched the victim’s brother in the face, which led to a melee inside the house. Henderson then brandished his weapon and shot Amos three times -– once in the shoulder, once in the stomach and once in the leg -– while others in the house tried to take the gun from his hand, officials said.

This dude sounds like he was looking for long time since he was born. Number one, ask your honey to stop hanging out with people rude enough to signify on her weight.

For the first time since the dioxin scandal broke out in Germany, the toxin has been found in pigs. EU officials have confirmed that the animal feed was also exported to France and Denmark.

German authorities have detected high levels of the toxic chemical dioxin in pork from a farm banned from selling since last week’s scare, the Consumer Protection Ministry in the state of Lower Saxony said Tuesday.

“A test on the meat has shown high levels of dioxin content,” a ministry spokesman told the news agency AFP.

One animal had been slaughtered for testing purposes and found to be over the limit. Hundreds of pigs on the farm were then culled…

The northern German farm was one of those supplied with animal feed containing ingredients made by a firm suspected of knowingly selling some 3,000 tons of fatty acids meant only for industrial use. Samples of the fat contained more than 70 times the approved amount of dioxin.

The scandal broke last week when German investigators found excessive levels of dioxin in eggs and then some chickens. Authorities then froze sales of poultry, pork and eggs from thousands of farms…

The government has said so far that there is no immediate risk to public health. German officials say the dioxin levels pose no risk to humans if they only eat small amounts of the tainted food, but add that the contamination must be stamped out to avert serious long-term risks…

“The damage that has been caused is immense, not only financially but also when it comes to consumer trust … This is a scandal, as consumers who expect safe food were duped,” German Agriculture Minister Ilse Aigner said on Monday.

Minister Aigner said, “This incident must and will have consequences” – and I certainly hope so. Traditions of food purity are older and most would think more deeply ingrained in the commerce and culture of Europe than in much of the rest of the world.

Maybe much less so than we assumed.

Thousands of quiches and cakes were sold in British supermarkets over Christmas, which contained eggs contaminated by dioxins.

The dioxins, which have the potential to cause cancer, originated in Germany and have raised fresh questions about British food labelling and this country’s reliance on food imports.

Fourteen tons of the contaminated liquid egg – large vats of de-shelled eggs bought by caterers and manufacturers – entered Britain last month. The liquid egg was bought by two leading food companies which supply supermarkets: Samworth Brothers, who own Gingsters pasties, and Finsbury Foods, the country’s biggest cake maker.

Both companies refused to give details of which quiches and cakes were affected or how many, but both Tesco and Morrisons confirmed that they had sold products which contained the contaminated eggs.

Sainsbury’s said its children’s Caterpillar Cake was also potentially affected.

Any remaining products were been pulled from the shelves on Friday, though the Food Standards Agency said it could not rule out other manufacturers buying contaminated eggs.

The dioxin was discovered in late December but the extent of the problem was only revealed this week when German officials said 3,000 tonnes of feed were affected.
Germany has stopped more than 4,700 farms selling their meat and eggs as a result of the scare.

This is growing exponentially since questions were first raised.

The family of an obese woman whose body was ‘too fat’ to be cremated is suing a French crematorium for discrimination.

Danielle Pelabarrere, 63, who weighed 22-stone, died of a heart attack in Merignac, near Bordeaux on Saturday.

When her husband Andre booked her coffin into the local crematorium however, he was told it was two inches too wide to fit into the incinerator. The family also tried crematoriums in neighbouring French towns, but none were able to help.

Only Toulouse, which is 100 miles away, said it had an incinerator large enough to take the three-feet wide coffin. Mr Pelabarrere is now demanding compensation from the crematorium “for its inability to meet our needs.”

“It is an outrage. She was mocked for her size in life, and now she is being mocked in death,” he said.

Jean-Claude Oruezabal, the Merignac crematorium manager, denied discrimination. “We accept people and coffins of any size in principle, but in this case it just wont fit and there is nothing we can do”, he said.

I must admit that being a grillin’ and chillin’ kinda guy, at first I thought they were worried about fire spreading to the rest of the building from a fat flare-up.

But, suing because the chosen casket doesn’t fit into the furnace is absurd. They could have put her into the oven in a shroud – or a little judicious squeezing into a narrower casket. I’m willing to bet none of these alternatives were acceptable to the family. Which makes their lawsuit even more ridiculous.