It’s not exactly news that obesity is a huge issue in the US. In 2015, 30% of adults were considered obese, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). On top of that, Boston University School of Public Health sheds a new light on this extremely serious issue.

After analyzing national data from 1988 to 2014, researchers found that 51% of American men and 52% of American women have been obese at some point.

“The results suggest that a much larger fraction of the population is affected by obesity than is reflected by statistics on current weight status alone,” the researchers wrote.

Obesity is a really serious issue as it is tied to heart disease, poor mental health, chronic pain, and cancer. It is really important for those who suffer from it to eliminate completely the risk for certain health risk.

Obese people risk getting heart attacks, strokes, diabetes and liver diseases every day. So it is extremely important to fight this phenomenon and make sure than less and less Americans suffer from obesity every year.

Americans love dairy products. It’s no surprise that staple meals of the American diet are comprised of Mac n cheese and pizza. And, while foods such as these are clearly drenched in the presence of dairy, many other popular foods of the American diet such as ice cream, chocolate, milk, yogurt, some soups, bake mixes, and sauces all contain some amount of dairy. These foods are consumed by the majority of Americans every single day.

Therefore, it is interesting to note that according to the National Digestive Diseases Information Clearinghouse, about 30 to 50 million Americans are lactose intolerant. Cornell recently published a study that links lactose intolerance to people whose ancestors were not primarily from places where dairy herds were raised safely, such as in Europe.

The study elaborates on this implication saying that because people who had really available, safely made, dairy available to them were the people who developed an ability to digest milk, whereas people whose ancestors came from Africa or Asia where dairy was not as readily available, lost the ability to digest lactose.

Another interesting example of why this may be the case is that people of Northern European descent tend to retain the ability to produce the enzyme lactase and can healthily drink milk all their life while about 60 percent of people with primarily African and Asian descent stop producing lactase as they mature.

And while the population of Americans appears to be largely lactose intolerant, there is not a foreseeable future of America getting rid of all dairy products.  So, for the time being, if you find yourself having mostly negative responses to dairy containing foods, don’t feel bad. Many people are lactose intolerant. Luckily, there are some pills on the market to help aid dairy digestion.

The best diet is a varied one, one that has fruits, vegetables, proteins, carbs all together. Despite that, the latest trend is to avoid certain food categories to loose weigh as fast as possible. For instance, some diets suggest to eat proteins only avoiding carbs at all costs. We have found out what happens to your body when you do that.

The less serious results are a bad mood and a bad breath. When we stop eating carbs, we use the energies we accumulated in the past that are kept in our body as “emergency,” in case of need. Once we run out of “extra energies,” we are actually more hungry and want to eat more than we used to before we started the diet. So we start loosing and putting up weight, going up and down on the scale weekly. We loose weight fast but we gain more even faster. If we eat too much proteins we also risk damaging our kidneys to the point that we could get kidney stones. Besides those serious effects, this kind of diet can cause insomnia and food poisoning. From now on, do some research before starting an extreme diet!

All new residential buildings in the US state of California must be equipped with solar panels, while fifty-percent of the state’s electricity should come from carbon-free sources by 2030, California Energy Commission has been quoted as saying.

 Experts have calculated that these new requirements will reduce greenhouse gas emissions to the same degree as if 115,000 cars have been taken off the roads.

This move certainly seems like some good news amid growing concerns about climate change. But there are still questions to be answered. Here is what the average Californian should know about the local government’s ambitious plan.

The 2019 Energy Efficiency Standards mandates that new buildings must have better insulation and better ventilation, and requires energy-efficient lighting for commercial and buildings. The document also encourages the use of demand-responsive technologies that allow residents to store the extra energy that their solar-powered homes generate and use it over a longer period of time.

Builders in California now have two options – they can either add panels to individual homes or create shared power systems for residential complexes. These energy-efficient homes will still rely on the traditional grid for power supply at night. Also, homes whose location does not allow enough sunlight will be exempt from having solar panels installed on their roofs.

If approved by the Building Standards Commission by the end of this year, the new requirements for solar panels on residential buildings in California will come into force on January 1, 2020.
 

