Top : 2007 : 2007_03_23

• Study Alcohol tobacco worse than drugs

• Man who had 3 hearts leaves Pa. hospital

• N.J. eyes HIV tests for moms newborns

• Study Seniors prefer to exercise alone

• Dutch hope to invent foods that prevent obesity

• Man gets probation for dead deer sex

Study Alcohol tobacco worse than drugs

Fri, 23 Mar 2007 07:41:13 GMT
By MARIA CHENG, AP Medical Writer
LONDON - New "landmark" research finds that alcohol and tobacco are more dangerous than some illegal drugs like marijuana or Ecstasy and should be classified as such in legal systems, according to a new British study.
In research published Friday in The Lancet magazine, Professor David Nutt of Britain's Bristol University and colleagues proposed a new framework for the classification of harmful substances, based on the actual risks posed to society. Their ranking listed alcohol and tobacco among the top 10 most dangerous substances.

Nutt and colleagues used three factors to determine the harm associated with any drug: the physical harm to the user, the drug's potential for addiction, and the impact on society of drug use. The researchers asked two groups of experts — psychiatrists specializing in addiction and legal or police officials with scientific or medical expertise — to assign scores to 20 different drugs, including heroin, cocaine, Ecstasy, amphetamines, and LSD.

Nutt and his colleagues then calculated the drugs' overall rankings. In the end, the experts agreed with each other — but not with the existing British classification of dangerous substances.

Heroin and cocaine were ranked most dangerous, followed by barbiturates and street methadone. Alcohol was the fifth-most harmful drug and tobacco the ninth most harmful. Cannabis came in 11th, and near the bottom of the list was Ecstasy.

According to existing British and U.S. drug policy, alcohol and tobacco are legal, while cannabis and Ecstasy are both illegal. Previous reports, including a study from a parliamentary committee last year, have questioned the scientific rationale for Britain's drug classification system.

"The current drug system is ill thought-out and arbitrary," said Nutt, referring to the United Kingdom's practice of assigning drugs to three distinct divisions, ostensibly based on the drugs' potential for harm. "The exclusion of alcohol and tobacco from the Misuse of Drugs Act is, from a scientific perspective, arbitrary," write Nutt and his colleagues in The Lancet.

Tobacco causes 40 percent of all hospital illnesses, while alcohol is blamed for more than half of all visits to hospital emergency rooms. The substances also harm society in other ways, damaging families and occupying police services.

Nutt hopes that the research will provoke debate within the UK and beyond about how drugs — including socially acceptable drugs such as alcohol — should be regulated. While different countries use different markers to classify dangerous drugs, none use a system like the one proposed by Nutt's study, which he hopes could serve as a framework for international authorities.

"This is a landmark paper," said Dr. Leslie Iversen, professor of pharmacology at Oxford University. Iversen was not connected to the research. "It is the first real step towards an evidence-based classification of drugs." He added that based on the paper's results, alcohol and tobacco could not reasonably be excluded.

"The rankings also suggest the need for better regulation of the more harmful drugs that are currently legal, i.e. tobacco and alcohol," wrote Wayne Hall, of the University of Queensland in Brisbane, Australia, in an accompanying Lancet commentary. Hall was not involved with Nutt's paper.

While experts agreed that criminalizing alcohol and tobacco would be challenging, they said that governments should review the penalties imposed for drug abuse and try to make them more reflective of the actual risks and damages involved.

Nutt called for more education so that people were aware of the risks of various drugs. "All drugs are dangerous," he said. "Even the ones people know and love and use every day."

Man who had 3 hearts leaves Pa. hospital

Fri, 23 Mar 2007 04:52:15 GMT
By KATHY MATHESON, Associated Press Writer
PHILADELPHIA - A 46-year-old man whose body was powered by three separate hearts in the span of a month walked out of the hospital Thursday and said he felt like competing in a triathlon. "I feel like a million dollars, actually," said patient Gary Onufer. "I feel like a whole new person."
Accompanied by his wife and hospital staff, Onufer took slow steps out of the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania as a donor heart beat in his thin frame. The organ replaced a temporary "Total Artificial Heart," a mechanical device that doctors said Onufer was the first person to receive in the Northeast.

"I feel like I could do a triathlon right now," said Onufer, an insurance agent from Ambler.

Onufer was "deathly ill" when he arrived at the Penn hospital on Feb. 1, said Dr. Michael Acker, one of his surgeons. Though doctors still aren't sure why, the seemingly healthy and active man was suffering from congestive heart failure and needed a new organ.

Most patients in that situation would have a device implanted in their ailing hearts to keep them alive until a donor can be found, health officials said. But doctors thought Onufer's heart, even with artificial help, was too weak to last the two months Acker said is normally needed to find a donor.

So they asked Onufer if he wanted to be a pioneer of sorts by undergoing the region's first implant of the Total Artificial Heart, made by Arizona-based SynCardia Systems.

