Horsemeat: EU Public Health Risk?

Given that the European Union horsemeat scandal is already a 16-nation affair are there any real health risks in consuming horsemeat?

By: Ringo Bones

When the “horsemeat scandal” first broke out in the UK during the last week of January 2013 when meat inspectors found out that a London franchise of Burger King was using horsemeat instead of beef, many UK citizens are in an uproar because Brits are very sentimental and reverent about the heroism of horses as draft animals. Not just for their heroism in the trenches of Word War I but throughout the rest of British history for their largely undocumented role in nation building, not to mention there might already be a British horse awarded with the Dickens Medal for bravery during wartime. But are there any real health risks in eating horsemeat? After all, the French had been eating horsemeat as gourmet food for centuries and they seem reasonably healthy.

For want of a horse, a kingdom was lost – doth quote the great English bard Shakespeare and now it seems the recent 16-nation European Union wide horsemeat scandal has been handled by the powers-that-be as the clear and present danger du jour when it comes to threat to public health. A few days ago, the UK’s environment minister Owen Patterson stated that the main health risk of consuming horsemeat is the yet unknown effects of pharmaceuticals used in culled race and draft horses that had been turned into meat on the human physiology. Certain anti-inflammatory veterinary drugs confined to use in farm animals not destined for human consumption have yet hitherto unknown physiological effects on humans. Not to mention the narcotic effects of so called “horse tranquilizers” on those people who eat horsemeat from culled race and draft horses.

After a popular brand of supposedly all-beef boxed grocery lasagne called Findus was found to be using horsemeat instead of beef, the UK food investigation committee later traced the source of the horsemeat to a government run abattoir in Romania. Now the Romanian government is under investigation by EU food watchdogs on why their government abattoirs were allowed to label horsemeat as beef. 

Along with dogs, horses are one of the few animals that are revered here in the West and eating them is largely seen as taboo. Though in this day and age, there are already certain health risks that come with the consumption of “unseemly meats” due to the very fact that these use certain veterinary pharmaceuticals that are banned for use in farm animals destined for meat on the table like chickens, pigs and cows, draft and race horses and sheep herding dogs are NOT intended for human consumption so they are prescribed veterinary drugs that are not normally used in “culinary animals”; Thus making the regular consumption of their meat carry certain long-term and largely unknown health risks. 

What Not To Touch During Flu Season

Despite of everyone’s inherent susceptibility of falling ill every flu season, did you know that you can lessen your chances of catching the flu by avoiding touching certain everyday items?

By: Ringo Bones

Human ergonomic studies conducted since the 1960s have shown that we humans who work in an urban office setting grab up to 30 objects a minute while at the same duration of time also tend to touch our faces at least five times. Given that droplets of moisture laden with flu viruses tend to increase their chances of infecting us humans as they get close to the proximity to our respiratory tract – as in within our facial area, are there steps – i.e. precautionary measures - to be taken to lessen our chances of getting the flu during the dreaded flu season?

Washing your hands thoroughly with soap and water or using an effective antimicrobial hand sanitizer before touching your face certainly helps, but there are everyday objects that you should be mindful of before touching them because they are seldom cleaned by those in charge of them. Restaurant menus are one of the usual magnets of microbial pathogens because they tend to be treated by antibacterial cleaning agents only after the restaurant’s closing time for the next day’s business. So too are fast-food and restaurant condiment dispensers that tend to be cleaned only after closing time.

Door knobs in public restrooms make excellent hubs for microbial pathogens on their way to infect us because users who go into the public restrooms tend to have already dirty hands and those exiting are more often than not – didn’t wash their hands thoroughly or used an effective hand sanitizer. And so too are water faucets in public restrooms, though you can lessen your chances of catching flu viruses from these by wiping them with paper towels before using them.

Shopping cart handles are also a veritable magnet of microbial pathogens and parents of toddlers should be wary because tots slung in the “kid holder” part of the shopping cart tend to lick the shopping cart handles with their tongues. But believe it or not, recent studies have found out that copper and silver coins do not harbor pathogens – contrary to earlier popular belief – because copper and silver ions formed on the surface of these types of coins tend to have excellent antibacterial properties. Ancient Egyptians even used copper and silver coins to purify drinking water by heating them and then dunking these metals into the container of water intended to be purified over 4,000 years ago.

