Iraq toys with polygamy as solution for war widows
By Roula Ayoubi
BBC News, Baghdad


Years of conflict in Iraq have left the country with more than one million war widows and a shortage of young unmarried men - pressures that may be bringing about the return of polygamy.

Politicians have suggested financial incentives for men who marry widows.

Hanan lost eight members of her family in the war, including her husband, and was left to bring up three children alone.

The experience has not broken her. She continues to work as a hairdresser in her noisy and lively home on Haifa Street in Baghdad.

But she still needs a "man-shelter", she says - and this is why she ended up married to a married man.

"When he proposed to me, he said he was divorced," she says.

"But after we got married, he got back together with his first wife, because he has children with her."

He now stays with Hanan once a week. But while she has only reluctantly accepted a situation where she shares a husband with another woman, some in Iraq are actively promoting the idea of polygamy.

Dignity
It's a practice that became less common in the 20th Century, but politicians put forward a proposal last year to offer married men financial incentives to take on a second wife.

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FROM NATURAL NEWS

Radiation scientists agree TSA naked body scanners could cause breast cancer and sperm mutations

Learn more:http://www.naturalnews.com/030607_naked_body_scanners_radiation.html#ixzz1CdV1OPnD

(NaturalNews) The news about the potential health dangers of the TSA's naked body scanners just keeps getting worse. An increasing number of doctors and scientists are going public with their warnings about the health implications of subjecting yourself to naked body scanners. These include Dr Russell Blaylock (see below) as well as several professors from the University of California who are experts in X-ray imaging.

At the same time, some internet bloggers are insisting that the TSA's naked body scanners pose no health risks because air travelers are subjected to higher levels of radiation by simply enduring high-altitude flights where cosmic radiation isn't filtered out by the full thickness of the Earth's atmosphere. This comparison, however, is inaccurate: The TSA's body scanners focus radiation on the skin and organs near the skin whereas cosmic radiation during high-altitude flights is distributed across the entire mass of your body.

Comparing the total radiation exposure across your entire body to machine-emitted radiation exposure that focuses its ionizing radiation primarily on your skin is like comparing apples and oranges. You'll see this explained further, below, in the words of these scientists.

As Dr Russell Blaylock (www.BlaylockReport.com) recently reported:

The growing outrage over the Transportation Security Administration's new policy of backscatter scanning of airline passengers and enhanced pat-downs brings to mind these wise words from President Ronald Reagan: The nine most terrifying words in the English language are: I'm from the government and I'm here to help you. So, what is all the concern really about - will these radiation scanners increase your risk of cancer or other diseases? A group of scientists and professors from the University of California at San Francisco voiced their concern to Obama's science and technology adviser John Holdren in a well-stated letter back in April.

Learn more: http://www.naturalnews.com/030607_naked_body_scanners_radiation.html#ixzz1CdUrzgGM

Pneumonia drugs helped evolve a superbug
Microbe's genetic history charts its growing resistance to antibiotics and a vaccine
By Tina Hesman Saey

Sometimes natural selection gets a helping hand from humans. A new study tracing the genetic history of a nasty strain of pneumonia-causing bacteria shows that antibiotics and vaccines helped shape the microbe’s evolution.

In a technical tour de force, an international team of researchers deciphered the complete genetic blueprints of 240 samples of a strain of Streptococcus pneumoniae taken from sick people in 22 countries. The samples were isolated between 1984 and 2008, allowing researchers to see how the bacteria changed over time.

This strain of pneumonia, known as the Pneumococcal Molecular Epidemiology Network clone 1 or PMEN1, was first recognized in a hospital in Barcelona in 1984. But the new analysis indicates the strain probably first arose about 1970, the team reports in the Jan. 28 Science.

“When this clone emerged, it emerged into a world in which penicillin was frequently used,” says study coauthor Stephen Bentley, a molecular microbiologist at the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute in Hinxton, England. Because the strain was not killed by penicillin, it had an advantage over strains that were susceptible and quickly spread.

S. pneumoniae is a common cause of death, especially among young children. A recent estimate published in the Lancet, for example, showed the bacteria caused 14.5 million cases of serious disease in children aged 1 to 5 worldwide in 2000, killing about 826,000. The PMEN1 strain contributes to these totals and, because of its resistance to several different antibiotics, has become a public health concern. The strain is considered a major cause of pneumonia, meningitis and other infections worldwide. The new study reveals some of the genetic tricks the organism used to develop drug resistance.