 

Tattoos might be unhealthy. So far, it was believed that if you were able to keep the area clean and avoid infection, there wasn’t any concern about your health. However, a new report by some researchers might prove something different. According to this studies, tattoos leave lasting impacts on your physiology, specifically on your lymph nodes, a piece of your immune and circulatory systems.

Scientists were able to analyze nanoparticles of ink from a tattoo that had been deposited in nearby lymph nodes. What they found is incredible: as it breaks down, the ink is transported and stored within the body.

If the tattoo artists are not using high-quality ink, it could be a very serious issue. “When someone wants to get a tattoo, they are often very careful in choosing a parlor where they use sterile needles that haven’t been used previously,” one of the study’s authors said. “No one checks the chemical composition of the colors, but our study shows that maybe they should.” Tattoo inks contain toxic materials such as chromium or nickel.

The issue is that all of these pigments eventually are either broken down or steadily move further into the body until they are deposited in the lymphatic tissue.

“We already knew that pigments from tattoos would travel to the lymph nodes because of visual evidence. The lymph nodes become tinted with the color of the tattoo,” said one of the researchers. “It is the response of the body to clean the site of entrance of the tattoo. What we didn’t know is that they do it in a nano form, which implies that they may not have the same behavior as the particles at a micro level. And that is the problem—we don’t know how nanoparticles react.”

U.S. studies show that people who use marijuana are significantly more likely to experience negative emotions, particularly feeling alienated from others. The studies reveal that they are more likely to feel that others wish them harm or are deceiving them. Brain scans reveal that the drug also increases signal connectivity in regions of the brain that have previously been linked to psychosis, which is associated with severe depression. Teenagers are particularly affected because their brains are still developing.

The study was done on 60 people in Bethesda, Maryland, half of whom are dependent on marijuana. Brain scans were also taken of all of the participants. Dr Cameron Carter, editor of the journal Biological Psychiatry: Cognitive Neuroscience and Neuroimaging, where the study was published, said: ‘These brain imaging data provide a link between changes in brain systems involved in reward and psychopathology and chronic cannabis abuse, suggesting a mechanism by which heavy use of this popular drug may lead to depression and other even more severe forms of mental illness.’

People who used cannabis at least twice to three times a week at 17 are more likely to experience hypomania (a mild form of mania, marked by elation and hyperactivity) in their early twenties. Research published over the summer discovered that going from an occasional use of marijuana to an everyday indulgence increases the risk of psychosis by up to 159 percent. Marijuana is thought to cause psychosis-like experiences by increasing a user’s risk of depression.

Study author Josiane Bourque from the University of Montreal said, ‘Our findings confirm that becoming a more regular marijuana user during adolescence is, indeed, associated with a risk of psychotic symptoms. They may be infrequent and thus not problematic for the adolescent. When these experiences are reported continuously, year after year, then there’s an increased risk of a first psychotic episode or another psychiatric condition.’

Earth is about 70% water. There are billions of organisms who reside deep within oceans and on the surface of exotic lakes that need to be surrounded by water constantly in order to survive and thrive.

Like these billions of creatures such as plankton, fish, eels, and more, all other living organisms rely on the presence and consumption of water to some extent. Humans are no exception, as water is one of the most important factors that make up the human body.

Up to 60% of the human adult body is comprised of water, which may be surprising to some, considering the mass of their bones and muscles. Along with making up a huge part of your body’s composition, water also regulates bodily functions and helps facilitate toxin removal and oxygen flow, just to name a couple of ways in which water is necessary. This is why it is so important for the average adult male to continuously consume water throughout the day in order to drink the recommended three liters per day.

Water not only regulates organ and bodily function but has a large variety of other health benefits as well.

For example, consuming an adequate amount of water can help you tolerate more pain, reduce over-consumption of unnecessary processed food by regulating your appetite, increase your energy level, clear your skin, aid in successful bodily excretion, and can clear your mind in order to allow your energy and brain to be more focused and present.

Setting the personal goal to consume more water every day can ultimately accumulate into all of these incredible health benefits.

