Are slimming sprays dangerous?

I got a mail from a todaysgist reader asking me to warn people who are trying to lose weight to stay away from slimming sprays. 

Slimming spray is a slimming drug that is sprayed into the mouth and makes the user lose appetite for days. 

According to the reader, once you stop using it, it could lead to illness. 

One of her friends who used it for months recently passed away and she asked me to warn others. This is the first time I'll be hearing about slimming sprays.

 Is it really dangerous?

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Posted in: latest health news

At Last A Cure Is Found For HIV and AIDS

Dozens of HIV and AIDS patients in the Gambia, a tiny West African State have been cured using his secret concoction of boiled herbs, according to President Yahya Jammeh.

“Who am I to expect that everybody would praise me," President Jammeh said in a state television broadcast on Sunday evening, announcing that 68 patients had been cured and discharged from a treatment centre.

“Just as the Prophet Mohammed prevailed and established Islam, I have also prevailed to cure HIV/AIDS to the point that 68 are being discharged today," he said.

The World Health Organisation and the UN have said President Jammeh’s HIV/AIDS treatment is alarming mainly because patients are required to cease their anti-retroviral drugs making them more prone to infection.

However, the president said the cured group was the seventh batch of HIV/AIDS patients undergoing his herbal remedy to have been discharged since the treatments began five years ago.

President Jammeh said on Sunday that his government would fully integrate “natural medicine’’ to all the country’s hospitals, to complement Western medical techniques.

Recall that President Jammeh first announced he had found a natural remedy to cure HIV and AIDS in 2007, stirring anger among Western medical experts who claimed he was giving false hope to the sick.

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Posted in: HIV infections,latest health news

Infected Vegetables Can Cause Hepatitis

 Dr Mudashiru Uthman of University of Ilorin Teaching Hospital, (UITH), said on Monday that vegetables grown with infected human faeces as manure could lead to Hepatitis B.

The consultant public health physician told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Ilorin that hepatitis was a viral disease that killed fast.Hepatitis B is deadlier than HIV, as its virus survives longer while outside the body system, especially in its dry state.

The virus could be transmitted when vegetables grown with infected human faeces used as manure are eaten without being boiled properly.

Any person infected with a severe kind of Hepatitis B could die within one month of being infected, if not properly treated at the point of diagnosis,'' Uthman said.He said that the disease was transmitted through ``faeco-oral route’’, that is from faeces to the mouth as well as through unprotected sex.

“Just like HIV virus is transmitted, Hepatitis B and other types can be transmitted through unprotected sex, use of contaminated sharp objects; child-birth transmission in terms of Mother-to-Child transmission, among others,” he added.

The medical expert advised people to go for periodic medical tests in order to detect the virus at early stage and prevent sudden death.

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Posted in: Hepatitis news,infected vegetables

Fertility envy: It should be the greatest joy you can share with a friend, so why does pregnancy often drive such a wedge between women? One writer tells her story

Ateh Jewl - pictured with her twin daughters, Adanna, left, and Ola, right - did not receive the support she had hoped she would when she announced her pregnancy to her friends

From the moment the positive pink lines appeared on my pregnancy test, I couldn't wait to share my news with family and friends. At 32, I had prepared myself for the fact that I might have problems conceiving, but when it happened as soon as we started trying I couldn't believe my luck. Ever cautious, my husband urged me to wait until we'd passed the three months mark before I told anyone — and I reluctantly agreed.

 I crossed the days off until I could finally pick up the phone to tell my best friends that, not only was I going to be a mother, but I was having twins. I pictured them screaming with delight, desperate to hear every detail. After all, there had not been a time in my life — from getting my first job to buying my first flat — when they hadn't been there for me. But, as I announced the news to my closest childhood friend, I was met with a stony silence then a barrage of aggressive questions.

 'Why didn’t you tell me you were trying?' she wanted to know. 'Why now? I thought you were going to move house before you started a family.' The silence returned before she muttered her congratulations and made a hurried excuse about having to go. But as she put down the phone I heard muffled tears and a sob.