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FROM THE NATURAL NEWS

Taco Bell beef faked? No more than the rest of the FDA-approved toxic food supply

Learn more:http://www.naturalnews.com/031147_Taco_Bell_beef.html#ixzz1CWnwkCkl


(NaturalNews) The word spread like wildfire across the internet: An Alabama law firm had filed a class action lawsuit against Taco Bell in California, saying its meat fails to meet the definition of beef set forth by the U.S. government (and even that's a pretty low hurdle, if you ask me). The lawsuit claims Taco Bell's meat cannot be honestly advertised as "beef" because it claims tests showed the meat was only 35% beef, not the 70% beef required by federal standards.

"It's mainly soy and oats, and there's lots of other stuff in there that I don't even know how to pronounce," said attorney Dee Miles.

Taco Bell responded quickly, saying theirmeatwas "88% beef" and that they buy the same brand ofbeefsold in supermarkets --Tyson Foods.

Oh well, that clears it all up, then. Tyson Foods.

And what's the other 12%? According toTaco Bell, it's water, spices, oats, starch and "otheringredients" that the restaurant says contribute to the "quality" of its beef. Apparently, Taco Bell believes the way to enhance the quality of beef is to throw in things that are not beef.

So what else might be found in that "other ingredients" category? A quick look at Taco Bell's own website reveals the restaurant uses all the following ingredients in its various menu offerings:

• Autolyzed Yeast Extract (which contains MSG, an excitotoxin)
• Red #40, Blue #1, Yellow #6 artificial colors
• Corn syrup solids
• Partially Hydrogenated Corn Oil
• Soy Protein
• Propylene Glycol Alginate
• Dimethylpolysiloxane (an anti-foaming chemical)

Source:http://www.tacobell.com/nutrition/i...

Are you seriously eating at Taco Bell?If you're eating at Taco Bell, there's not something wrong with their meat...there's something wrong with your head.

Even if Taco Bell's beef is 100% beef, it's still conventional beef from cows that are processed in factory farm operations (rather than open-range grass-fed cows). The soy ingredients used in Taco Bell foods are almost certainly GMO soy in origin. The other chemicals such as dimethylpolysiloxane make their foods sound more like chemical concoctions than real food.


Learn more:http://www.naturalnews.com/031147_Taco_Bell_beef.html#ixzz1CWnnp6ru

From the telegraph
Future criminals could be identified as toddlers
Tantrums and lack of self control in toddlers is a sign they may grow up to be drugs addicts and criminals, claims research.

Badly behaved children as young as three are also the most prone to financial and health problems in adulthood.
Researchers believe that identifying youngsters at such an early age could be a cheap way of tackling a range of issues from drug abuse to prison overcrowding.

The long term study followed more than 1,000 children in New Zealand through their lives to see if there was a connection between early behaviour and success in adulthood.

The youngsters were assessed by teachers, parents, observers and the participants themselves on a range of measures including "low frustration tolerance, lacks persistence in reaching goals, difficulty sticking with a task, overactive, acts before thinking, has difficulty waiting turn, restless, not conscientious".

They were then followed up later in life to see how they had turned out.

Prof Terrie Moffitt and Prof Avshalom Caspi, of Duke University, North Carolina, said the impulsivity and relative inability to think about the long-term gave them more difficulty with finances, like savings, home ownership and credit card debt.
They also were more likely to be single parents, have a criminal conviction record, and be dependent on alcohol, tobacco, cannabis and harder drugs.

The New Zealand children with low-self control were more likely to make poor choices as adolescents including taking up smoking, having unplanned pregnancies and dropping out of school.

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FROM DAILY MAIL

The rice with human genes
By SEAN POULTER
Last updated at 08:57 06 March 2007

The first GM food crop containing human genes is set to be approved for commercial production.

The laboratory-created rice produces some of the human proteins found in breast milk and saliva.

Its U.S. developers say they could be used to treat children with diarrhoea, a major killer in the Third World.

The rice is a major step in so-called Frankenstein Foods, the first mingling of human-origin genes and those from plants. But the U.S. Department of Agriculture has already signalled it plans to allow commercial cultivation.

