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Consuming a primarily plant-based diet may be associated with better cancer-specific health outcomes among men with prostate cancer, according to a study. Vivian N. Liu and colleagues examined whether post-diagnostic plant-based dietary patterns are associated with the risk for prostate cancer progression and prostate cancer-specific mortality. The analysis included 2,062 participants in the multisite Cancer of the Prostate Strategic Urologic Research Endeavor study. The researchers found that men scoring in the highest versus lowest quintile of the Plant-based Diet Index (PDI) had lower risk for progression (hazard ratio, 0.53). There was no association for healthful PDI and risk for progression...

WASHINGTON, Oct. 21, 2005 – Members of Joint Task Force Guantanamo are ensuring detainees get special consideration for religious requirements of observing Ramadan, the Muslim holy month, which began Oct. 4 and runs to Nov. 3 this year. Most observant Muslims fast from sunup to sundown during Ramadan, and food-service officials at the U.S. military detention center at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, are providing pre-dawn and midnight meals to help the detainees observe their customs during this holy period, the joint task force's food-service officer explained. Breakfast, which might normally be served around 7 a.m., is now served at 4 a.m....

Deepening his personal involvement in an industry that has business pending at the Capitol, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger earlier this year helped dietary supplement companies launch a lobbying group. An article in the August 2005 edition of Muscle & Fitness magazine, for which Schwarzenegger serves as executive editor, recounts his attendance at a March 5 meeting at which the lobbying group formed and says the governor remains "a phone call away" from the organization. The meeting took place while legislation was pending that would restrict high school athletes from using some performance-enhancing supplements. The bill still awaits action in the Legislature....

You don’t need to be a physician, a nutritionist, or even have a fancy degree to understand why humans eat meat. Just check the teeth in your mouth. There are 20 of them devoted to eating meat, but only 12 for fruit and vegetables. If you are inclined to examine the human body further, you will discover, as Dr. Max Ernest Jutte, MD, pointed out in 1936, "the stomach is a carnivorous organ designed primarily to digest lean meat, and that the small intestine, pancreas, and liver are mainly herbivorous and designed to digest vegetables, fruits, fats, and farinaceous (starch)...

WEDNESDAY, Jan. 12 (HealthDayNews) -- Americans need to consume fewer calories and exercise more to maintain a healthy weight, according to new dietary guidelines released Wednesday by the federal government. "Let's face it. Every American is looking for a pill. It's not going to happen," U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Tommy Thompson said at the Washington, D.C., news conference announcing the guidelines.