This article is worth reading if you are currently thinking about or taking vitamin pills. It offers some practical advice on the benefits of eating a balanced diet rather than supplementing with pills. Read article

You can find some great articles in our Nutrition and Diet section along with some videos from The Food Dude.

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Interactive Health – Nutrition + Diet

A federal grant along with new technology will enable nurses in Muskegon keep track of patients in rural areas across West Michigan.

The service allows nurses to monitor the vital signs of diabetics and people with congestive heart failure.

If patients do not submit their data on a regular basis or send information that indicates a problem, nurses will follow up with a phone call or visit. Patients will be sent to a physician or hospital if nurses receive data that indicate serious problems.

Research has shown that patients who use the devices to track their vital signs often make behavioral and health changes.

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A report published today in Australia puts a cost to the obesity epidemic facing Australia.

The cost, a staggering $17.2 billion a year.

The report shows the drain on human resources as a result of the sharply rising incidence of costly chronic diseases associated with obesity, including type 2 diabetes, heart disease, stroke, osteoarthritis and cancer.

It finds the heaviest losses result from the burden of disease, accounting for $17.2 billion a year and representing the non-financial costs of disability, loss of wellbeing and premature death caused by obesity.

The report, commissioned by Diabetes Australia, is to be released at an obesity forum at Parliament organised by the Tasmanian Liberal senator Guy Barnett. “I was surprised and alarmed by the high figures and the finding that there could be 7.2 million Australians with obesity by 2025,” he said.

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Walt Disney announced yesterday that it will curtail the use of its name and characters with food items that did not meet new nutritional standards.

The new guidelines would limit how much sugar, calories and fat could be in snacks and foods marketed by companies that Disney has licensing relationships with.

Disney has said they will be also be changing their theme park restaurants policy to provide default side orders of french fries to healthier options like carrots and apple sauce.

With childhood obesity increasingly becoming of great concern for parents, it is great to see a major chain taking notice and changing their business practice to accommodate the trend for healthy options.

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A new pill promises to help people trying to lose weight take the edge of cravings with the added bonus of reducing blood pressure, blood glucose and cholesterol.

The drug, rimonabant blocks the receptors in your brain responsible for making you crave food.

Rimonabant has been approved in Europe where it goes by the name Acomplia. Approval in the US is scheduled by the end of the year.

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The Egyptian health ministry said on Wednesday that it had detected a new case of the H5N1 strain of bird flu, the first since May, the official news agency reported.

A 39 year old woman, from the northern delta province of Gharbiya was tested positive for bird flu after suffering from high fever and shortness of breath.

Her case brings to 15 the total number of human bird flu cases since the virus was first detected in February in Egypt. Six cases turned out to be fatal and eight people recovered after being treated with Tamiflu.

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The Government yesterday released figures that show two-thirds of men and almost 60% of women are unhealthily heavy, making them the fattest people in Europe.

The problem is now being passed to children, if nothing changes, nearly a third of boys and girls aged under 11 will be overweight or obese by 2010.

The study also highlights a north-south divide within England. Life expectancy is one year shorter for woman and two years shorter for men in the north of England compared with the south.

The public health minister said that the UK led Europe in obesity for a combination of reasons, some of which were cultural and associated with shopping and family habits.

The government has set itself the target of halting the year on year rise in obesity among children under 11 by 2010. But it does not set a similar target for stopping the weight gain in adults, aiming instead to encourage people to “want to change their lifestyles and take responsibility for their health”.

The government is looking towards incentives as one way to encourage people to adopt a healthier lifestyle. These include a voucher scheme offering money off fruit and vegetables being tried out in Cornwall.

There is also hope that supermarkets will start showing parents how to prepare exotic fruit and vegetables in-store and allowing children to try them. Parents quite often pass up buying unknown fruit and vegetables as they are concerned their children will not eat them.

Between 1994 and 2003, diabetes increased by two-thirds in men and doubled in women. The disease is debilitating, and complications can include blindness and foot amputation.

The Government has said that whilst it has had success in reducing numbers of smokers, improving quality housing and tracking child poverty, it admits concern over obesity and high levels of teenage pregnancy.

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