Argentine Congress votes to legalize medical marijuana

Yahoo – AFP, March 30, 2017

Argentina is set to join Uruguay, Colombia, Chile and Mexico in legalizing
medical marijuana (AFP Photo/FILIPPO MONTEFORTE)

Buenos Aires (AFP) - Argentina's Senate voted unanimously to legalize medical marijuana, joining the lower house and setting the country on course to become the latest to relax its laws on pot.

President Mauricio Macri is all but certain to sign the bill, which garnered an unusual level of cross-party support and was applauded by patients and their families.

A group of mothers with sick children burst into tearful applause in the Senate as lawmakers voted 58-0 to pass the bill.

"This is a dream fulfilled, an immense happiness because it will bring solace to patients," said Maria Laura Alasi, whose four-year-old daughter Josefina suffers from West syndrome, a form of epilepsy that causes her to have dozens of seizures a day.

The new law lifts a ban on importing cannabis oil and allows Argentines to buy it with a prescription.

It stops short of allowing home-grown marijuana, something young patients' families had demanded.

"I have faith the senators will find a way around that," said Alasi. "A lot of mothers are already growing their own."

Latin America has seen a major political shift on pot in recent years.

In 2013, Argentina's neighbor Uruguay became the first country in the world to fully legalize marijuana at every stage of production, sale and consumption -- though users must be registered.

Colombia, Chile and Mexico have all legalized the cultivation and use of marijuana for medical and scientific purposes.

Cambodia bans human breast milk exports to US

Yahoo – AFP, March 28, 2017

Cambodia temporarily halted breast milk exports by Utah-based Ambrosia Labs,
which claimed to be the first firm to source the product from overseas and
distribute it in the US (AFP Photo/Raul ARBOLEDA)

Phnom Penh (AFP) - Cambodia officially banned selling and exporting locally-pumped human breast milk Tuesday, after reports exposed how women were turning to the controversial trade to boost meagre incomes in one of Southeast Asia's poorest countries.

The order comes after Cambodia temporarily halted breast milk exports by Utah-based Ambrosia Labs, which claims to be the first firm to source the product from overseas and distribute it in the United States.

The milk was pumped by poor Cambodian women in the capital Phnom Penh and then shipped to the US, where it was pasteurised and sold for $20 per 5 oz (147 ml) pack.

The company's customers are American mothers who want to supplement their babies' diets or cannot produce enough milk of their own.

On Tuesday, Cambodia's cabinet ordered the health ministry to "take actions to immediately prevent the purchasing and exporting of breast milk from mothers from Cambodia," according to a letter seen by AFP.

"Although Cambodia is poor and (life is) difficult, it is not at the level that it will sell breast milk from mothers," it added.

Cambodia's cabinet has ordered the health ministry to "take actions to immediately

 prevent the purchasing and exporting of breast milk from mothers from Cambodia," 

according to a letter seen by AFP (AFP Photo/Fred DUFOUR)

Ambrosia Labs has defended its business in previous interviews, saying the model encouraged Cambodian women to continue breast feeding, earned them much needed extra income and helped fill milk bank shortages in the US.

But UNICEF -- the arm of the UN protecting children -- welcomed the ban, saying the trade was exploitative and that excess breast milk should remain in Cambodia, where many babies lack proper nutrition.

"In Cambodia exclusive breastfeeding for newborns for their first six months declined from 75 per cent in 2010 to 65 per cent in 2014," Debora Comini, UNICEF's Cambodia Representative said in a statement.

Ros Sopheap, the director of the local women's rights group Gender and Development for Cambodia (GDC), applauded the government's decision to bar the trade.

"Even if women agree to do it voluntarily, they often have no other choices and face economic pressure," she told AFP.

Chea Sam, a 30-year-old mother who once worked for Ambrosia Labs, told AFP in a recent interview that she had been selling her breast milk for three months after the birth of her son.

She said she earned $7.5-$10 a day and she knew at least 20 other mothers doing the same.

"We are regretful that this trade has been banned. It had helped our livelihood a lot," she told AFP after the exports were initially suspended.

Dutch scientists discover key to ‘reverse ageing’

DutchNews, March 27, 2017

Studies carried out by Dutch scientists have resulted in a major breakthrough in the anti-ageing process which could ultimately lead to future treatment for cancer patients. 

