Addiction Solution Source

The USDA’s new food icon is not a pyramid this time but is a brightly colored plate that breaks a healthy diet into four main sections: fruits, vegetables, grains and proteins, with a small side of dairy.

NOTE: There is one very important section missing! Where are the healthy fats? Items such as omega-3 fish oil and olive oil and coconut oil are important to your health (buy organic as much as possible).

It replaces the old Food Guide Pyramid, first launched in the early 1990s, then revamped in 2005. It was just too difficult for people to understand.

Toby Smithson, R.D., a national spokesperson for the American Dietetic Association stated that the plate is an improvement because it’s easy for non-readers to understand, which means young kids can learn the message early on and carry it with them throughout their lives.

The new food plate image reflects the 2010 Dietary Guidelines for Americans, which promote measures like switching to fat-free or low-fat milk and opting for water over sugary drinks. The guidelines also recommend making sure that half your plate is filled with fruits and veggies — a recommendation that is one of the major points highlighted by the new graphic. You can download that report here: US Dietary Guidelines.pdf

Remember that the size of your plate matters and you should probably use eight or nine-inch plates. People should be paying attention to the different food groups, but they should also be watching their serving sizes.

The National Survey on Drug Use and Health (NSDUH) states that the number of older adults using drugs will increase in the next two decades. It has been predicted that by the year 2020, the number of persons needing treatment for a substance use disorder will double among persons aged 50 or older as the baby boom generation moves into older adulthood.

Illicit drug use is associated with numerous health and social problems, and age-related physiological, psychological, and social changes make older adults more vulnerable to the detrimental effects of illicit drug use.

NSDUH defines illicit drugs as marijuana/hashish, cocaine (including crack), inhalants, hallucinogens, heroin, or prescription-type drugs used nonmedically. Nonmedical use is defined as the use of prescription-type pain relievers, tranquilizers, stimulants, and sedatives that were not prescribed for the respondent by a physician or used only for the experience or feeling they caused.

The American Lung Association joins the World Health Organization (WHO) to observe World No Tobacco Day on Monday, May 31, to bring attention to the global epidemic of tobacco use among women, and the harmful effects of tobacco industry marketing targeting women and girls.

Tobacco use takes an enormous toll on women with more than 170,000 American women dying each year from smoking-caused disease. Recent public health data show lung cancer death rates for some women are still rising at a time when death rates for other kinds of cancer in women are declining. In addition, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), which includes chronic bronchitis and emphysema, now kills more women than men.

“The tobacco industry has a long and shameful history of targeting women and children,” said Mary H. Partridge, National Board Chair of the American Lung Association. “The most recent example is R.J. Reynolds’ Camel No. 9 cigarettes, a pink-hued version that one newspaper dubbed ‘Barbie Camel’ because of marketing that appealed to girls. Advertised as ‘available in stiletto’ with promotional giveaways of flavored lip glosses and pink purses, it seems clear who R.J. Reynolds was targeting.”

Recent research showed that people at extremely high risk of developing a psychosis were found to be less likely to develop psychotic disorders after just 12 weeks of taking omega-3 fish oil. The study was published in the February issue of Archives of General Psychiatry.

The American Psychiatric Association is proposing major changes to its diagnostic "bible", the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, fifth edition. This is the manual that doctors, insurers and scientists use in deciding what's officially a mental disorder and what symptoms to treat. The current manual is referred to as DSM IV.

I recently finished producing this video for Dr. CE Gant. The video – Stop Aging and Stay Well – identifies the 12 types of stressors that are at the root cause of all medical and psychiatric disorders, premature aging and death. The video is now available at the web site of Dr. CE Gant

Stress is defined as any mental or bodily tension resulting from factors which tend to alter an existent equilibrium. Most people who abuse drugs are doing it because they are not coping well in society and they are stressed out. Chronic stress can lead to distress, defined as pain, anxiety, physical or mental suffering, which is often diagnosed as a medical or psychiatric disorder.

Most people vaguely realize that chronic stress is harmful, but they can’t quite identify what it is until distress arises, and even then the relationship to stress is often not clear.

I recently completed producing and editing this 2 hour DVD, “Grand Unified Theory of Mind Brain Function”, for Dr. CE Gant.

Dr. Gant states: “After 35 years of practicing complementary/alternative, integrative and holistic medicine and psychiatry, and carefully assessing (and “curing”) many thousands of patients with in-depth, functional medicine testing, I am happy to present the culmination of my life’s work.”

In the DVD, he presents 20 mind/brain concepts, some of which I list here:

* Drugs are used to anesthetize stress, fear, anger, burnout, psychic pain, derived from the past and future

* The primary cause or exacerbating factor of most mental disorders is the “fight” or “flight” response and chronic stress.

* The scientifically proven, immediate cause of the “fight” or “flight” response comes from within the brain in an area called the Locus Ceruleus (LC)

* Many stressors can ignite the Locus Ceruleus (not only psychological)

According to a new study published in the September, 2009 issue of the Journal of the American College of Cardiology, the risk of heart attacks was reduced, as a result of smoking bans in public areas. This was noted particularly among younger individuals as well as nonsmokers and is reducing the number of heart attacks by as much as 26% each year.

According to Dr. David Meyers, Professor of Cardiology and Preventive Medicine at the University of Kansas School of Medicine, ‘even breathing in low doses of cigarette smoke can increase the risk of heart attacks’. Dr. Meyers is the lead investigator of the most comprehensive study done to date on smoking issues. Dr. Meyers also stated that ‘public smoking bans might also help prevent lung cancer and emphysema’.

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has shown new signs of regulating the tobacco industry by placing a federal ban on flavored cigarettes effective September 22, 2009.

This means that it is illegal to manufacture, import, market or distribute candy, fruit and all flavored cigarettes. According to health and federal authorities, flavored cigarettes are more appealing to youth and simply encourages smoking. It doesn’t take a ‘rocket scientist’ to see that flavored cigarettes are a gateway for children and young adults to become addicted to tobacco/nicotine.

A three-judge panel from the 9th Federal U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals unanimously rejected a challenge by Phillip Morris USA Cigarette company. The company claimed that the law violated its right to free speech by banning sales of tobacco in the City of San Francisco pharmacies.

Chief Judge Kozinski wrote that the city law only “limits where cigarettes may be sold; it doesn’t prevent the cigarette company from advertising.” Judge Kozinski also wrote that advertising may be a form of free speech, but “selling cigarettes isn’t”.