Free Republic

If most foods created by the food industry are unhealthy, why not place a stiff tax on all of them and use the revenue to subsidize healthier food? This bold proposal, from Boston-area researchers, appears as commentary in the current issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA). The researchers from Tufts University, Harvard University and Boston Children's Hospital wrote that their plan would surely meet strong opposition from both the food and restaurant industries but that it could help people make meaningful dietary changes and substantially reduce health care costs. At issue is the higher cost of...

CHICAGO (CBS) – The state’s second largest school district has started the school year with a new look for its lunch menu, after opting out of the National School Lunch Program and forfeiting nearly $1 million in federal funding, to gain more freedom in the food it serves students. In May, the board for Township High School District 214 voted to drop out of the federal program, after deciding its guidelines were too restrictive. For instance, kids would not have been able to buy hard-boiled eggs or certain types of yogurt. School officials also have noted new guidelines consider hummus...

The virus causes symptoms like a cold, except worse, and is prompting up to 30 children a day to seek care at one Kansas City hospital, where about 15% of the youngsters were placed in intensive care, officials said. In a sign of a possible regional outbreak, Colorado, Illinois and Ohio are reporting cases with symptoms similar to the same virus and are awaiting testing results, according to officials and CNN affiliates in those states. In Kansas City, about 450 children were recently treated at Children’s Mercy Hospital, and at least 60 of them received intensive hospitalization, spokesman Jake Jacobson...

Beginning September 18, the nation will prohibit residents from leaving their homes for four days, with the hopes that health officials will be able to detect early-stage cases, Ibrahim Ben Kargbo, a presidential advisor in Sierra Leone, told Reuters. “The aggressive approach is necessary to deal with the spread of Ebola once and for all,” he said. Unfortunately, the news was accompanied by worsening statistics from the World Health Organization (WHO), which announced on Friday that out of the roughly 4,000 people that have been confirmed to have the virus, 2,105 people have died in Guinea, Liberia, Sierra Leone, and...

The U.S. Forest Service celebrated National Roasted Marshmallow Day the only way a government agency knows how — by telling people how not to roast smores.“Never start a campfire when there are fire restrictions in place,” the jovial blog post says. “Be sure you are at least 15 feet from tent walls, trees or other flammable objects.” It also recommends keeping children at least 10 feet from the campfire, ensuring that they take no part in dangerous marshmallow melting.Once minors have been safely sequestered out of sight, “let’s get to the marshmallow basics. Use a roasting stick of at least...

Pro-choice activists concerned over women’s rights to safe reproductive health pulled into Copley Square Wednesday as part of a national bus tour calling for a lift of bans that deny abortion coverage for low-income women. Since kicking off the 10,000-mile Be Bold Road Trip in Los Angeles, C.A. on Aug. 9 the tour has hit up Portland, O.R., Minneapolis, M.N, and Chicago, I.L., before parking Boston.

If cow’s milk is the Gen X of dairy, and soy milk the Gen Y, then camel milk may very well be Gen Z. As of this January, U.S. shoppers can buy the country’s first retail camel milk at market. The brand, Desert Farms, is now sold in Whole Foods Market stores in California, as well as through the company’s website. One of the first things shoppers might notice about camel milk is the price. At approximately $18/pint, camel milk is far from cheap. But, according to founder Walid Abdul-Wahab, camel milk’s benefits may be well worth the cost—especially to...

CVS Caremark has followed through with its long-promised cigarette ban, as the tobacco-free pharmacy chain officially changed its name to CVS Health. "The sale of cigarettes and tobacco at CVS pharmacy stores ends today," said Larry Merlo, president and CEO of CVS, in a video statement on the company web site. "By eliminating the sale of cigarettes and tobacco products in our stores, we can make a difference in the health of all Americans." CVS (CVS) stopped selling cigarettes nearly a month earlier than expected, since the chain had previously announced the ban would go into effect by Oct. 1.

As CVS sharpens its focus on customer health, the nation's second-largest drugstore chain will tweak its corporate name and stop the sale of tobacco nearly a month sooner than planned. CVS Caremark will now be known as CVS Health. The signs on its roughly 7,700 drugstores won't change, so the tweak may not register with shoppers.