'People struggling to have a baby can be in a desperate place and are in some ways not themselves'

I felt confused and hurt. What had I done wrong? When I called her again a few days later, she broke down. Unbeknown to me, she had been trying to get pregnant for nearly three years and was now forced to start thinking about IVF or adoption. My good news was salt in her wound — and the fact that it had happened so quickly made matters worse.

 I felt terrible to have upset her and guilty that I hadn't known what she’d been going through. We'd met at primary school and been through everything together: first boyfriends, dodgy hairstyles and an embarrassing obsession with Britney Spears. As teenagers we'd shared our dreams about getting wed and having children, and laughed about how much fun it would be if we did it at the same time. 

The fact that I didn't even know she'd been trying for a baby highlighted the huge gulf that had formed between us — and now it was only going to get bigger. But it wasn't just her. My pregnancy caused hidden — and sometimes not-so-hidden — tensions with many of my friends, some of whom were struggling to conceive or had gone through the silent anguish of miscarriage.

'When couples first try for a baby they're very optimistic but if they don't succeed they can start to feel like they are the only people on the planet it's not happening for'

One friend who I'd worked with for seven years suddenly told me she was on her third course of IVF. My news prompted her to break down and blurt out: 'Why should you be able to have two babies when I only want one? It's not fair. I have to go through weeks of needles, injections and surgery, and I might not even get a child at the end of it.' I didn't know what to say. She was right; it wasn’t fair — but it also wasn't my fault. We'd planned our careers together and always encouraged each other work-wise, yet when it came to babies she couldn't accept that it came more easily to me than her.

 In fact, the only friends who were excited for me were the ones who were single or not interested in starting a family yet. I thought they would be the least likely to want to meet up given the fact that now I was pregnant I was 'boring'. Obviously I couldn't go out drinking with them in the same way as before but that didn't matter — they were overjoyed for me and came round with pregnancy books and presents from Baby Gap.

 The difference was they had no reason to feel angry and resentful. While I was totally unprepared for the reaction my pregnancy prompted, experts say that it's very common for friendships to be affected by fertility issues. 'When couples first try for a baby they're very optimistic but if they don't succeed they can start to feel like they are the only people on the planet it's not happening for,' says fertility expert Zita West. 'It's no surprise that they then dread friends and family announcing their pregnancies. Many women tell me they're happy for their pregnant friends but they also can't help feeling upset, jealous and angry at the unfairness of the situation'. BABY BOTHER After pregnancy itself, infertility is the most common reason for women aged 20- to 40 to see their GP.

 For some women, it's not even possible to be pleased for their expectant friends — their own feelings of failure and heartbreak about being unable to conceive are so primal they simply cannot put on a brave face. 'People struggling to have a baby can be in a desperate place and are in some ways not themselves,' says psychologist Lucy Beresford. 'Friends you expect to be supportive may be unable to put their emotions aside, grit their teeth and be pleased for you. It can be very hurtful and cause a huge gulf in friendships.' Another good friend, who'd had numerous rounds of failed IVF, told me quite candidly that she wasn't sure our 15-year friendship could survive my pregnancy. 

 Friends you expect to be supportive may be unable to put their emotions aside, grit their teeth and be pleased for you. It can be very hurtful and cause a huge gulf in friendships.' Another good friend, who'd had numerous rounds of failed IVF, told me quite candidly that she wasn't sure our 15-year friendship could survive my pregnancy. She wrote me an email saying that she felt 'our lives are about to go in two very different directions.' I was shocked — when I got married she helped me to organise everything from the ceremony to my hen do and I'd done the same for her.

 While I respected the fact that she was brave enough to tell me how she felt, I was heartbroken that the happiest news in my life upset her so much that she couldn't bear to be around me. I also felt scared and alone. Being pregnant with twins was challenging in itself; the morning sickness lasted all day and I was constantly exhausted. More than ever I needed my support network. I craved people to talk to — and not just about my pregnancy. I still wanted to gossip and discuss EastEnders but my three best friends in the world couldn't even bear to speak to me. As my bump grew, some friends made excuses when I tried to arrange to meet up. 

