Compared to neighbors south of the border, Canadians live longer, healthier lives, says research published in BioMed Central's open access journal Population Health Metrics, which found the disparity between the two countries and suggest that America's lack of universal health care must be to blame.
Culture
Tobacco imagery is still relatively common in films rated suitable for kids and young teens, despite significant declines in the cinematic depiction of smoking over the past 20 years, indicates research published in Thorax today.
Based on their findings, active product placement may still be taking place, particularly in UK films, say the authors.
Organic foods are not structurally different from any other food, they are simply processed differently and need only contain 95% 'organic' components, and even those can be exemptions from a rather broad list.
The organic foods public relations machine is quite successful, though. So successful that organic labels appear to make people think their organic snack has a lot fewer calories than it really does.
Melting sea ice has been shown to be a major cause of warming in the Arctic according to a University of Melbourne, Australia study.
Findings published in Nature today reveal the rapid melting of sea ice has dramatically increased the levels of warming in the region in the last two decades.
Lead author Dr James Screen of the School of Earth Sciences at the University of Melbourne says the increased Arctic warming was due to a positive feedback between sea ice melting and atmospheric warming.
Scientists in Poland are describing how a medical imaging technique has taken on a second life in revealing forgery of an artist's signature and changes in inscriptions on paintings that are hundreds of years old. A report on the technique, called optical coherence tomography (OCT), is in ACS' Accounts of Chemical Research, a monthly journal.
A weed calculator developed by an Agricultural Research Service (ARS) scientist tells ranchers the number of additional cows they could raise if they eliminated one or two widespread exotic invasive weeds.
Rangeland ecologist Matt Rinella at the ARS Fort Keogh Livestock and Range Research Laboratory in Miles City, Mont., created a computer model that predicts weed impacts on forage production.
COLUMBIA, Mo. – Fibromyalgia is a condition that causes chronic, widespread pain throughout the body. In a new study, University of Missouri researchers are examining how the diagnosis of Fibromyalgia can affect marriages. Initial findings reveal that diagnosed spouses have considerably higher levels of depressive symptoms and pain and report more marital instability and anger than their spouses. For both spouses, the symptoms can trigger increased emotional withdrawal and mental strain.
Teaching babies to swim turns out to be more than just fun. Baby swimmers have better balance and are also better at grasping at things than non-swimmers. This difference persists even when children are five years old, when babies who have been taught to swim still outperform their peers.
"Practice makes perfect," say Hermundur Sigmundsson, a professor of psychology at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology.
BEER-SHEVA, ISRAEL, April 28, 2010 – A researcher at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev (BGU) conducted the first study of hand-clapping songs, revealing a direct link between those activities and the development of important skills in children and young adults, including university students.
Cervical cancer screening intervals could be extended to five years for women aged 30 and over if the primary screening method was human papillomavirus (HPV) testing, say scientists at Queen Mary, University of London.
The research, published in the British Journal of Cancer today (28 April), found HPV tests are very accurate in identifying early signs of cervical cancer, detecting more serious abnormalities compared to current cytology screening in women aged 30 and over.
Who said the following regarding vaccines and autism in the 2008 election campaign?
"We've seen just a skyrocketing autism rate. Some people are suspicious that it's connected to the vaccines. This person included. The science right now is inconclusive, but we have to research it."
Doctors who are male, from lower income groups and have experienced academic difficulties at medical school are more likely to find themselves in front of the General Medical Council (GMC) for professional misconduct, according to research published on bmj.com today.
The authors, Janet Yates and David James from the University of Nottingham Medical School, emphasise that this is a small study and that "the findings are preliminary and should be interpreted with caution."
Migration from rural to urban areas is associated with increasing levels of obesity and is a factor driving the diabetes epidemic in India, according to a new study published this week in PLoS Medicine.
A receptor that is present in the nucleus of cells can, when activated, slow the growth of tamoxifen-resistant breast cancer cells, a new study found. The study built on the recent discovery that farnesoid X receptor (FXR) — a nuclear receptor found mainly in the liver — is found in breast cancer tissue. Although previous research showed that FXR can slow proliferation of breast cancer cells, it was not known whether it could do the same with tamoxifen-resistant cells.
COLUMBIA, Mo. ¬—What constitutes effective public relations strategies is an ongoing discussion among professionals in the field, as well as the general public. Researchers recently studied the effectiveness of public relations strategies employed during the SARS crises of 2002.