It’s incredibly irritating, prevents us from comfortably enjoying the outdoors, and follows us everywhere. Can you guess what it is? Yep, it’s pollen. As Spring quickly approaches, so does the ever so loving allergy season. Make sure to stock up on soft tissues and allergy medications because it looks like it’s gonna be one rough season.

For those who struggle with seasonal allergies, symptoms such as sneezing, runny nose and itchy eyes may have already begun. That’s because the pollen season has come early this year. As of Friday, a high concentration of tree pollen was detected in Savannah, GA  and a moderate concentration was detected in Charleston, SC, according to the American Academy of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology’s National Allergy Bureau.

Supposedly, allergy season has hit the Sunshine State pretty hard, as it is already the most miserable in the country. Allergy experts say oak trees are to blame. As soon as the leaves drop, the plant starts to bloom and begin emitting tons of pollen into the air. However, the trees didn’t bloom until recently because of the frigid weather we had earlier in the year. But when the heat finally rolled around, the blooming all began at once.

“They’re bad; they’re catastrophically bad,” said Dr. Richard F Lockey, director of South Florida’s Division of Allergy and Immunology about the oak trees. “Suddenly huge numbers of trees are blooming at one time, and I think it’s going to be a shorter season but a much more violent season, there’s going to be much more pollen in the air,” Lockey said.

This statement can be reinforced by Pam Knox, an agricultural climatologist with the University of Georgia, who said, “The cold temperatures provide that dormancy that we really lacked the last couple of years. And the wet conditions, of course, have been good because the trees are well-watered going into the season.

So they’re ready to produce a lot of flowers and a lot of pollen with that.” Ultimately Knox is predicting a worse than usual pollen season, just like Lockey. And while that might mean headaches and runny noses if you have allergies, Knox says it’s actually a good sign.

“The ecosystem is in a pretty good shape going into this growing season, and that’s not only for trees like pine trees but should be good for agricultural purposes,” she said. While you may temporarily be suffering from allergy season, in the end it will be worth it to ultimately help our ecosystem

It’s not exactly news that obesity is a huge issue in the US. In 2015, 30% of adults were considered obese, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). On top of that, Boston University School of Public Health sheds a new light on this extremely serious issue.

After analyzing national data from 1988 to 2014, researchers found that 51% of American men and 52% of American women have been obese at some point.

“The results suggest that a much larger fraction of the population is affected by obesity than is reflected by statistics on current weight status alone,” the researchers wrote.

Obesity is a really serious issue as it is tied to heart disease, poor mental health, chronic pain, and cancer. It is really important for those who suffer from it to eliminate completely the risk for certain health risk.

Obese people risk getting heart attacks, strokes, diabetes and liver diseases every day. So it is extremely important to fight this phenomenon and make sure than less and less Americans suffer from obesity every year.

Americans love dairy products. It’s no surprise that staple meals of the American diet are comprised of Mac n cheese and pizza. And, while foods such as these are clearly drenched in the presence of dairy, many other popular foods of the American diet such as ice cream, chocolate, milk, yogurt, some soups, bake mixes, and sauces all contain some amount of dairy. These foods are consumed by the majority of Americans every single day.

Therefore, it is interesting to note that according to the National Digestive Diseases Information Clearinghouse, about 30 to 50 million Americans are lactose intolerant. Cornell recently published a study that links lactose intolerance to people whose ancestors were not primarily from places where dairy herds were raised safely, such as in Europe.

The study elaborates on this implication saying that because people who had really available, safely made, dairy available to them were the people who developed an ability to digest milk, whereas people whose ancestors came from Africa or Asia where dairy was not as readily available, lost the ability to digest lactose.

Another interesting example of why this may be the case is that people of Northern European descent tend to retain the ability to produce the enzyme lactase and can healthily drink milk all their life while about 60 percent of people with primarily African and Asian descent stop producing lactase as they mature.

And while the population of Americans appears to be largely lactose intolerant, there is not a foreseeable future of America getting rid of all dairy products.  So, for the time being, if you find yourself having mostly negative responses to dairy containing foods, don’t feel bad. Many people are lactose intolerant. Luckily, there are some pills on the market to help aid dairy digestion.