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Mothers who give birth in areas with higher concentrations of African-Americans are less likely to get breastfeeding support on maternity wards than mothers in other communities, a new study shows. Breastfeeding provides well-documented health benefits to infants and their mothers. But African-American women are about 16 percent less likely to nurse their newborns than white women, according to research from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

The Affordable Care Act cannot be broken down into sound bites. This holds true for both its most ardent supporters and its most fervent opponents. The law is simply too complex to be labeled either a total failure or a smashing success. But that doesn't mean it isn't trending in one of those two directions. Across the country, individuals and families are beginning to learn whether their insurance premiums will change for 2015—early estimates indicate an overall national increase of 7.5 percent, according to a PricewaterhouseCoopers analysis. That's what is expected despite the early promise that the ACA would lower...

Bad memories could be reversed after scientists discovered the part of the brain which links emotions to past events Bad memories of past trauma can leave people emotionally scarred for life. But now neuroscientists believe they can erase feelings of fear or anxiety attached to stressful events, in a breakthrough which could help treat depression or post-traumatic stress disorder. Researchers at MIT, US, have discovered which brain circuits attach emotions to memories, and crucially, how to reverse the link. They managed to ‘switch off’ feelings of fear in mice which had been conditioned to feel anxious. It is likely the...

The American Heart Association says e-cigarettes are dangerous gateway products that cause nicotine addiction and should be subject to strict federal controls for minor-aged use. The group published its statement into the journal Circulation. Among its views: Ban e-cigarettes for minors, tightly regulate the product’s marketing and ban vapors that have flavors because they entice youngsters to try the product, Medical News Today reported.

An eruption of aggravation about what American schoolchildren can no longer eat in school cafeterias is never far away in the Obama era.Now, thanks to federal intervention that first lady Michelle has made her signature issue, students in all 11 taxpayer-funded public schools in Elyria, Ohio cannot enjoy the famous Elyria pink cookie anymore.This cookie is no ordinary cookie, according to The Chronicle-Telegram, the Cleveland suburb’s local newspaper.It’s a velvety, cake-like, scrumptious delicacy glazed with a huge dollop of sugary pink icing. Cleveland magazine dubbed the Elyria pink cookie the “Best Cafeteria Cookie” in 2009. Locals will even call up...

<p>Agustin Zeferino, 24, received "extensive" information and medication for his illness, but he discontinued his treatment, public health officials said.</p>

Since October, 155,000 New Mexico residents have joined the state’s Medicaid rolls, pushing total enrollment to more than 630,000, or nearly a third of the state’s population. On top of that, 410,000 New Mexicans are enrolled in Medicare, the federal health care program for the elderly. Together, total enrollment in those two federal programs are more than 1 million, or half of the state’s 2.1 million population. ... “It’s shocking, and when you add that to the outmigration of people and the lack of economic growth, it’s almost an incentive to stay poor,” said retired University of New Mexico economics...

A Sacramento hospital announced Tuesday that one of its patients may have Ebola. Kaiser Permanente South Sacramento Medical Center said in a release the patient is isolated. The hospital's Dr. Stephen Parodi said in the release 'We are working with the Sacramento County Division of Public Health regarding a patient admitted to the Kaiser Permanente South Sacramento Medical Center who may have been exposed to the Ebola virus. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) will be testing blood samples to rule out the presence of the virus.

ISIS has posted a video, claiming that they have beheaded American journalist James Foley of Rochester, New Hampshire. They say that he was beheaded by the terror group in order to dissuade the United States from its involvement in Iraq. Foley has been missing since 2012. A Middle Eastern radio station’s reporter, Zaid Benjamin, has posted pictures to Twitter. Reportedly, the photos are from the video that ISIS posted. Zaid Benjamin, the Washington correspondent for Radio Sawa, said that the location of the beheading is unknown, but he did say that he thought the accent of the man in the...

Cases in West Africa's Ebola outbreak this year have risen to 2,240, including 1,229 deaths, the World Health Organisation (WHO) said on Tuesday, reporting the toll in four countries, including Nigeria. While Nigeria, Africa’s most populous nation and No. 1 oil producer, appears to be containing its smaller outbreak, Liberia and Sierra Leone are struggling to halt the spread of the deadly Ebola virus among their populations. On Friday, these small two West African nations and a medical charity chided the WHO for its slow response, saying more action was needed to save victims threatened by the disease and hunger.

From the HOME PAGE of the World Health Organization website (http://www.who.int/en/): The World Health Organization (WHO) today reiterated its position that the risk of transmission of Ebola virus disease during air travel remains low... WHO is therefore advising against travel bans to and from affected countries...