Researchers at Erasmus university in Rotterdam have found a way to turn back the effects of ageing following experiments on elderly mice which led to a startling regrowth of the rodents’ fur. 

The projects carried out by scientists at Erasmus Medical Centre, Rotterdam, initially centred on an investigation into cells that play a role in ageing, but they have now found a way to alter those cells. 

They developed a compound to kill senescent cells – these are the cells which remain in the body in a semi-dormant state as we age. As we get older, these cells have ceased to divide but are not really dead. Their metabolism continues, which means they continue to secrete proteins, including inflammatory cytokines. The cytokines cause a more rapid ageing of tissues and poorer organ function. 

But the newly formulated compound of Proxifim developed by Peter de Keizer and his colleagues at Erasmus’ department of molecular genetics has found a way of stopping the binding between damaging proteins FOX04 and p53. 

‘I started research on a fundamental biological question without any idea of application because I was interested in seeing what happened to senescent cells when they get irreparably damaged – whether they die or go into another type of response,’ De Keizer told DutchNews.nl.

‘Once I had identified what was the culprit of those cells, then I started to constitute a compound to try to target those cells. While looking at this biological question, I realised it may work in the issue of ageing.’

Experiment

The results of the Erasmus experiment have just been published in the leading scientific journal Cell. Researchers had previously already found a way to slow down ageing. ‘But turning back time proved to be very difficult,’ says De Keizer.

‘The mice were injected with the compounds, and the technicians in the lab came up to me and said, ‘Peter, the mice have re-grown their hair’. When we handled them, we noticed they were more active. These mice had been immobile like old people, but were now running around their cage a lot more.’ 

After three weeks, the running wheel activity of the mice increased two to three times and their organ function improved. After 10 days their coat of fur became fuller. 

‘These effects were not what we were purposefully looking for – we had been looking at the kidneys of the mice. But when we realised the implications, we started dancing in the lab,’ said De Keizer. 

Crucially, the injected compound has had no adverse effects on the mice so far. Their platelet count and liver function remained normal. 

Dr de Keizer has been working on the project for the past eight years and came to Erasmus in 2012. Previously, he had gained his PhD at Utrecht University and carried out post-doctoral training at Buck Institute for Research on Ageing, in Novato, California, on the molecular hallmarks of cellular senescence, and focused on ageing and cancer. 

Cancer

Hopes are high that this compound can come to play an important role in the treatment of cancer now that more is known about the senescent cells. 

Proxifim is a peptide, a small protein which can easily penetrate into cells. It kills the senescent cells and stimulates the surrounding stem cells to create new tissues. 

‘The senescent cells make cancer less sensitive to chemotherapy and can accelerate the growth of tumours,’ explains De Keizer. ‘In other words, we actually want to get rid of these cells.’ 

Next step

Trials have only been carried out on mice, so the next stage is to carry out more trials on animals, possibly pigs. If those trials are successful, then De Keizer is looking to conduct clinical trials for cancer patients. 

‘There are three areas in which we we can work to reverse certain ageing effects,’ says De Keizer. ‘The first area is to delay ageing by eating less and by taking more exercise. 

‘Our bodies can be likened to a car, so the second area of reversing the ageing effects is to recognise the damaged parts and remove them. But it will get old eventually, so the third area to stop ageing is to replace parts – in people this can mean the senescent cells. 

‘If we combine these areas together, we can live healthier for longer. We do not seek eternal life, but a longer life without ailments and in excellent health would be great.’ 

(By Moira Holden)

Related Article:

"The Quantum Factor" – Apr 10, 2011 (Kryon channeled by Lee Carroll) (Subjects: Galaxies, Universe, Intelligent design, Benevolent design, Aliens, Nikola Tesla (Quantum energy), Inter-Planetary Travel, DNA, Genes, Stem Cells, Cells, Rejuvenation, Shift of Human Consciousness, Spontaneous Remission, Religion, Dictators, Africa, China, Nuclear Power, Sustainable Development, Animals, Global Unity.. etc.) - (Text Version)

“… Cell Division - a static process?