The best diet is a varied one, one that has fruits, vegetables, proteins, carbs all together. Despite that, the latest trend is to avoid certain food categories to loose weigh as fast as possible. For instance, some diets suggest to eat proteins only avoiding carbs at all costs. We have found out what happens to your body when you do that.

The less serious results are a bad mood and a bad breath. When we stop eating carbs, we use the energies we accumulated in the past that are kept in our body as “emergency,” in case of need. Once we run out of “extra energies,” we are actually more hungry and want to eat more than we used to before we started the diet. So we start loosing and putting up weight, going up and down on the scale weekly. We loose weight fast but we gain more even faster. If we eat too much proteins we also risk damaging our kidneys to the point that we could get kidney stones. Besides those serious effects, this kind of diet can cause insomnia and food poisoning. From now on, do some research before starting an extreme diet!

All new residential buildings in the US state of California must be equipped with solar panels, while fifty-percent of the state’s electricity should come from carbon-free sources by 2030, California Energy Commission has been quoted as saying.

 Experts have calculated that these new requirements will reduce greenhouse gas emissions to the same degree as if 115,000 cars have been taken off the roads.

This move certainly seems like some good news amid growing concerns about climate change. But there are still questions to be answered. Here is what the average Californian should know about the local government’s ambitious plan.

The 2019 Energy Efficiency Standards mandates that new buildings must have better insulation and better ventilation, and requires energy-efficient lighting for commercial and buildings. The document also encourages the use of demand-responsive technologies that allow residents to store the extra energy that their solar-powered homes generate and use it over a longer period of time.

Builders in California now have two options – they can either add panels to individual homes or create shared power systems for residential complexes. These energy-efficient homes will still rely on the traditional grid for power supply at night. Also, homes whose location does not allow enough sunlight will be exempt from having solar panels installed on their roofs.

If approved by the Building Standards Commission by the end of this year, the new requirements for solar panels on residential buildings in California will come into force on January 1, 2020.
 

 

Tattoos might be unhealthy. So far, it was believed that if you were able to keep the area clean and avoid infection, there wasn’t any concern about your health. However, a new report by some researchers might prove something different. According to this studies, tattoos leave lasting impacts on your physiology, specifically on your lymph nodes, a piece of your immune and circulatory systems.

Scientists were able to analyze nanoparticles of ink from a tattoo that had been deposited in nearby lymph nodes. What they found is incredible: as it breaks down, the ink is transported and stored within the body.

If the tattoo artists are not using high-quality ink, it could be a very serious issue. “When someone wants to get a tattoo, they are often very careful in choosing a parlor where they use sterile needles that haven’t been used previously,” one of the study’s authors said. “No one checks the chemical composition of the colors, but our study shows that maybe they should.” Tattoo inks contain toxic materials such as chromium or nickel.

The issue is that all of these pigments eventually are either broken down or steadily move further into the body until they are deposited in the lymphatic tissue.

“We already knew that pigments from tattoos would travel to the lymph nodes because of visual evidence. The lymph nodes become tinted with the color of the tattoo,” said one of the researchers. “It is the response of the body to clean the site of entrance of the tattoo. What we didn’t know is that they do it in a nano form, which implies that they may not have the same behavior as the particles at a micro level. And that is the problem—we don’t know how nanoparticles react.”

U.S. studies show that people who use marijuana are significantly more likely to experience negative emotions, particularly feeling alienated from others. The studies reveal that they are more likely to feel that others wish them harm or are deceiving them. Brain scans reveal that the drug also increases signal connectivity in regions of the brain that have previously been linked to psychosis, which is associated with severe depression. Teenagers are particularly affected because their brains are still developing.

The study was done on 60 people in Bethesda, Maryland, half of whom are dependent on marijuana. Brain scans were also taken of all of the participants. Dr Cameron Carter, editor of the journal Biological Psychiatry: Cognitive Neuroscience and Neuroimaging, where the study was published, said: ‘These brain imaging data provide a link between changes in brain systems involved in reward and psychopathology and chronic cannabis abuse, suggesting a mechanism by which heavy use of this popular drug may lead to depression and other even more severe forms of mental illness.’

