Developmental neurotoxicity and industrial chemical

Developmental neurotoxicity of industrial chemicals
P Grondjean, PJ Landrigan Lancet 2006, 368, 2167-78
Neurodevelopmental disorders such as autism, attention deficit disorder, mental retardation, and cerebral palsy are common, and cause lifelong disability. Their causes are mostly unknown. A few industrial chemicals (eg, lead, methylmercury, polychlorinated biphenyls [PCBs], arsenic,
and such elements as manganese, fluoride,perchlorate and toluene) are recognised causes of neuro-developmental disorders and subclinical brain dysfunction. Exposure to these chemicals during early fetal development can cause brain injury at doses much lower than those affecting adult brain function. During the 9 months of prenatal life and for the first period of life, there growth from single nerve plate to a complex highly interconnected structure with precise location of cells into precise functioning positions in a very precise programme. This makes the brain very vulnerable to toxic interference. There is some protection from the placenta but this is not a complete protection.
Recognition of these risks has led to evidence-based programmes of prevention, such as elimination of lead additives in petrol. Although these prevention campaigns are highly successful, most were initiated only after substantial delays. Another 200 chemicals are known to cause clinical neurotoxic effects in adults. Despite an absence of systematic testing, many additional chemicals have been shown to be neurotoxic in laboratory models. The toxic effects of such chemicals in the developing human brain are not known and they are not regulated to protect children. The two main impediments to prevention of neurodevelopmenial deficits of chemical origin are the great gaps in testing chemicals for developmental neurotoxicity and the high level of proof required for regulation.
There are other theories for poor development in infants, but this is a real problem and warrants care for pregnant mothers and their exposure to chemicals. How one does this in a busy moden life , goodness knows.

A Buddhist view on eating meals

Eating is central to nutrition, how we eat is seldom discussed. This is the view of a well known Buddhist teacher on eating meals

Thich Nhat Hanh
PEACE IS EVERY STEP
Eating Mindfully
A few years ago, I asked some children, "What is the purpose of eating breakfast?" One boy replied, "To get energy for the day." Another said, "The purpose of eating breakfast is to cat break­fast." 1 think the second child is more correct. The purpose of eating is to eat.
Eating a meal in mindfulness is an important practice. We turn off the TV, put down our newspaper, and work together for five or ten minutes, setting the table and finishing whatever needs to be done. During these few minutes, we can be very happy. When the food is on the table and everyone is seated, we practice breathing: "Breathing in, I calm my body. Breathing out, I smile," three times. We can recover ourselves completely after three breaths like this.
Then, we look at each person as we breathe in and out in order to be in touch with ourselves and everyone at the table. We don't need two hours to see another person. If we are really settled within ourselves, we only need to look for one or two seconds,
and id that is enough to see. I think that if a family has five members, only about five or ten seconds are needed to practice this “ looking and seeing."
After breathing, we smile. Sitting at the table with other
people, we have a chance to offer an authentic smile of friendship and understanding. It is very easy, but not many people do it. To me, this is the most important practice. We look at each person and smile at him or her. Breathing and smiling together is a very important practice. If die people in a household cannot smile at each other, the situation is very dangerous.
After breathing and smiling, we look down at the food in a
way that allows the food to become real. This food reveals our
connection with the earth. Each bite contains the life of the sun and the earth. The extent to which our food reveals itself depends on us. We can see and taste the whole universe in a piece bread! Contemplating our food for a few seconds before eating;, and eating in mindfulness, can bring us much happiness.
Having the opportunity to sit with our family and friends and
enjoy wonderful food is something precious, something not everyone has. Many people in the world are hungry. When I hold a bowl of rice or a piece of bread, I know that I am fortunate, and I feel compassion for all those who have no food to eat and are without friends or family. This is a very deep practice. We do not need to go to a temple or a church in order to practice ;. We can practice it right at our dinner table. Mindful eating can cultivate seeds of compassion and understanding that will strengthen us to do something to help hungry and lonely people be nourished.
In order to aid mindfulness during meals, you may like to eat silently from time to time. Your first silent meal may cause you to feel a little uncomfortable, but once you become used to it, you will realize that meals in silence bring much peace and happiness. Just as we turn off the TV before eating, we can "turn off" the talking in order to enjoy the food and the presence of one another.
I do not recommend silent meals every day. Talking to each other can be a wonderful way to be together in mindfulness. But we have to distinguish among different kinds of talk. Some subjects can separate us: for instance, if we talk about other people's shortcomings. The carefully prepared food will have no value if we let this kind of talk dominate our meal. When instead we speak about things that nourish our awareness of the food and our being together, we cultivate the kind of happiness that is necessary for us to grow. If we compare this experience with the experience of talking about other people's shortcomings, we will realize that the awareness of the piece of bread in our mouth is much more nourishing. It brings life in and makes life real.
So, while eating, we should refrain from discussing subjects that can destroy our awareness of our family and the food. But we should feel free to say things that can nourish awareness and happiness. For instance, if there is a dish that you like very much, you can notice if other people are also enjoying it, and if one of them is not, you can help him or her appreciate the wonderful dish prepared with loving care. If someone is thinking about something other than the good food on the table, such as his dif­ficulties in the office or with friends, he is losing the present
moment and the food. You can say, "This dish is wonderful don’t you agree?" to draw him out of his thinking and worries and bring him back to the here and now, enjoying you, enjoying the wonderful dish.