Let me take you to the cellular division process. We've said this before, but you need to hear this to understand how it works. A cell is ready to divide. The Human body is designed to rejuvenate... all tissue. You've been told that there's some tissue that does not rejuvenate, but that is incorrect. It all rejuvenates at different speeds at different times and in different ways. It rejuvenates. So now you know that the Human body is designed to live a long time. Unfortunately, the energy that you have created on this planet and what you've gone through, has beat it up. You don't live much more than 80 years. That was not the design.

The Biblical personalities were sometimes prophets and sometimes masters and sometimes just there... and lived for hundreds of years. Did they really? Or perhaps this is that just a metaphor? Did they get that right in the Bible without a error in transcription? I'm going to tell you the truth. It's very accurate. Thousands of years ago you lived a very long time, Lemurian. If you knew your lifespan, you'd gasp. But not anymore. Instructions have been given over time to DNA, literally, by the energy of the planet... en energy that you have created through consciousness.

A cell divides. Right before it divides, it needs the blueprint to clone itself. The blueprint is available from the stem cell. The stem cell gets its information from the quantum part of the DNA, which has never changed since you were born. It's remained static, since nothing has ever changed it... and the fact that you don't believe it's changeable and have just accepted aging. There's not a conscious effort to do anything with it, and it just lays there like it always did.

The diving cell "talks" to the stem cell and says, "Do the same thing you always did? Change anything?" And the stem cell talks to the cell that is dividing, saying, "Make another one just the same." Then you rejuvenate just like the last one, accepting everything you received when you were born.  …”

Dogs detect breast cancer from bandage: researchers

Yahoo – AFP, Mariëtte Le Roux, March 24, 2017

Assistant cynophilist Patrick Mairet, pictured in October 2016, and his dog Thor
are part of the Kdog project, which aims to train dogs to detect breast cancer
(AFP Photo/PASCAL LACHENAUD)

Paris (AFP) - Dogs can sniff out cancer from a piece of cloth which had touched the breast of a woman with a tumour, researchers said Friday, announcing the results of an unusual, but promising, diagnostic trial.

With just six months of training, a pair of German Shepherds became 100-percent accurate in their new role as breast cancer spotters, the team said.

The technique is simple, non-invasive and cheap, and may revolutionise cancer detection in countries where mammograms are hard to come by.

"In these countries, there are oncologists, there are surgeons, but in rural areas often there is limited access to diagnostics," Isabelle Fromantin, who leads project Kdog, told journalists in Paris.

This means that "people arrive too late," to receive life-saving treatment, she added. "If this works, we can roll it out rapidly."

Working on the assumption that breast cancer cells have a distinguishing smell which sensitive dog noses will pick up, the team collected samples from 31 cancer patients.

These were pieces of bandage that patients had held against their affected breast.

With the help of canine specialist Jacky Experton, the team trained German Shepherds Thor and Nykios to recognise cancerous rags from non-cancerous ones.

"It is all based on game-playing" and reward, he explained.

After six months, the dogs were put to the test over several days in January and February this year.

This time, the researchers used 31 bandages from different cancer patients than those the dogs had been trained on.

One bandage was used per experiment, along with three samples from women with no cancer.

In the first round, the dogs detected 28 out of the 31 cancerous bandages and 

on the second try, they scored 100 percent (AFP Photo/PASCAL LACHENAUD)

Saving lives

Each bandage was placed in a box with a large cone which the dogs could stick their noses into, sniffing at each in turn -- four boxes per test.

The exercise was repeated once with each sample, meaning there were 62 individual responses from the dogs in all.

In the first round, the dogs detected 28 out of the 31 cancerous bandages -- a 90-percent pass rate, the researchers announced.

On the second try, they scored 100 percent -- sitting down in front of the box containing the cancerous sample with their muzzle pressed deep into the cone.

"There is technology that works very well, but sometimes simpler things, more obvious things, can also help," said Amaury Martin of the Curie Institute, citing the many untested stories of dogs having detected cancer in their owners.

"Our aim was see if we can move from conventional wisdom to... real science, with all the clinical and research validation that this entails."

This was the proof-of-concept phase of Kdog.

The next step will be a clinical trial with more patients and another two dogs, but the team is still in need of project funding.

The team believes that one day dogs may be replaced by "sniffing" machines, possibly armies of electronic diagnosticians dedicated to analysing samples that people far from clinics would send them by the post.

