Category: Health

Canadian Youth Learn Smoking is Bad

Anti-smoking laws and advertising campaigns are working in Canada, which is most obviously a good thing since smoking destroys your health. The study notes that smoking has dropped across all age groups, but most significantly with teenagers.

“Fewer young Canadians are smoking, but they are still the group most at risk of being exposed to second-hand smoke, according to new data released Tuesday.

The results of the Canadian Community Health Survey, released by Statistics Canada, found that in 2005 about 40 per cent of non-smokers aged 12 to 17 reported being regularly exposed to second-hand smoke, far higher than the 11 per cent of those aged 65 and over and 19 per cent of 35 to 64 year olds.”

The Cycling Cog

The Cycling Cog is a website for cyclists, obviously, but the neat thing about this site is that it is web 2.0! It’s a social networking site for cyclists where they can find cycling tips and ride buddies. Features of the site include the ability for cyclists can create their own cycling groups, they can post their own events and blogs, plus post information that is important for the places they live in.

One thing I find particularly interesting is that people can post their stolen and recovered bikes.

WHO Paves Way for Medicines for the Poor

The World Health Organization is actually going to try to make drugs more affordable for the majority of the world.

“The resolution approved by the Assembly, the supreme decision-making body of the World Health Organisation (WHO), urges the 192 member states to make the manufacturing of pharmaceuticals a strategic sector, thus committing themselves to making R&D of medicines consistent with public interest needs a priority.

This was the response of health ministers at last week’s meeting in Geneva to the concerns of developing countries and humanitarian non-governmental organisations, which criticised the tendency of transnational pharmaceutical companies to concentrate their R&D efforts on diseases prevalent in affluent countries. “

Smoking Cannabis Does Not Increase Lung Cancer Risk

Cannabis LeafAccording to an article on Fox News, cannabis does not increase the risk of lung cancer in smokers. Even frequent users who have smoked tens of thousands of joints over their lifetime are at no greater risk than infrequent users or non-users.

The researchers are not sure exactly why this is, but think it may have something to do with the active ingredient in cannabis, THC.

Dancing Therapy Helps Children with Mental Illness

A research project in Sweden, the first of it’s kind, has shown that dance therapy is effective in treating AD/HD in boys and depression in girls. For sullen teenagers who often refuse or are unable to talk about what is troubling them, dance therapy helps to loosen them up and shake off their mental shackles.

Boys affected with AD/HD start out with frenetic, high energy dancing, and then move on to slower, more methodical exercises which require them to pay attention and mimic.

Depressed and self-destructive teenage girls learn self-esteem, setting limits and saying ‘no’ through flamenco dancing.

The researchers are hoping that other countries will introduce dance therapy as a compliment to traditional psychotherapy.