antioxidant action

1: Q^M. 1999 Sep;92(9):527-30.
Interaction of dietary antioxidants in vivo: how fruit and vegetables prevent disease?
Eastwood MA.
Department of Medicine, University of Edinburgh, Western General Hospital Trust, UK.
Epidemiological studies indicate that fruit and vegetables are health-promoting and protective against disease, particularly cardiovascular disease and cancer. Possible plant nutrients providing this protection include antioxidants and dietary fibre. Clinical trials with antioxidant supplements give inconsistent results for protection against lung cancer in smokers, invasive cervical cancer, oesophageal and gastric cancers, colorectal polyps and coronary heart disease. The antioxidants used in trials may be contributing to a more complex system. Antioxidants have differing solubilities which partition across the phases of tissues, cells and macromolecular structures: water-soluble ascorbate, glutathione and urate; lipid-soluble tocopherols and carotenoids, and intermediatory-soluble flavonoids and hydroxycinnamic acids. The health protection provided by fruit and vegetables could arise through an integrated reductive environment delivered by plant antioxidants of differing solubility in each of the tissue, cellular and macromolecular phases.
QJM. 1999 Sep;92(9):527-30.
Interaction of dietary antioxidants in vivo: how fruit and vegetables prevent disease?
Blomhoff R et al Health benefits of nute: potential role of antioxidants Brit J Nutrition 2006,96, suppl 2, S52-60

Poisons in Politics

Poisons in Politics
Assassins have used poisons to remove troublesome individuals since the beginning of time. Hemlock was used by the Ancient Greeks . Socrates was killed by Hemlock ingestion. Arsenic oxide was widely used,it is free of taste, odour, readily dissolves in water and killes in doses of less than 250 mg. Ideal for the job. This practice was taken up in Ancient Rome and Agrippina advanced the cause of her son Nero to becoming Emperor by the judicious use of arsenic. Pope Clement II was killed by lead poisoning in 1047 AD.
Cesare and Lucrezia Borgia and Madame Tofana of Sicily made use of arsenic for carefully planned murders.
More recently in 1978 the Bulgarian dissident Georgi Markov was killed by firing a small pellet of platinum from a devise in the tip of an umbrella shot into his leg. He died within three days.
This winter, the Russian Litvinenko died over several days from polonium-210 poisoning administered during a meal. The alpha ray emissions are deadly and effective before the element is excreted.
A popular poison said to be used against Iraqi Political refugees was thallium-201, deadly and slow, taking several days to kill . Thallium sulphate has also been commonly used and is also slow. Giving the killer plenty of time to escape.
Viktor Yushchenko, the Ukrainian Presidential candidate in 2004 was poisoned with tetrachlorodibenzodioxin ( TCDD) and this turned his facial skin into pustules. ( chloracne ) .
Ricin is another favourite but easily detected.
John Emsley FT Magazine January 6/7 2007, pp 24-25