One was honest, and admitted that it was because looking at my growing tummy was too upsetting. 'I can’t even walk past playgrounds, pregnant women in the street or a buggy without bursting into tears,' she said. My heart broke for her, but while once upon a time I would have told her it was all going to be OK, that was the last thing she wanted to hear from a pregnant person. Any advice from me simply sounded smug. I started planning a baby shower but then envisaged myself sitting alone surrounded by pink cupcakes and teddy bears. In the end I felt I had to avoid talking about my pregnancy to certain friends.

 I downplayed things I should have been excited to tell them about — like feeling the girls' first kicks, picking out my first pram or going to ante-natal classes. Instead of talking about my latest doctor's visit or ultrasound — as I was desperate to — I would listen to hours of their conversation about IVF and then share my own good news with taxi drivers, or people in shops who I knew wouldn’t get upset. I remember going to buy some body oil for my stretchmarks and being asked by an old lady in the queue when I was due.

 I broke down and spent the next hour telling her about how scared I was about the birth and whether both babies would be OK. I got really teary because I realised I should have been able to discuss this with friends I'd known for years rather than a stranger in Boots. My husband was very protective of me and thought I should avoid or even ditch the friends who were being so negative. He simply couldn't understand why my friends were behaving in such a way. 

But I wanted to maintain the relationships — being pregnant made me feel vulnerable and I needed them more than ever. Also, I was too racked with guilt about my own good luck to tell my friends how I was feeling about their reaction. On one occasion I did confront a friend by saying I felt like she changed the subject any time I mentioned anything to do with the baby. She acted surprised, but afterwards I received a seven-page email with links to articles on how to handle infertile friends.

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Posted in: latest health news,pregnancy news

UK health backs 12-week abortion limit

Britain's new health secretary has said he favors reducing the limit for women to have abortions from 24 weeks of pregnancy to 12, reigniting a divisive political debate and sparking criticism from women's rights activists Saturday.

Jeremy Hunt, who took up the job just a few weeks ago, said that after studying unspecified evidence he believed that 12 weeks was "the right point." In an interview with the Times newspaper published Saturday, he said: "It is just my view about that incredibly difficult question about the moment that we should deem life to start."

The remarks, coming just before the annual Conservative Party conference, immediately stirred up debate and drew criticism from pro-abortion rights campaigners and some health professionals. Abortion is an increasingly sensitive political issue in Britain, though not as much so as in the U.S., where it has flared up in the presidential campaign despite the candidates' reluctance to dwell on the topic.

The prime minister's office stressed that Hunt was expressing purely personal views, and that the government has no plans to change laws on abortion. But campaigners for abortion rights reacted strongly, attacking the comments as "insulting to women."

"I think women and families across the country will find it staggering that the priority for this government is playing politics with people's lives like this," opposition Labour Party health spokeswoman Diane Abbott said. "Late abortion only affects a small number of women, who are often in extremely challenging circumstances."

Abortion is legal in England, Wales and Scotland up until 24 weeks of gestation, although 91 percent of terminations were carried out before 13 weeks last year. Only 2 percent were carried out after 20 weeks, according to the National Health Service. Abortion is illegal in Northern Ireland except when the mother's life is in danger or there is a serious threat to her health.

Supporters for reducing the current legal limit argue that abortions should not be allowed past 20 weeks because by then a baby is often "viable," or has potential for life.

Opponents argue that the current limit should be kept because severe health problems such as Down's syndrome are often not revealed in testing until later in the pregnancy. Some women may also not become aware they are pregnant at 12 weeks, or not have access to abortion services until later in their term. Women should be allowed to have a choice for later-term abortion in such cases, they say.

Hunt's comments followed recent comments by Culture Secretary Maria Miller, also the minister for women, who said she would like to see the law tightened so that the limit comes down to 20 weeks.

Prime Minister David Cameron said that he did not agree with Hunt's position, and instead personally favored a more "modest" reduction in the legal limit. Home Secretary Theresa May expressed similar views Saturday, telling the BBC in an interview that "there is scope for some reduction."

The Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists said that lowering the time limit would not reduce the abortion rate, and may only drive abortion procedures underground.

"Reducing the time limit to 12 weeks would severely limit women's choice at an extremely difficult time in their life," spokeswoman Dr. Kate Guthrie said.

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Posted in: abortion gist

18,898 Test HIV Positive in Niger

 Minna — Between 2007 to date, 18,898 people out of 575, 792 tested positive to HIV/AIDS after diagnosis in Niger State, the state Commissioner for Health, Dr. Ibrahim Sule, has said.