In the meantime, Experton said there is little danger of the trained dogs using their new-found skills to accost cancer sufferers outside the lab.

"These tests happen within a very specific work environment," he explained. "In a different context, these dogs are unlikely to simply pounce on random people in the street."

The team says it is the only one to work with breast cancer detection from skin-touch samples.

Other research projects are testing canines' ability to smell different types of cancer in samples of the skin itself, blood or urine, even the air people exhale.

In France, the chances of surviving ten years after a breast cancer diagnosis is about 85 percent, compared to around 50 percent in poorer countries.

New blow for Trump as Obamacare repeal bid collapses

Yahoo – AFP, March 25, 2017

Health care activists march to the Trump International hotel in Washington, DC,
during a protest against President Donald Trump's effort to repeal Obamacare
(AFP Photo/MANDEL NGAN)

Washington (AFP) - President Donald Trump faced the biggest blow yet to his young presidency as his bid to repeal Obamacare went down in flames at the hands of rebel Republican lawmakers.

Barely two months into his term, Trump was forced to withdraw an embattled Republican health care bill Friday, moments before a vote, leaving his campaign pledge to dismantle his predecessor's health care reforms unfulfilled.

The stinging defeat showed the limits of Trump's power to deliver on an ambitious legislative agenda despite Republican control of both houses of Congress.

Already rocked by a string of damaging reversals and controversies, Trump must now consider how to move forward in the face of a fractured, rebellious Congress.

"Trump will have a very hard time dealing with these divides because he does not understand them," said John Pitney, a professor of American politics at Claremont-McKenna College.

On Trump's agenda are a major overhaul of the tax system and a bill to upgrade infrastructure like roads and bridges.

Comparing Trump's health care plan to Obamacare (AFP Photo/Gustavo 

IZUS, Anella RETA)

"We were very, very close" to securing enough support for the bill, Trump said in the Oval Office.

But with no Democratic backing, "we couldn't quite get there."

Trump had thrown his full political weight behind the measure, spending days arm-twisting recalcitrant Republicans, and he declared himself "disappointed" and a "little surprised" by the defeat.

The battle was an eye-opening experience for Trump, a billionaire real estate tycoon who entered the White House with no experience in politics or government, including the delicate navigations of Congress.

The bill's defeat marked a second major policy setback for the new president, who has seen his attempt to curb travel from Muslim-majority countries twice frozen by the courts.

Instead of projecting humility, Trump went on the offensive Friday, branding Democrats as the real "losers" of the failed repeal bid because "now they own Obamacare. They own it, 100 percent."

The president met with House Speaker Paul Ryan earlier in the day, then spoke with him by telephone when it was clear the party did not have the votes to get its plan across the finish line.

"I told him that the best thing I think to do is to pull this bill and he agreed with that decision," Ryan said.

But while Trump was quick to blame Democrats for not giving "a single vote" for his plan, Ryan owned up to the failures.

"I will not sugar coat this. This is a disappointing day for us," said the top Republican in Congress.

US President Donald Trump branded Democrats as the real "losers" of the failed 

bid to repeal Obamacare because "now they own Obamacare. They own it, 

100 percent" (AFP Photo/MANDEL NGAN)

Start over

The Trump-backed plan, intended to expand free-market competition in the insurance industry and lower the cost of premiums for most Americans, would also have slashed public assistance to people who have no health coverage through their employer.

Some 14 million people stood to lose their coverage starting next year, according to congressional forecasts.

Basic benefits covered under Obamacare -- such as maternity care and emergency room visits -- would no longer have been considered essential and required for insurers to provide.

The bill now appears dead, with Republican lawmakers urging a return to the drawing board.

"Clearly, the votes weren't there," said Congressman Charlie Dent, one of several moderate House Republicans who expressed concerns over the bill's impact on poor and elderly Americans.

"So I think it's important now that we start over, and we do a durable, sustainable health care reform and it be done in a bipartisan way," he added.

By pulling the bill, Ryan flew in the face of a White House that had declared negotiations over and demanded a vote on Friday.

Trump had put his reputation as a dealmaker on the line with the high-risk vote.

Congressman Mo Brooks, a member of the ultra-conservative House Freedom Caucus that largely opposed the measure on grounds it was too similar to Obamacare, said he was "pleased as could be that the legislation has failed," arguing it would have been bad for Americans.