People who used cannabis at least twice to three times a week at 17 are more likely to experience hypomania (a mild form of mania, marked by elation and hyperactivity) in their early twenties. Research published over the summer discovered that going from an occasional use of marijuana to an everyday indulgence increases the risk of psychosis by up to 159 percent. Marijuana is thought to cause psychosis-like experiences by increasing a user’s risk of depression.

Study author Josiane Bourque from the University of Montreal said, ‘Our findings confirm that becoming a more regular marijuana user during adolescence is, indeed, associated with a risk of psychotic symptoms. They may be infrequent and thus not problematic for the adolescent. When these experiences are reported continuously, year after year, then there’s an increased risk of a first psychotic episode or another psychiatric condition.’

Earth is about 70% water. There are billions of organisms who reside deep within oceans and on the surface of exotic lakes that need to be surrounded by water constantly in order to survive and thrive.

Like these billions of creatures such as plankton, fish, eels, and more, all other living organisms rely on the presence and consumption of water to some extent. Humans are no exception, as water is one of the most important factors that make up the human body.

Up to 60% of the human adult body is comprised of water, which may be surprising to some, considering the mass of their bones and muscles. Along with making up a huge part of your body’s composition, water also regulates bodily functions and helps facilitate toxin removal and oxygen flow, just to name a couple of ways in which water is necessary. This is why it is so important for the average adult male to continuously consume water throughout the day in order to drink the recommended three liters per day.

Water not only regulates organ and bodily function but has a large variety of other health benefits as well.

For example, consuming an adequate amount of water can help you tolerate more pain, reduce over-consumption of unnecessary processed food by regulating your appetite, increase your energy level, clear your skin, aid in successful bodily excretion, and can clear your mind in order to allow your energy and brain to be more focused and present.

Setting the personal goal to consume more water every day can ultimately accumulate into all of these incredible health benefits.

It’s incredibly irritating, prevents us from comfortably enjoying the outdoors, and follows us everywhere. Can you guess what it is? Yep, it’s pollen. As Spring quickly approaches, so does the ever so loving allergy season. Make sure to stock up on soft tissues and allergy medications because it looks like it’s gonna be one rough season.

For those who struggle with seasonal allergies, symptoms such as sneezing, runny nose and itchy eyes may have already begun. That’s because the pollen season has come early this year. As of Friday, a high concentration of tree pollen was detected in Savannah, GA  and a moderate concentration was detected in Charleston, SC, according to the American Academy of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology’s National Allergy Bureau.

Supposedly, allergy season has hit the Sunshine State pretty hard, as it is already the most miserable in the country. Allergy experts say oak trees are to blame. As soon as the leaves drop, the plant starts to bloom and begin emitting tons of pollen into the air. However, the trees didn’t bloom until recently because of the frigid weather we had earlier in the year. But when the heat finally rolled around, the blooming all began at once.

“They’re bad; they’re catastrophically bad,” said Dr. Richard F Lockey, director of South Florida’s Division of Allergy and Immunology about the oak trees. “Suddenly huge numbers of trees are blooming at one time, and I think it’s going to be a shorter season but a much more violent season, there’s going to be much more pollen in the air,” Lockey said.

This statement can be reinforced by Pam Knox, an agricultural climatologist with the University of Georgia, who said, “The cold temperatures provide that dormancy that we really lacked the last couple of years. And the wet conditions, of course, have been good because the trees are well-watered going into the season.

So they’re ready to produce a lot of flowers and a lot of pollen with that.” Ultimately Knox is predicting a worse than usual pollen season, just like Lockey. And while that might mean headaches and runny noses if you have allergies, Knox says it’s actually a good sign.

“The ecosystem is in a pretty good shape going into this growing season, and that’s not only for trees like pine trees but should be good for agricultural purposes,” she said. While you may temporarily be suffering from allergy season, in the end it will be worth it to ultimately help our ecosystem