The commissioner, who made the disclosure in Minna yesterday, also said that 15, 617 people are on antiretroviral drugs.

Dr Sule also said that 108, 280 pregnant women were screened out of which 1,836 were also placed on drugs.

The commissioner called on the people state to endeavour to go for screening so as to be able to know their status, adding that HIV/AIDS is real.

In another development, the Director General of Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) in the state, Mr. Joshua Bawa said that the state in collaboration with Federal Governments was planning to expend N800m on development projects in Edati, Katcha, Rafi and Agwara local government areas of the state.

He added that Niger State was among the 18 states selected in the country that will benefit from N150m of 2012 Special Conditional Cash Transfer (CCT), noting that CCT programme is targeting over 1,875 extremely poor households over a period of one year in the state.

Mr. Bawa further said government is also planning to spend N600m on water and sanitation, health and education in Lavun, Munya Wushishi LGAs.

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Posted in: HIV infections,HIV statistics

Anthropologist Finds Evidence of Hominin Meat Eating 1.5 Million Years Ago: Eating Meat May Have 'Made Us Human'

"Meat eating has always been considered one of the things that made us human, with the protein contributing to the growth of our brains," said Charles Musiba, Ph.D., associate professor of anthropology at the University of Colorado Denver, who helped make the discovery. "Our work shows that 1.5 million years ago we were not opportunistic meat eaters, we were actively hunting and eating meat." The study was published October 3 in the peer-reviewed journal PLOS ONE. 

The two-inch skull fragment was found at the famed Olduvai Gorge in northern Tanzania, a site that for decades has yielded numerous clues into the evolution of modern humans and is sometimes called `the cradle of mankind.' The fragment belonged to a 2-year-old child and showed signs of porotic hyperostosis associated with anemia. 

According to the study, the condition was likely caused by a diet suddenly lacking in meat. "The presence of anemia-induced porotic hyperostosis…indicates indirectly that by at least the early Pleistocene meat had become so essential to proper hominin functioning that its paucity or lack led to deleterious pathological conditions," the study said.

 "Because fossils of very young hominin children are so rare in the early Pleistocene fossil record of East Africa, the occurrence of porotic hyperostosis in one…suggests we have only scratched the surface in our understanding of nutrition and health in ancestral populations of the deep past."

 Musiba said the evidence showed that the juvenile's diet was deficient in vitamin B12 and B9. Meat seems to have been cut off during the weaning process. "He was not getting the proper nutrients and probably died of malnutrition," he said. The study offers insights into the evolution of hominins including Homo sapiens. 

Musiba said the movement from a scavenger, largely plant-eating lifestyle to a meat-eating one may have provided the protein needed to grow our brains and give us an evolutionary boost. Some scientists have argued that we became human when we became carnivorous-omnivorous creatures. 

"Meat eating is associated with brain development," he said. "The brain is a large organ and requires a lot of energy. We are beginning to think more about the relationship between brain expansion and a high protein diet." 

Humans are one of the few surviving species with such a large brain to body size ratio. Chimpanzees, our closest relatives, eat little meat and have far less brain capacity than humans, Musiba said. "That separates us from our distant cousins," he said. "The question is what triggered our meat eating? Was it a changing environment?

 Was it the expansion of the brain itself? We don't really know." Four students participating in the CU Denver Tanzania Field School were at Olduvai Gorge when the skull fragment was discovered. 

"It was a great experience for them," said Musiba, director of the Field School and a native of Tanzania. "Hopefully, it will inspire even more students to come to Africa and help us find answers to the questions posed by these discoveries."

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Posted in: latest health news

Women, 47, forced to have leg amputated after discovering 'blood blister' is deadly cancer

A grandmother will have her leg amputated after developing what she thought was a blood blister. Ms Skelton, 47, has had primary lymphoedema, a chronic condition that causes swelling in the body's tissue, in her leg for more than 20 years. But when her leg began to bleed Vicki sought help first from her GP in April, then from her nearest accident and emergency department in Hull in July. 

 But it wasn't until last month that doctors told her she had a rare cancer. She was horrified to learn they would need to remove her left leg from above the knee to try and stop it from spreading.

