Hyvin
A Natural Health and Wellness Blog

On May 16, 2006, the Annals of Internal Medicine reported that, based on an analysis of data from the the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) (from 1999 to 2002), 4.1 million Americans have been infected with the hepatitis C virus (HVC), and most of them have chronic infection. That’s a huge number of people.

According to the Reuters Health report of this article:

Chronic hepatitis C is the leading reason for liver transplantation and up to 5 percent of people with chronic disease will die.

We took a look a couple of weeks ago at the amazing role of the liver in the body and its many critical functions. I am so pleased to tell you that there is a relatively new product available that has been clinically proven to significantly reduce HVC levels in patients with high viral titers!

Talk about a timely public health solution!

This is one of those things that makes me slap my forehead and say, “You’ve got to be kidding!”

According to Reuters Health:

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration said on Monday that product labels for three popular asthma medications have been updated to state that the drugs could increase the chance of severe asthma attacks that could result in death.

What is wrong with this picture?! How can these drug companies keep a straight face when they say “here, we have a drug to help your asthma, but it may cause severe asthma attacks”… but this is no laughing matter!

If you’d like some natural health and wellness ideas for dealing with asthma, approaches that can only help and do no harm, please contact me.

According to the National Institute of Health website, the NIH will hold a “State-of-the-Science” conference from May 15-17 to examine the effects of multi-vitamin/mineral (MVM) supplementation on chronic disease prevention.

Awesome! I look forward to the results of this conference.

The panel experts will likely be looking at studies such as these conducted by my favorite supplement company to prove the efficacy of their MVM:

Effects of Calcium and Micronutrients on Premenopausal and Postmenopausal Bone Loss. J Am Med Assoc 1980;244:1915 (abstract).

Multivitamin-mineral Supplementation: Effects on Blood Chemistries of College-Age Women. Spiller, Pattison, Jensen, Wong, Whittam, Scala. Acta Vitaminol Enzymol 1985;7:217-22.

Calcium Nutrition and Skeletal and Alveolar Bone Health. Albanese, Lorenze, Edelson . Nutr Rep Int 1985;31:741-55.

Homocysteine Lowering in Men and Women with Normal Plasma Homocysteine Levels. Spiller, Bruce, Jensen. J Am Coll Nutr 1998;17:530 (abstract).

Effect of Long-Term Vitamin-Mineral Supplements on Immune Response in Older Healthy Adults. Spiller, Whittam, Bruce, Morse, Chernoff, Jensen. J Am Coll Nutr 1998;17:511 (abstract).

We just learned thatU.S. health ranks behind England in terms of diabetes, heart disease, strokes, lung disease, and cancer.

Now here’s news that the U.S. ranks behind lots of countries for newborn survival rates. Can you believe that?! And why?

According to a Fox News report of this recent ranking, researchers identified lack of national health insurance and short maternity leaves in the U.S. as contributors. Fox also cited a health policy expert who claimed that, while the U.S. excels in high-tech services for complicated cases, Americans lack (by not paying for) basic preventative health care.

Basic preventative health care… hmm… prevention… hmm… not very flashy, is it? Isn’t that what it’s all about for those of us trying to adopt natural health and wellness measures? That is TRUE health care (not the “sickness care” of the medical establishment).

I agree that our traditional medical field provides incredibly valuable services for “high-tech” procedures like complicated surgeries, but I do think we would do well to rely less on the medical establishment for this basic preventative care. This report suggests it’s not there anyway, and we CAN do much more for ourselves, don’t you think?

Have you seen the news reports on recent research concluding that Americans are much sicker than people from England? This is despite the fact that “U.S. health care spending is double what England spends on each of its citizens”, according to the Yahoo News account of the comparison.

Released in the Journal of the American Medical Association, these results appear to be confounding the “experts.” A lot of possible contributing variables have been accounted for (wealth, ethnicity, education, etc.) and the English are still healthier than us, with lower rates of diabetes, heart disease, strokes, lung disease, and cancer!

Now, I’ve always believed that “health care” is a misnomer; it should be called “sickness care.” The medical profession’s role is primarily the treatment of disease, so if we want to know why we, as a nation, are sicker, methinks we better look at what makes us sick, not what we spend when we get sick. And what does make us so much sicker than the English?

