Author: dtrend

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Raising drinking costs saves lives

imgres-3Research published in Canada has linked the introduction of minimum pricing with a significant drop in alcohol-related deaths.

The findings, in the journal Addiction, were welcomed by health campaigners but they have been criticised as “misleading and inaccurate” by the drinks industry, which has questioned the statistical basis of the research, reports the BBC today

“The Scottish government’s plans to introduce a minimum unit price are on hold pending a court challenge. The researchers said a rise in alcohol prices of 10% had led to a 32% reduction in alcohol-related deaths. The Canadian study was carried out between 2002 and 2009 in British Columbia, where alcohol could only be sold directly to the public in government-owned stores. It suggests that, when drink prices rose, there were “immediate, substantial and significant reductions” in deaths wholly attributable to alcohol abuse. The authors suggest increasing the price of cheaper drinks reduces the consumption of heavier drinkers who prefer them.

“Dr Tim Stockwell, director of the University of Victoria’s Centre for Addictions Research of British Columbia, said: ‘This study adds to the scientific evidence that, despite popular opinion to the contrary, even the heaviest drinkers reduce their consumption when minimum alcohol prices increase. “It is hard otherwise to explain the significant changes in alcohol-related deaths observed in British Columbia.’ During the period under study, the law changed in Canada, permitting private liquor stores to open. A 10% growth in the number of such outlets was associated with an increase (2%) in all alcohol-related deaths. This is the first study to highlight the effects on mortality of alcohol minimum pricing, although the Scottish government has used previous research from the University of Sheffield to claim consumption of alcohol would be reduced if prices rose.”

 

Full story at BBC: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-21358995

 

 

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Smoking and mental illness linked

imgres-4People with mental illness are 70 percent more likely to smoke cigarettes than people without mental illness.

“New data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration show that one of every three adults with mental illness smokes, compared with one in five adults without mental illness,” reports today’s New York Times

“Adults with mental illness smoke about a third of all the cigarettes in the United States, and they smoke more cigarettes per month and are significantly less likely to quit than people without mental illness, the report said. There are nearly 46 million adults with mental illness in the United States, about a fifth of the population.

‘Many people with mental illness are at greater risk of dying early from smoking than of dying from their mental health conditions,’ said Dr. Thomas R. Frieden, director of the Centers for Disease Control, during a press briefing.

“The report is based on information from the National Survey on Drug Use and Health, which interviewed 138,000 adults in their homes from 2009 to 2011. Continue reading “Smoking and mental illness linked”

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Binoculars that can recognize you

It was only a matter of time: the marriage of facial recognition software and digital telescopy. Now the U.S. Navy is talking about binoculars that can identify people.

Take a close look, because the next generation of military binoculars could be doing more than just letting sailors and soldiers see from far away, reports Wired Danger Room. “The Navy now wants binoculars that can scan and recognize your face from 650 feet away.

“That’s according to a Jan. 16 contract announcement from the Navy’s Space and Naval Warfare Systems Command, which is seeking a “Wireless 3D Binocular Face Recognition System.’ imgresDuring a testing period of 15 months, the plan is to improve “stand-off identification of uncooperative subjects” during daylight, using binoculars equipped with scanners that can read your mug from “100 to 200 meters” away, or about 328 to 650 feet. After scanning your mug, the binoculars then transmit the data to a database over a wireless network, where the data is then analyzed to determine a person’s identity. The no-bid contract, for an unspecified amount of money, went to California biometrics firm StereoVision Imaging. Continue reading “Binoculars that can recognize you”

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Massive support for immigration reform

The U.S. is often described as a nation of immigrants. And it seems most Americans are finally remembering that basic fact.imgres-2

At least two-thirds of Americans favor each of five specific measures designed to address immigration issues — ranging from 68% who would vote for increased government spending on security measures and enforcement at U.S. borders, to 85% who would vote for a requirement that employers verify the immigration status of all new hires, reports the Gallup Organization today.

“More than seven in 10 would vote for a pathway to citizenship for undocumented immigrants now living in this country. Slightly more than seven in 10 favor a law that would track the departures of foreigners who have come into the country and one that would increase the number of visas for immigrants with science and technology skills. Continue reading “Massive support for immigration reform”

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Diet soda + booze = drunk

Looking to cut back on the calories in your cocktail by mixing, say, diet soda and rum? Well, get ready for the buzz.