The rice's producers, California-based Ventria Bioscience, have been given preliminary approval to grow it on more than 3,000 acres in Kansas. The company plans to harvest the proteins and use them in drinks, desserts, yoghurts and muesli bars.
The news provoked horror among GM critics and consumer groups on both sides of the Atlantic.

GeneWatch UK, which monitors new GM foods, described it as "very disturbing". Researcher Becky Price warned: "There are huge, huge health risks and people should rightly be concerned about this."

Friends of the Earth campaigner Clare Oxborrow said: "Using food crops and fields as glorified drug factories is a very worrying development.

"If these pharmaceutical crops end up on consumers' plates, the consequences for our health could be devastating.
"The biotech industry has already failed to prevent experimental GM rice contaminating the food chain.

"The Government must urge the U.S. to ban the production of drugs in food crops. It must also introduce tough measures to prevent illegal GM crops contaminating our food and ensure that biotech companies are liable for any damage their products cause."

In the U.S., the Union of Concerned Scientists, a policy advocacy group, warned: "It is unwise to produce drugs in plants outdoors.


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Europe to ban hundreds of herbal remedies
Safety concerns sparked drive to outlaw products

By Jeremy Laurance, Health Editor
Thursday, 30 December 2010

Hundreds of herbal medicinal products will be banned from sale in Britain next year under what campaigners say is a "discriminatory and disproportionate" European law.

With four months to go before the EU-wide ban is implemented, thousands of patients face the loss of herbal remedies that have been used in the UK for decades.

From 1 May 2011, traditional herbal medicinal products must be licensed or prescribed by a registered herbal practitioner to comply with an EU directive passed in 2004. The directive was introduced in response to rising concern over adverse effects caused by herbal medicines.

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THE HERALD SUN

Troops warned against using too much viagra

AUSTRALIAN soldiers who are entitled to taxpayer-funded Viagra pills have been warned about the dangers of erectile dysfunction drugs and told they can have just four tablets a month.

Defence personnel, including those on active duty in places such as Afghanistan, have also been informed they must be medically assessed as suffering from sexual performance problems before the pills will be prescribed to them.

The Defence surgeon-general has issued a health bulletin in response to concerns about the possible over-use and over-prescribing of the drugs by military personnel.

The warning applies to Viagra and Cialis medication and states that a proper diagnosis of erectile dysfunction must be made before troops can qualify for the drugs.

Service personnel deployed overseas, who qualify to receive the drugs, continue to obtain them on deployment.

Defence said higher doses were available if prescribed by a medical officer.

It said it had no idea how many defence members were using Viagra or Cialis and it confirmed the drugs were available to anyone who needed them, including soldiers at war.

Four brand name 50mg Viagra tablets sell for $115.95 on the internet and four 10mg Cialis tablets cost the same.

Generic Viagra can be purchased for $1.95 a tablet and blackmarket pills for even less.

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Scientific American

What, Me Care?
A recent study finds a decline in empathy among young people in the U.S.

Humans are unlikely to win the animal kingdom’s prize for fastest, strongest or largest, but we are world champions at understanding one another. This interpersonal prowess is fueled, at least in part, by empathy: our tendency to care about and share other people’s emotional experiences. Empathy is a cornerstone of human behavior and has long been considered innate. A forthcoming study, however, challenges this assumption by demonstrating that empathy levels have been declining over the past 30 years.

The research, led by Sara H. Konrath of the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor and published online in August in Personality and Social Psychology Review, found that college students’ self-reported empathy has declined since 1980, with an especially steep drop in the past 10 years. To make matters worse, during this same period students’ self-reported narcissism has reached new heights, according to research by Jean M. Twenge, a psychologist at San Diego State University.

An individual’s empathy can be assessed in many ways, but one of the most popular is simply asking people what they think of themselves. The Interpersonal Reactivity Index, a well-known questionnaire, taps empathy by asking whether responders agree to statements such as “I often have tender, concerned feelings for people less fortunate than me” and “I try to look at everybody’s side of a disagreement before I make a decision.” People vary a great deal in how empathic they consider themselves. Moreover, research confirms that the people who say they are empathic actually demonstrate empathy in discernible ways, ranging from mimicking others’ postures to helping people in need (for example, offering to take notes for a sick fellow student).

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