Onufer said yes.

"My choices were very limited," he said Thursday. "I would have slowly died."

The apparatus, approved by the federal Food and Drug Administration in October 2004, is a modern version of the one invented by Dr. Robert Jarvik and first implanted in a patient 25 years ago.

On Feb. 12, doctors removed Onufer's failing heart in a six-hour procedure and replaced it with a Total Artificial Heart. Though it still required Onufer to stay at the hospital, the "bridge to transplant" allowed him to exercise and, essentially, heal the damage caused by his old heart while he awaited a donor.

"That's what was very exciting to us," said Acker.

Because Onufer's artificial heart worked so well, doctors could be more choosy in finding the right match for him, Acker said. It turned out that a suitable organ for Onufer came along 28 days after the artificial heart was implanted.

Onufer underwent a transplant March 11. Eleven days later, he was walking out of the hospital, holding a lucky Tin Man charm that had been given to him by a nurse. The character from "The Wizard of Oz" also needed a heart.

The past month has virtually been a blur, he said.

"It was like riding by the seat of my pants at 110 miles per hour," said Onufer.

His wife Joan agreed.

"It still hasn't sunk in," she said. "I'm just thankful that he's alive."

N.J. eyes HIV tests for moms newborns

Fri, 23 Mar 2007 01:20:59 GMT

TRENTON, N.J. - New Jersey would become the first state in the United States to require both pregnant women and newborns to be tested for HIV, under a proposal unveiled Thursday by an influential lawmaker.
Senate President Richard J. Codey said he will introduce legislation to require the testing unless the mother specifically chooses in writing to reject the test.

According to the Kaiser Foundation, a nonprofit research organization focusing on U.S. health care issues, four states — Arkansas, Michigan, Tennessee and Texas — require health care providers to test a mother for HIV, unless the mother specifically asks not to be tested.

Connecticut and New York are the only states that test all newborns, according to the foundation.

"The key in the fight against HIV and AIDS is early detection and treatment," said Codey, D-Essex. "For newborns this can be a lifesaving measure."

"If early detection can help reduce newborn infections and improve the quality of life for newborns and women that are infected, then by all means, we should be doing it," Codey added.

The bill would require that pregnant women be tested for HIV as early as possible in their pregnancy and again during their third trimester. Each birthing facility in the state would be required to test newborns in its care.

Current New Jersey law requires providers only to offer HIV testing to pregnant women.

The Center for Women Policy Studies, a Washington, D.C.-based feminist advocacy organization, opposes mandatory HIV testing, arguing it violates a woman's right to make childbearing and medical treatment decisions.

"There's an important issue about privacy and the right to make certain decisions about one's self," said Leslie Wolfe, the center's president. "What's really needed is good counseling, preventative education and conversations with respectful medical personnel and counselors about HIV."

The federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has recommended all pregnant women be tested for HIV, though it has said testing "should be voluntary and free of coercion."

The CDC found intervention can prevent many HIV-infected women from transmitting the virus to the infant.

Drugs during pregnancy, it found, can cut mother-to-child HIV transmission to 2 percent, compared to 13 percent if drugs aren't given to the baby until labor and delivery and 25 percent if no drugs are ever used.

Codey's bill would require doctors and health care providers give women information about HIV and AIDS, the benefits of being tested, medical treatment available to treat HIV infection and the reduced risk to a fetus if an HIV-infected pregnant woman receives treatment.

New Jersey has about 17,700 AIDS cases, according to the Kaiser Foundation, including about 5,800 women, the fifth-highest total for women in the United States.

Women represent 32.5 percent of all AIDS cases in the state, compared to a national average of 23.4 percent.

The Garden State has 772 pediatric AIDS cases, the third highest in the nation behind New York and Florida, and 409 pediatric HIV cases, the second highest in the nation behind New York, through 2005, according to the foundation.

"In a state with some of the highest HIV rates among women, this move should be a no-brainer," Codey said. "The additional benefit of testing every woman is that it reduces the stigma associated with testing only those based on their risk behaviors and should, as statistics show, make women less inclined to refuse the test."

Study Seniors prefer to exercise alone

Thu, 22 Mar 2007 22:57:55 GMT
By JEREMY HAINSWORTH, Associated Press Writer
VANCOUVER, British Columbia - Older people would rather exercise alone than be surrounded by a bunch of youthful hard bodies in Spandex, suggests a study that examined how group fitness appeals to people of different ages.
The results are a cautionary note about providing the right exercise setting for senior citizens, said University of British Columbia researcher Mark Beauchamp.

"A growing body of evidence suggests that a far greater proportion of people actually prefer to exercise alone with some instruction," rather than in a class, his study found.