“According to the results of a new study, this combination will leave you drunker than if you’d mixed the liquor with a sugary, caloric mixer,” reports NPR today

“’Alcohol, consumed with a diet mixer, results in higher (BrAC) Breath Alcohol Concentrations as compared to the same amount of alcohol consumed with a sugar-sweetened mixer,’ says Cecile Marczinski, a cognitive psychologist who authored the new study.imgres-2

Why? Turns out that sugar slows down the absorption of alcohol from the stomach to the bloodstream. Continue reading “Diet soda + booze = drunk”

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“It gets better” study findings

imgresIt really does get better for gay and bisexual teens when it comes to being bullied, although young gay men have it worse than their lesbian peers, according to the first long-term scientific evidence on how the problem changes over time, reports a story today in HuffPost.

“The seven-year study involved more than 4,000 teens in England who were questioned yearly through 2010, until they were 19 and 20 years old. At the start, just over half of the 187 gay, lesbian and bisexual teens said they had been bullied; by 2010 that dropped to 9 percent of gay and bisexual boys and 6 percent of lesbian and bisexual girls. The researchers said the same results likely would be found in the United States. Continue reading ““It gets better” study findings”

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CIA gets kidnapping help from around the globe

Alternative news sources from around the world are reporting today about findings from the Open Society Justice, documenting how 54 countries have been helped the American CIAin it’s kidnapping program, known as “rendition,” in which terrorism suspects were held in secret prisons overseas or turned

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over to foreign governments for interrogation.

Governments in Europe, Asia and Africa have been secretly involved in global kidnap, detention and torture of at least 136 people on behalf of the United States after September 11, 2001 attacks, reports Al Jazeera.

“’By engaging in torture and other abuses associated with secret detention and extraordinary rendition, the US government violated domestic and international law, Continue reading “CIA gets kidnapping help from around the globe”

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Worries about Iran’s space monkey

imgresLast week Worlding.org brought you the story of the Iranian monkey reportedly launched into outer space. Now we are worried about the little guy.

“The United States expressed doubt on Monday about Iran’s claim that it safely returned a monkey from space, saying it is questionable that the monkey survived — or if the flight happened at all,” reports today’s Salon.com.

“State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said a lot of questions remained ‘about whether the monkey that they reportedly sent up into space and reportedly came down was actually the same monkey, whether he survived.’

“’The Iranians said they sent a monkey, but the monkey that they showed later seemed to have different facial features,’Nuland told reporters. ‘He was missing a little wart.’ Tehran blames the confusion on Iranian media for initially using a photo of a backup monkey. It says the monkey orbited and returned safely, and President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad added Monday that he would consider being Iran’s first astronaut in space.Nuland described Ahmadinejad’s proclamation as an “interesting choice,” but was more diplomatic than Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., who joked about Ahmadinejad’s ruminations earlier Monday. Continue reading “Worries about Iran’s space monkey”

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Fidel’s revolution continues

Over 50 years ago the United States launched a comprehensive embargo against Cuba, aimed at isolating the country and bringing it to political and economic ruin.

But Cuba keeps chugging along, despite the collapse of the Soviet Union and its other bigger friends.

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And yesterday they just had another election, as reported by Al Jazeera:

“Ailing Cuban revolutionary leader Fidel Castro has made a surprise appearance in Havana to vote in parliamentary polls, expressing confidence in the revolution despite a decades-long US trade embargo. Castro’s visit to the voting precinct in Havana’s El Vedado neighbourhood was the main event in Sunday’s elections, during which Cubans chose 612 members of the National Assembly as well as deputies of local legislatures.

“The 86-year-old is said to have spent up to an hour talking to other voters and the media after casting his vote. About 8.5 million Cubans took part in the polls that featured no opposition candidates. Continue reading “Fidel’s revolution continues”

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Robots stole my life

“The robots are coming! Word is they want your job, your life and probably your little dog, too.” This is how a piece by Catherine Rampell begins in yesterday’s New York Times. This is hardly a new worry, as the piece continues to discuss:

“Robots have once again gripped the nation’s imagination, stoking fears of displaced jobs and perhaps even a displaced human race. An alarmist segment on “60 Minutes’ was only the most vivid of a recent series of pieces in respected magazines and newsoutlets warning about widespread worker displacement.Professors at Cambridge University and a co-founder of Skype

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are creating a newCenter for the Study of Existential Risk, which would research a ‘Terminator’-like scenario in which supercomputers rise up and destroy their human overlords, presumably plotting the whole caper in zeros and ones.