Ms Skelton, from Hull, said: 'If I don't have my leg amputated, I will die. It started off as a blood blister and I think if they had known what it was, it might not have been like it is now and I might not be losing my leg. 'I have no choice and I'm gutted. 

After the operation, I have to have chemotherapy and, even after all that, they still don't know if it will be clear. 'They said the way this cancer works, it will go straight to the lungs. They are clear at the moment but you just don't know what's going to happen.'

Vicki is staying at Castle Hill Hospital in Cottingham and recent tests confirmed she had angiosarcoma, a rare cancer of the blood vessels, in her ankle. She claims her prognosis may have been better if services to manage the primary lymphoedema were available in Hull and the tumour in her leg had been detected sooner. 

 Primary lymphoema is caused by mutations in some of the genes responsible for the development of the lymphatic system. This results in problems in draining fluids from the body properly, and it is treated using massage and compression bandages. Vicki said there is a possibility of having an artificial limb in the future but the swelling due to her condition may make it difficult.

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Posted in: cancer news,latest health news

Baby boy diagnosed with SIX eye tumours

Among the dozens of photos that proud parents Curtis and Leonie Norville were taking of their newborn son, one in particular stood out. The striking image showed nine-week-old Romero lying on a play mat with a ghostly white reflection in his left eye. Alarm bells immediately started ringing for Mr Norville, a professional photographer and cameraman who had never seen anything like it before. 

 After a trip to the GP, Romero was swiftly referred to a local children’s hospital where a consultant delivered the devastating news that a rare eye cancer had caused a large tumour behind the eye – and five smaller ones behind his right eye. Four months on, Romero is responding to chemotherapy and laser treatment. But his parents have decided to speak out about his case to warn other parents about the condition. ‘When we were told he had tumours it was heartbreaking and Leonie was hysterical.

 'She was crying her eyes out,’ said Mr Norville, who is in his 30s and from Perry Barr in Birmingham. ‘We’d never heard of this condition before. No one in our family had had it. Our world fell apart. ‘But he is responding well to treatment. Romero has been very good and the only problem is he wakes up a lot at night because chemotherapy makes babies feed little and often.’

 Mrs Norville, an adult social services manager, added: ‘At first when we heard the news I would cry every day – away from Romero so he wouldn’t pick up on our unhappiness. Now we take it one day at a time.’ The couple first spotted something was wrong at the end of May. ‘Romero is our first child so we were taking lots of photos with a camera phone,’ said Mr Norville. 

‘Sometimes you get red eye in the photos but this looked almost like a hole in his eye. ‘We went to the GP who said the eye wasn’t reflecting light and referred us to Birmingham Children’s Hospital.’ Within days, tests revealed the mass of tumours behind his eyes.

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Posted in: latest health news

Did having her ears pierced make this schoolgirl's heart stop?

When 16-year-old Jess Smith visited her GP about the pains in her chest, she was told they were nothing more than a spot of indigestion. Within days, she was undergoing seven hours of emergency open-heart surgery. 

The teenager, who had previously been considered perfectly healthy, suffered heart failure from an infection which she may have picked up when she had her ears pierced a year earlier. 

 She had a heart attack and was in intensive care for three weeks after being struck by a rare condition which usually affects people more than three times her age. Jess, then a keen dancer and gymnast, visited her GP in September last year. 

She was told her chest pains were probably caused by indigestion and to take the heartburn remedy Gaviscon. When she did not feel any better and returned a week later, a second doctor realised she was suffering from heart failure and could be dead within days.

 She was diagnosed with endocarditis – a rare infection of the heart – and was admitted to hospital for open-heart surgery, during which doctors replaced her heart valves. Just 24 hours after her operation she suffered a heart attack and then spent a total of seven weeks in hospital.

 The trainee hairdresser from Camborne, Cornwall, now 17, is on a heart transplant waiting list. She said: ‘At first I thought it was indigestion. I went back [to the doctors], thinking it was a chest infection. I couldn’t believe it when they said it was my heart. ‘You expect your older relatives to suffer from heart attacks, not people my age.’

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Posted in: 16-year-old Jess Smith,latest health news