Do Heavier People Live Longer Than Average?

Even though being “pleasingly plump” may only be in vogue during your grandparents’ generation, but do heavier people live a bit longer than average?

By: Ringo Bones

In a decade-long study conducted on 2.8 million research participants around the world by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have shown, surprisingly, that “slightly overweight people” - i.e. persons who weigh 5 to 6 percent above their ideal body mass index tend to live 5 to 6 percent longer than people who weigh within or below their ideal body mass index. Will the results of this research study undermine the commitment of those folks already sticking to their live-lengthening caloric restrictive diet regimen?

Even though morbidly obese people still have a way higher mortality rate in comparison to individuals who weigh within or slightly above their ideal body mass index, slightly heavier folks that weigh 5 to 6 percent above their ideal body mass index – especially if they can jog for a mile without collapsing – are living on average 5 to 6 percent longer than their thinner counterparts. The latest US-CDC study also show results that persons who weigh 5 to 6 percent above their ideal body mass index have a significantly statistically better chances of surviving during medical emergencies. Proving the old World War II-era adage of a “healthy pleasingly plump figure”?

Brown Fat Cells: The Secret To Combating Obesity?

Even though it is still a largely esoteric part of the human anatomy, does brown fat cells now hold the key in our battle against obesity?

By: Ringo Bones

Just look at every survey and study made since the mid-1990s about the incidence of obesity, chances are figures show that up to 33 percent of Americans are now obese. Worse still, her “poorer” neighbor south-of-the-border had shown an increasing rise in childhood obesity cases since the mid 1990s. Given that a proper diet and exercise alone seems powerless to halt the slowly - but so even perceptively – increasing cases of obesity, can another much healthier tactic be used to end this scourge of civilized mankind?

Since their scrutiny by medical researchers, brown fat cells had been found out to be active in infants as a way to keep them warm, but brown fat cells later turn off metabolically in adulthood. During the 1980s, MRI imaging technicians used to mistake dormant brown fat cells of adult patients being examined as cancer cells for their cancer-like imaging result in a typical MRI scanning session. Further studies in the 1990s had also shown that brown fat cells had kept our Stone-Age ancestors warm but our largely indoor lifestyle could have metabolically atrophied the main function of our brown fat cells – which is burning food sourced calories to keep us warm.

Dr. Norbert Stefan, an endocrinologist at Tubingen State University, specializes in the treatment of morbidly obese persons and persons with thyroid deficiency that made them morbidly obese. As latest medical research have shown that brown fat cells are packed with mitochondria and are a regional main hub for capillaries that controls our body’s core temperature, Dr. Stefan’s pioneering new method of curing obesity centers around increasing the metabolic rate of largely dormant brown fat cells in adults to make them burn more calories even when living out our present-day largely sedentary lifestyle.

A hormone treatment that’s used to be given to people with thyroid disorders had recently been trialed to activate the dormant brown fat cells in adults stricken with obesity, though the. Preliminary results have shown that more than 90 percent of the trial participants had their overall weight reduced down to much more healthier levels than before – especially those patients who also added dieting and exercise to the treatment. Could revitalizing our atrophied brown fat cells be the key to ending the scourge of obesity in out increasingly sedentary 21^st Century lifestyle? 

Arsenic Cancer Therapy

More famous as the poison of choice in murder mysteries due to its not so obvious symptoms, does arsenic has the potential for a more useful role in cancer therapy?

By: Ringo Bones

Since ancient times and until Victorian period murder mysteries, writers and murderers have often resorted to arsenic largely because its symptoms resemble that cholera. It wasn’t until the advances of analytic chemistry in the 19^th Century that law-enforcement forensic teams have amassed enough knowledge to tell whether arsenic was used to poison someone. And given its role as a cure for venereal diseases before the advent of antibiotics and its recently reprised role as a cure for antibiotic-resistant venereal diseases does arsenic – or more accurately arsenical compounds – now have a role in cancer therapy?

In a pilot study during the late 1990s, it was shown that certain medical arsenic compounds is given in low doses to patients with a rare form of leukemia known as APL or acute promyelocytic leukemia, nearly all patients go into remission.  The treatment – using all-trans retinoic acid (ATRA), a derivative of vitamin A,  is mixed with arsenic trioxide – has back then been found to have fewer side effects than conventional chemotherapy previously used on APL using only ATRA.