“In New York alone, there are four plays running this month with themes of cybernetics run amok. One is a revival of ‘R.U.R.,’ a 1920 Czech play that was the granddaddy of the cybernetic revolt genre and that originated the current meaning of the word “robot.” Continue reading “Robots stole my life”

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War and genocide today

imgres-2“Opposing genocide has become a sort of cottage industry in the United States,” writes Patricia Johnstone in a thoughtful essay in CounterPunch. The article then analyses how justified war has become a preferred solution to mass extermination . . .  but at what cost and in whose interests?

“Everywhere, “genocide studies” are cropping up in universities.  Five years ago, an unlikely “Genocide Prevention Task Force” was set up headed by former secretary of state Madeleine Albright and former defense secretary William Cohen, both veterans of the Clinton administration.

“The Bible of the campaign is Samantha Power’s book, ‘A Problem from Hell’.  Ms. Power’s thesis is that the U.S. Government, while well-intentioned, like all of us, is too slow to intervene to “stop genocide”.  It is a suggestion that the U.S. government embraces, even to taking on Ms. Power as White House advisor. Continue reading “War and genocide today”

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How economy is hitting older people

Young graduates are in debt, out of work and on their parents’ couches.

People in their 30s and 40s can’t afford to buy homes or have children.Retirees are earning nea

r-zero interest on their savings. Today’s New York times carries a sobering story about the way the economy is hitting people just under retirement age:

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“In the current listless economy, every generation has a claim to having been most injured. But the Labor Department’s latest jobs snapshot and other recent data reports present a strong case for crowning baby boomers as the greatest victims of the recession and its grim aftermath. Continue reading “How economy is hitting older people”

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Human flesh searches explained

A recent article published on Tea Leaf Nation, and tweeted by Tricia Wang, explains what the flesh searches are

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and how they change China. SmartMods reports that “Despite their ghoulish resonance, they refer to grassroots, collaborative efforts to share and probe personal information online with the goals of romance, kinship, justice, or vindication.They are netizen initiatives to solve cases of injustice and cruelty left unbalanced by a society that is not democratic and has no rule of law, where the government officials show innefficiency, detachment, or even smugness in the face of public tragedies or social injustices.

“Which was the case of Yang Dacai, a government official, who’s grinning face while watching the burning bus that killed 36 people in August was tweeted via Sina Weibo, the China’s Tweeter. His dispassionate smile, contrasting the tragedy he was witnessing, and his expensive tastes in watches, belts, and eyeglasses that didn’t match the his meager wage as a government employee triggered the “cyber vigilatism” of the netizens (as Rebecca MacKinnon called it in her article) and prompted a flesh search. Yang was eventually dismissed from his position as chief of Shaanxi Safety Supervision Bureau. Continue reading “Human flesh searches explained”

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How Netflix tracks you

I hit the pause button roughly one-third of the way through the first episode of “House of Cards,” the political drama premiering on Netflix Feb. 1, say a piece in today’s Salon.

“By doing so, I created what is known in the world of Big Data as an ‘event’ — a discrete action that could be logged, recorded and analyzed.

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“Every single day, Netflix, by far the largest provider of commercial streaming video programming in the United States, registers hundreds of millions of such events. As a consequence, the company knows more about our viewing habits than many of us realize. Netflix doesn’t know merely what we’re watching, but when, where and with what kind of device we’re watching. It keeps a record of every time we pause the action — or rewind, or fast-forward — and how many of us abandon a show entirely after watching for a few minutes.

“Netflix might not know exactly why I personally hit the pause button — I was checking on my sick son, home from school with the flu — but if enough people pause or rewind or fast-forward at the same place during the same show, the data crunchers can start to make some inferences. Continue reading “How Netflix tracks you”

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The question of the border fence

imgresAs immigration has moved to the center of political debate, the fate of possible citizenship for millions of people hinges on a bolstered southern border.