Beauchamp, who works in UBC's School of Human Kinetics, said researchers found that people of all ages generally prefer to exercise with people their own age — or they may opt to go it alone. He noted that older people may be intimidated by "the Spandex-clad ideal" seen in some exercise environments.

Researchers studied the behaviors of 947 people, ranging in age from 30 to 92, in the northern English city of Leeds.

When people in their 30s and 40s were asked how they'd feel about exercising with twentysomethings, they responded positively. Not so for those 50 and up, the study found.

When people in their 60s and 70s were asked about exercising with those their same age, they reacted positively, while those in the other age groups were more negative about that prospect.

"All this study highlights is older adults can exercise in environments that are socially supportive," when given the right setting, Beauchamp said.

The study is to be published in the April issue of the Annals of Behavioral Medicine.

Dr. Barbara Resnick, an expert in geriatric exercise and motivation at the University of Maryland School of Nursing, said the study makes clear the importance of environment in getting older adults to exercise.

"There are many individuals who enjoy exercising with others, and surveys have confirmed that they enjoy exercising in formats which are Spandex-free and among others their own age and ability level," Resnick said. "Conversely, there are some older individuals who choose to exercise alone" with a variety of options, such as outdoors, she said.

Resnick said it's important for governments to promote physical activity both through community centers and through walking trails and other outdoor options.

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On the Web:

Society of Behavior Medicine: http://www.sbm.org

Dutch hope to invent foods that prevent obesity

Thu, 22 Mar 2007 18:56:48 GMT
By Anna Mudeva
WAGENINGEN, Netherlands - Scientists in the Netherlands are developing a new generation of foods that can help prevent obesity by making people eat less, a research institute said on Thursday.
The Top Institute Food and Nutrition , funded by the Dutch government and food groups like CSM Anglo-Dutch Unilever, is also developing food ingredients which can stop an obese person from developing diabetes.

&;We are working on certain food ingredients, which provoke more satiety than others do on the long run, so that our partners can use them in food manufacturing,&; said Professor Robert-Jan Brummer, program director at TIFN.

&;These products should trigger satiety and stop us eating more and more. They should also meet our dietary requirements, have a very good taste and be enjoyable to eat,&; he told Reuters.

Brummer declined to give details, saying it was a commercial secret, but added these nutrients could eventually be used in any kind of food from drinks to spreads and bread.

Several other research centers in the world are working to develop nutrients that could prevent obesity but Brummer said that none of them, including his own, had achieved big breakthroughs so far.

&;My feeling is that we will see a breakthrough in the next five years or so,&; he added.

Obesity is on the rise in many countries, including the United States, where 60 percent of the population is overweight or obese, Britain and elsewhere in Europe.

It is clearly a matter of people eating more calories than they burn off, but experts argue over whether diet or exercise is more important.

The Dutch public health agency concluded in a research report last ear that poor diet was as deleterious to health as smoking. It said 25 percent of deaths and serious illness caused by overweight and obesity would be avoided if adults shed 3 kg.

Brummer said his institute was developing food ingredients that can raise insulin sensitivity and prevent an obese person from developing diabetes, as well as looking for novel dietary ingredients, which can lower high blood pressure.

The TIFN has invented ingredients that can keep bread crust crispy for longer and a technology that lowers the total fat content in foods without compromising the taste.

Brummer said his institute was one of the first in the world to prove that folic acid vitamins can improve brain function and hearing in elderly people.

The European food industry, faced with increasing demand for healthier foods and competition from lower cost regions, is investing more in R&D to meet the challenge.

&;Twenty years ago, the industry was only interested to sell as much as possible. That has changed, the industry now feels responsibility to respond to the health situation,&; Brummer said.

&;On the other hand, such innovative products have higher margins than those of selling a tomato or a bottle of milk.&;

Man gets probation for dead deer sex

Fri, 23 Mar 2007 02:25:41 GMT

SUPERIOR, Wis. - A 20-year-old man received probation after he was convicted of having sexual contact with a dead deer. The sentence also requires Bryan James Hathaway to be evaluated as a sex offender and treated at the Institute for Psychological and Sexual Health in Duluth, Minn.
"The state believes that particular place is the best to provide treatment for the individual," Assistant District Attorney Jim Boughner said.

Hathaway's probation will be served at the same time as a nine-month jail sentence he received in February for violating his extended supervision.

He was found guilty in April 2005 of felony mistreatment of an animal after he killed a horse with the intention of having sex with it. He was sentenced to 18 months in jail and two years of extended supervision on that charge as well as six years of probation for taking and driving a vehicle without the owner's consent.

Hathaway pleaded no contest earlier this month to misdemeanor mistreatment of an animal for the incident involving the deer. He was sentenced Tuesday in Douglas County Circuit Court.

"The type of behavior is disturbing," Judge Michael Lucci said. "It's disturbing to the public. It's disturbing to the court."

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Information from: The Daily Telegram, http://www.superiorwi.com