Obesity

Obesity is as eveyone knows a real and threatening modern problem. The simple minded think that obesity is a result of eating too much. That the ready provision of food in the West just means that people eat to much in relation to their activity. There are very few fat people in the poor areas of Asia and Africa.
For many this is too simplistic an explanation.
For my part I often wonder if the epidemic amongst Western populations is a result of more food being available to populations whose ancestors had for many generations adjusted to being starved or barely fed. And then in relatively recent times they have ready access to food, catch up time. Their bodies are accustomed to starvation and are overwhelmed by the available food and become fat. Genetic constitution is also a factor, maybe the epidemics and starvation of the past has selected a population more prone to obesity once food is plentiful.. The hormone leptin appears to have a role in calorie intake control. Lower blood leptin concentrations and food intake leaps.
It is also interesting that fat distribution is different between men and women, round the hips in women and the uppper abdomen in men.
What is clear is that the health and physical well being of obese men, women ansd children is compromised.
A recent interesting finding is that the intestinal flora of obese humans and mice differ from those of lean individuals. The two predominant populations of microbacteria in the gut are members of the Firmicutes and Bacteroidetes families. Obese mice have higher proportions of Firmicutes which have enzymes which are efficient in digesting normally indigestible polysaccharides. ( Nature 2006, vol 444, pp1009-10; 1022-1023; 1027-1031
What is not clear is if this is a cause or effect. A person who over eats will have the possibility of more food passing unabsorbed into the colon feeding the bacterial population there.
Under pressure over obesity the food industry is beginning to look for ideas to alleviate the problem. For example the drug firm Phytopharm is studying a plant called Hoodia, which grows close to the Orange River by the Kalahari Desert which it is said depresses appetite. This idea is being extended by Unilever.
Despite the explosion of information that we now have on obesity , this

epidemic continues to increase in severity.

In the Nutrition Society Sir David Cuthbertson Medal Lecture Gemma Fruhbeck reviews the contemporary view of this problem
Proceedings of the Nutrition Society 2006, 65, 329-347

Understanding the neuroendocrine systems that regulate energy homeostasis, and adiposity has been a long-standing challenge in studying obesity, which is an increasingly important public health problem. Adipose tissue is no longer considered to have no role in body-weight regulation. It actively secretes a large number of hormones, growth factors, enzymes. cytokines. complement factors and matrix proteins, at the same time as expressing receptors for most the
control of fuel storage, mobilisation and utilisation at both central and peripheral sites. Thus, an extensive interaction at a local and systemic level in response to specific external stimuli or metabolic changes underpins the multifunctional characteristics of adipose tissue. In addition to the already-known adipokines, such as IL, TNFα, leptin, resistin and adiponectin,, there are newly identified factors concerned in adipose tissue metabolism; aquaporin, caveolin, visfatin. serum amyloid A and vascular endothelial growth factor. Genomics. proteomics and metabolomics are identifying new insights into the molecular basis of obesity.
H. David McCarthy ( Proceedings Nutrition Society 2006, 65, 385-392) discusses the important point of measurements in children as predictors for the metabolic syndrome: focus on waist circumference. Rather than excess general fatness (assessed by BM1). more specifically it is excess abdominal fatness, waist circumference measurement, which is a better measure . Abdominal fat measurements in children is proving to be more clinically useful. Waist circumference centile charts have now been developed for the UK and other paediatric populations to assist in this process. Abdominal fatness has increased in infants, children and adolescents to a greater extent than overall fatness over the past 10-20 years, suggesting that obesity prevalence may be underestimated when based entirely on BMI. Additionally, ethnic differences in fat distribution have been demonstrated in children, with those from south Asian backgrounds having a greater abdominal distribution .
Rennie KL et al have written a review on The effect of physical activity on body fatness in children and adolescents ( Proceedings Nutrition Society, 2006, 65, 393-402) and discuss the lack of consistency between studies that have investigated the relationships between measurements of physical activity and energy expenditure and body fatness in children. This may be because energy intake is more important . Or that the methodology for measuring activity and body composition. does not adjust physical activity energy expenditure and differences in body composition, or body fat is not appropriately adjusted for body size. It may be more important to measure the amount and intensity of physical activity required to prevent fat-mass gain than the energy expended in physical activity. A clearer understanding of the psycho-social, behavioural and environmental factors that influence activity is needed, including the interactions between physical activity and other behaviours such as time spent sedentary, sleeping and eating.
Having said that I just wonder if the whole problem is basically one of eating too much.. Food is so cheap and plentiful and there is a massive industry dependent upon sales. The metabolic responses are fascinating. The cause may be simple, gluttony