APL or acute promyelocytic leukemia is a subtype of acute myelogenous leukemia or AML, a cancer of the blood and bone marrow – and it is also known as acute progranulocytic leukemia. Acute promyelocytic leukemia was first identified in 1957 and from then until the elucidation of its developmental mechanism by medical researchers during the 1970s, APL had a 100 per cent mortality rate as there was still no effective treatment. After years of further study, it was later found out that APL is unique among myeloid types of leukemia due to its sensitivity to all-trans retinoic acid or ATRA. But it wasn’t until the chemotherapy regimen consisting of ATRA and arsenic trioxide that was developed during the late 1990s that APL leukemia was no longer the death sentence it previously was. 

Broccoli Based Cancer Therapy, Anyone?

It may be more infamous as one of the most despised vegetables by kids during mealtime, but does broccoli have something to contribute to humanity’s “war on cancer”?

By: Ringo Bones

 Imagine if you or someone close to you have just found out that they have cancer and the doctor recommends broccoli cancer therapy. Would they think that the cure is worse than the disease? Almost all of us at one time or another probably hate it as kids when we were quite almost literally forced feed it during mealtime and it is still an acquired taste for us when it is sautéed in some irresistible secret sauce in a typical Chinese haute cuisine, but did you know that broccoli might have something in it that can be used as a potential cure for cancer?

Dr. Ingrid Herr of Heidelberg University Hospital and her research team had just found out in a recent medical study that a chemical found in broccoli makes conventional chemotherapy more effective in treating ordinary cancer cells and even the more aggressive stem cell cancer cells. The chemical is called sulforaphane – an organosulfur compound that exhibits anti-cancer and antimicrobial properties. Even though sulforaphane was found to be effective in previous anti-cancer experimental models, the recent study by Dr. Herr was one of the first of its kind to be tried in a real-world scenario in conjunction with existing chemotherapy.

Sulforaphanes are not only found in broccoli but also in other cruciferous vegetables such as Brussels sprouts and cabbages. It is produced, or “synthesized”, when the enzyme myrosinase transforms glucoraphanin – a glucosinolate – into sulforaphane upon damage to the vegetable’s cellular structure via chewing. Young sprouts of broccoli and cauliflower are particularly rich in glucoraphanin. In previous studies, consumption of broccoli sprouts had also been shown to be potentially effective at inhibiting the growth of Helicobacter pylori in our stomachs. Sadly, this is a further proof that most foods that are genuinely good for our health are the one’s we don’t particularly like. 

Immunotherapy: Newfangled Cancer Therapy?

Medical science had been trumpeting for ages that the complete understanding of our bodies’ immune system will be the “Magic Bullet” when it comes to curing all known diseases. Can it be used to cure all forms of cancer, too?

By: Ringo Bones

Ever since the advent of advanced microscopy, medical researchers had been fascinated by the phenomena of Killer T-Cells attacking cancer cells and during the latter half of the 1990s, sophisticated medical scanning equipment had even observed – in real time – cancer cells being attacked by Killer T-Cells in a living subject as soon as they are formed. Given the fascinating capabilities thus observed so far about using the human body’s own immune system to cure cancer, how come is it still not a widely-used medical procedure?

In a BBC interview back in July 2012, Paul Werman – head of the Institute of Cancer Research – says that the lack of research funding is the biggest hurdle faced by immunotherapy researchers around the world from progressing beyond the experimental treatment phase. One common proven application of immunotherapy method is by growing the patient’s own Killer T-Cells in the lab. This method had been showing good results in cancer patients who are not responding well to current conventional chemotherapy regimens.

As commonly observed via advanced microscopy methods, Killer T-Cells usually surround near cancer cell clusters as soon as they form, but the Killer T-Cells only attack the cancer cells in fits and stops. Killer T-Cells only attack cancer cell clusters continuously only if enough of them surrounds a cancer cell cluster. But if improved on further, immunotherapy could prove very useful in treating inoperable tumors – i.e. tumors located in hard-to-reach parts of the human body and for use in patients who might not survive conventional aggressive chemotherapy and/or radiation treatment. And immunotherapy might not only be useful in cancer therapy, it can also be used to treat fast-mutating viral diseases like AIDS, avian influenza – and even the common cold.