Well, I suspect that it not a one-answer question, but I DO believe we should be looking at individuals’ basic health and wellness choices: diets, exercise patterns, use of nutritional supplements, exposure to toxic substances in daily life, and so on. I firmly believe that these things make a huge difference in many cases.

I’m no expert, but I’m not nearly as confounded as they appear to be. It wouldn’t surprise me at all to learn that the U.S. lags behind England (and many other countries) in basic health and wellness practices. We reap what we sow, don’t you think?

Sleep has been in the news more often lately (now, don’t start yawning! ). Two polls showing that youth aren’t getting enough sleep have recently been released.

Here are the results of a KidsHealth® KidsPoll:

• On average, kids were short nearly 90 minutes of sleep each night.
• 70% of kids said they would like to get more sleep than they usually get.
• 39% of kids said they feel very sleepy when it’s time to wake up on schooldays.
• 40% of kids said they’re tired or sleepy at school every day or often.

And CNN just reported on a poll of adolescents conducted by the National Sleep Foundation which found that only 20% of teens get enough sleep!

As I admitted to you before, I was guilty of this same teen behavior, which extended even beyond my teen years. And we know the consequences of a sleep deficit: lack of concentration, poorer learning ability, emotional and physical health impediment, unsafe conditions (as in when driving), moodiness, and don’t forget just feeling crummy!!

On top of that, the CNN report of this study stated that: “[T]he agency [National Institute of Health] said there is growing evidence linking a chronic lack of sleep with an increased risk of obesity, diabetes, heart disease and infections.”

Okay, okay, can we just go to bed now!

There was a fascinating article in the November 2005 National Geographic on centenarians — specific populations that have very long-lived members. One of the common denominators among these groups is their healthy diets: natural whole foods, no “junk” food. The journalist on assignment stated that how long you live (and how well) is influenced 30% by genetics and 70% by lifestyle. So being hyvin [well] really is up to you!

We’ve been hearing the words epidemic and pandemic a lot lately. Here’s a context in which I would not have expected to hear these words: skin cancer! An American Academy of Dermatology report in the April 2006 issue of the Mayo Clinic Health Letter warns that one in five Americans will develop skin cancer. The Reuters Health report of this news item states “there is an unrecognized epidemic of skin cancer underway in the United States…”

Of course we all know the most common, effective way to prevent skin cancer: use sunscreen when out in the sun. But so many of us don’t do it! Why is that? Yes, it’s kind of a hassle, but hassle vs. cancer should be a no-brainer. And yes, it can be a gooey, sticky mess, but it doesn’t have to be! I love my sunscreen because it contains natural nutritional compounds that make it super effective with less of the sunscreen ingredients that make the lotion sticky and unappealing.

This is one epidemic we can surely halt!

A study just reported in the Journal of the American Medical Association concludes that we can live longer!… IF we eat less. This was the first human study assessing whether calorie restriction impacted signs of aging. The news item on this study explained:

All of those who cut down on their calories showed a fall in average core body temperature and reduced fasting insulin levels, both linked to living longer.

The rate at which their DNA decayed – a natural process – also slowed, reducing their chances of developing mutations and degenerative diseases related to ageing such as cancer.

And — oh, yes — the study participants did lose weight too.

It seems a fitting time to acknowledge the health benefits of fewer calories, as the Lenten season, and our family’s corresponding fasting, draws to a close. As we celebrate the holy days leading up to and including Easter, the blog will take a small break. I look forward to being back sharing natural health and wellness information with you next week.

According to a recent AP article, there is a movement afoot to scientifically link the high consumption of soda in the U.S. with the alarming obesity rate, to identify this liquid intake as a cause of this health concern.

Why, you may wonder? Why “prove” soda intake helps make you fat?

Well, apparently doing so opens the door for sales restrictions, and governmental oversight such as additional taxes (to discourage consumption) and maybe even label warnings.

As you might imagine, there are leading players on both sides of this “discussion.”

I do find it alarming that, according to the article, soda is the nation’s single biggest “food”!! Aye-yi-yi! It seems quite obvious to me that it’s a sweet “treat” food, like a dessert, only in liquid form.

Someone has done an incredible marketing job, I’d say. We, as a nation, bought into it, and now we’re paying.