“We put more boots on the ground on the southern border than at any time in our history,” President Obama exclaimed this week, adding that illegal crossings are down 80% since their peak in 2000.

The president committed a small army to the southwestern states–over 21,000 border patrol agents–racking up an almost $11.7 billion price tag in 2012, up $362 million allotted for the year before, reports MCNBC.  “According to the Migration Policy Institute, the federal government spent a total of $18 billion on immigration enforcement agencies, which accounted for an astounding 24% more in federal spending than what was given for the FBI, DEA, Secret Service, U.S. Marshals Service, and ATF–combined.

“And as the number of agents and resources allocated to the border rose, the number of arrests and apprehensions along the country lines plummeted. Continue reading “The question of the border fence”

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Do red lights reduce accidents?

Last week, the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety published findings that red-light-running violations had declined at intersections with the cameras in Arlington, Va, reports a story in today’s Wall Street Journal.

The study is consistent with other studiesshowing that the cameras make intersections safer, said Anne T. McCartt, co-author of the report and senior vice president for research at IIHS, which is funded by the insurance industry.

“But other researchers question the use of violations as a measure of safety. ‘As soon as you hear them talk about violation rates, these people are trying to obfuscate the fact that accidents don’t go down,’ said Declan O’Scanlon, a New Jersey state assemblyman and an opponent of the cameras.imgres-1

“’It is meaningless to study violations,’ Barbara Langland Orban, an associate professor of health policy and management at the University of South Florida, wrote in an email. Continue reading “Do red lights reduce accidents?”

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Straight, married southerners most likely to own guns

This may not shock anyone, but “married” male southerners own guns at higher rates than anyone else.

The odds of a man owning a gun are five times greater than the odds of a woman owning a gun, reports the Gallup organization today, once the influence of other factors related to gun ownership is taken into account.

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“Being from the South and being married are the next-most influential predictors; each is associated with 1.7 times greater odds of owning a gun than among those who are not married and among those who do not live in the South.”Given that no “southern” states have endorsed marriage equality, “marriage” means heterosexual.

“Being Hispanic and being from the East are associated with lower gun ownership, but on a relative basis, these are the next strongest predictors of gun ownership, followed by race, ideology, and age. Continue reading “Straight, married southerners most likely to own guns”

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Another reason not to watch the Super Bowl

imgres-3Many of us could care less about football  –  the hyper-violent, overly commercialized mainstay of outdated masculinity in American culture.

What if we just said: no thanks, no more willful glorification of a sport seductive enough for our nation’s young males to risk damaging their brains on the field, under the Friday night lights? This is the question posed by a piece today on NPR.org, which continues:

“The grim headlines just keep coming. This week it’s former NFL kicker Tom Dempsey. Age 66, Dempsey suffers from dementia. During his football career he endured three diagnosed concussions and, almost certainly, several undiagnosed ones. As The New York Timesnotes, his neurologist was ‘astonished by the amount of damage’ visible on Dempsey’s brain scans. Continue reading “Another reason not to watch the Super Bowl”

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Unhappy kids more at risk for heart disease

A study found being prone to distress at the age of seven was associated with a significantly higher risk of cardiovascular disease in later life.

Conversely children who were better at paying attention and staying focused had reduced heart risk when older, reports the BBC. “The US researchers said more work was needed to understand the link.

“Their study looked at 377 adults who had taken part in research as children. At seven they had undergone several tests to look at emotional behaviour.They compared the results from this with a commonly used risk score for cardiovascular disease of participants now in their early 40s.imgres-4

“After controlling for other factors which might influence heart disease risk, they found that high levels of distress at age seven were associated with a 31% increased risk of cardiovascular disease in middle-aged women. Continue reading “Unhappy kids more at risk for heart disease”

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Most think government threatens their rights

The latest national survey by the Pew Research Center for the People & the Press, conducted Jan. 9-13 among 1,502 adults, finds that 53% think that the federal government threatens their own personal rights and freedoms while 43% disagree. According to Pew,

“In March 2010, opinions were divided over whether the government

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represented a threat to personal freedom; 47% said it did while 50% disagreed. In surveys between 1995 and 2003, majorities rejected the idea that the government threatened people’s rights and freedoms.

“The growing view that the federal government threatens personal rights and freedoms has been led by conservative Republicans. Continue reading “Most think government threatens their rights”