Gun Control As A Health Issue

We need to redefine the gun control debate to an issue of health because of the death of over 30,000 Americans every year from the use of guns. 63% of the deaths were suicides and 36% were from homicides.

With the level of deaths from automobile accidents, we legislated seat belts, air bags and crush zones to be built into cars. With the level of deaths from smoking and second hand smoke, we legislated warning labels, raised the age for selling cigarette and added a tremendous amount of taxes onto the price of a pack of cigarettes.

So, why not use the legislation that President Obama is proposing to reduce the number of deaths by guns? And I’m not taking about taking away handguns and rifles that have a low magazine capacity.

There’s also an interesting Constitutional argument that I’d like to make for gun control. The leadership of the National Rifle Association wants a specific construction of the 2nd Amendment to allow for all guns to be available for purchase.

Now, if you look back to 1776 when the 2nd Amendment was included in the Constitution, people were using muskets, which took an expert 15 seconds to reload and their accuracy was very poor (This is why during the Revolution when the American and British soldiers were firing at each other they were only a very short distance apart).

So how about turning the clock back to what the Founding Fathers were dealing with when they enacted the 2nd Amendment and require modern assault weapons to have a 15 second timer on them before another round can be fired!
 

Getting Outside Into Nature Can Help You Heal

A study done for the National Recreation and Park Association found that spending time in nature speeds up healing in a variety of ways.

It cuts the time it takes to recover from surgery, improves the way the immune system works and helps diabetics achieve healthier blood glucose levels.

How long does it take to get these kinds of benefits? How about five minutes a day according to a study from the University of Essex, England!

(Reported Aarp.org/bulletin January/February 2013)
 

Exciting Treatment For Muscle Injuries And Pain

As you may know I do a form of Muscle Checking called Behavioral Kinesiology. This system evolved out of an area called Applied Kinesiology by Dr. George Goodheart.

Now, Dr. Craig Buhler has taken Goodheart’s concepts even further. He calls his approach Advanced Muscle Integration Technique (AMIT). His approach has helped world-class athletes recover from injuries and also to improve their performance.

Buhler’s approach is to heal muscle pulls and strains, in minutes, by reactivating the muscle. He can also align muscles so they work together with a dramatic increase in performance.

Dr. Buhler was the chiropractor for the Utah Jazz basketball team. Using his techniques, the team had the lowest player missed games due to injury rate in the NBA which was 2/3s less than the league’s numbers.

As examples of the impact of his work, Dr. Buhler has cut the time of a 5,000-meter speed skater by one and a half minutes and his technique has increased the vertical jump of a basketball player by seven inches in 24 hours.

For more information and to see if there is a therapist in your area, you can go to Dr. Buhler’s website at www.AMITMethod.com

 

More Benefits From Listening And Playing Music

Researchers at the University of Maryland School of Medicine found that emotions aroused by joyful music cause tissue in the inner lining of blood vessels to expand, increasing blood flow.

Other studies have shown that music can bring on sound sleep, boost mood and reduce anxiety.

Listening to music will also help surgery patients feel less pain and need less pain medication while they are recovering.

According to Nina Kraus, director of the Auditory Neuroscience Laboratory, even after a few years of musical training, children have more powerful brainstem responses to complex sounds than peers who never had lessons. These neural changes are retained into adulthood.

Using this music concept in Los Angeles with at-risk youths who attend schools in gang-reduction zones, the kids take music lessons and participate in ensembles.

Rather than winding up in jail, these kids are staying in school and they are completing their education.

So…turn that music on and take music lessons and remember to save your hearing if you are using ear buds by limiting your listening time to an hour and then give yourself a break.

 

Drinking Soda Or Fruit Punch May Lead To A Higher Risk Of Depression

A study presented at the annual meeting of the American Academy of Neurology found that drinking sweetened beverages may increase a person’s risk of depression.

The researchers found that drinking four cans of soda daily can lead to a 30% higher rate of depression. Drinking four cans of fruit punch can lead to a 38% higher risk of depression.

The effect was more pronounced with diet fruit punch/soda as compared with non-diet versions.

These findings are based on beverage consumption and depression data from 263,925 adults aged 50 to 71.

The researchers followed the participants for 10 years and found that at the end of the study 11,311 people were diagnosed with depression.

So…put that soda and fruit punch down a drink some water!

 

A New Approach to Harmful Insects

Researchers are exploring the use of pheromones which carry important messages between individuals within a species as an integrated pest management tool.

They have been using synthetic sex pheromones on the tomato pinworm.

This confused the male pinworm to the point that he didn’t know whom to mate with and became impotent. This crashed the pinworm population and let the tomato harvest flourish.

The beauty of using this approach is that the chemicals aren’t poisonous, the males show no signs of developing resistance and they only harm the pinworm.

While synthetic pheromones can’t be patented, commercial developers are supporting it with research funds by focusing on the distribution system. In most cases, one treatment is all that’s needed for season-long control.

Researchers are now using this approach to target the mountain pine beetle which has been destroying vast pine forests in the US. Four dollops per tree will deter infestation.

(Reported Onearth, Winter 2012/2013)


 

Crazy Sexual Behavior In A Species Of Sea Creatures

The shelled sea-butterfly mates in a crazy way. First, the all-male population will mate between themselves and will then store the sperm. Here’s the even stranger part, once this has been done, all the males change into females and then fertilize themselves with the sperm.

So…this is a great example of gay and lesbian behavior all rolled into one species. Pretty wild!


 

Another Hope For Getting GMO Labeling

While the California Ballot Initiative to require GMO labeling on all products was narrowly defeated after Monsanto, Dow and other companies spent $50 million dollars on advertising, there’s new hope on the horizon.

Activists in Washington State delivered 350,000 signatures to the state which guarantees that voters will be able to vote on whether to require GMO labeling on products in Washington.

Part of the optimism in Washington State is because wheat farmers, apple farmers and fishermen all support mandatory labeling. The newly elected Governor, Jay Inslee, is a long-time supporter of GMO labeling.

So…stay tuned, the fight to get GMO products labeled is going into its next phase.
 

THANKS, THAT'S IT FOR THIS MONTH!