But he refused to place blame on the president.

"I don't think this reflects on the president in any way, shape or form," Brooks said.

US Speaker of the House Paul Ryan said he told President Donald Trump "the

 best thing I think to do is to pull" an embattled Republican health care bill (AFP

Photo/Nicholas Kamm)

But some conservative centrists expressed frustration with recalcitrant hardliners.

"The House Freedom Caucus just single-handedly saved #Obamacare," Republican Congressman Adam Kinzinger charged on Twitter.

'Law of the land' 

It was not clear when Congress would return to health care, as Trump said he would shift quickly toward tax reform, another longstanding goal of Republicans.

"Obamacare is the law of the land. It's going to remain the law of the land until it's replaced."

Democrats said they were open to cooperation -- provided Republicans wanted to help fix the existing law.

"We're ready to work with the president," Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said on CNN.

"Take repeal off the table," and "we'll work with them on improving Obamacare."

Stem cell therapy helps some men with erectile dysfunction

Yahoo – AFP, Marlowe HOOD, March 25, 2017

New studies offer hope that stem cell therapy could help men unable to have
an erection after prostate surgery to enjoy a normal sex life (AFP Photo/
ANNE-CHRISTINE POUJOULAT)

Paris (AFP) - Men unable to have an erection after prostate surgery enjoyed normal intercourse thanks to stem cell therapy, scientists are to report Saturday at a medical conference in London.

In first-phase clinical trials, eight out of 15 continent men suffering from erectile dysfunction had sex six months after the one-time treatment, without recourse to drugs or penile implants.

The positive result showed no signs of flagging during a subsequent year-long monitoring period.

"As far as we know, this is the first time that a human study with a 12-month follow up shows that the treatment is lasting and safe," said Lars Lund, a professor at Odense University Hospital in Denmark who took part in the trials.

"That is much better than taking a pill every time you want to have intercourse," he told AFP.

The results were promising enough to convince Danish health authorities to authorise so-called phase III "double-blind" randomised trials in which one group of men is given stem cell therapy and another placebos.

Only men recovering from prostate cancer and able to control their bladders will be enrolled in the new experiments, Lund explained by phone.

All-purpose stem cells

To perform the procedure, doctors remove fat cells from a patient's abdomen via liposuction.

The cells undergo a brief treatment and emerge as all-purpose stem cells, meaning they can mutate into almost any specialised cell in the body.

"We do not cultivate the cells or change them in any way," said Lund's colleague Martha Haahr, head researcher and lead author of a study detailing preliminary results, published last year in EBioMedicine.

The stem cells are then injected with a syringe into the penis, where they spontaneously begin to change in to nerve and muscle cells, as well as the endothelial cells that line blood vessels.

Men are under general anaesthesia while all of this happens, and are discharged from hospital the same day.

Prostate surgery is responsible for about 13 percent of erectile dysfunction cases. Up to 80 percent of men experience difficulty having sex immediately after an operation, previous research has shown.

Diabetes accounts for 40 percent of erectile dysfunction cases, and vascular disease another 30 percent.

Men with diabetes would be the next target group for clinical trials, Lund said.

The results reported at the European Association of Urology conference could be an effective "therapeutic option for patients suffering erectile dysfunction from other causes," Haahr said.

It is estimated that nearly half of men between the ages of 40 and 70 experience erectile dysfunction to some degree.

The global market for drugs treating the disorder is expected to top $3.4 billion (3.15 billion euros) by 2019.

Failure to perform sexually can also, in some men, result from relationship problems, performance anxiety or repressed homosexuality, Haahr said.

Health care: Obama warns against changes that harm Americans

Yahoo – AFP, March 23, 2017

People protest Trump administration policies that threaten the Affordable
Care Act, Medicare and Medicaid in January 2017 in Los Angeles, California
(AFP Photo/DAVID MCNEW)

Washington (AFP) - Former president Barack Obama warned Thursday against approving a Republican bill that would repeal his signature health care reform law unless the measure improves coverage for Americans.

"We should start from the baseline that any changes will make our health care system better, not worse for hardworking Americans. That should always be our priority," Obama said in a statement on the seventh anniversary of his signing "Obamacare" into law.

Obama weighed in on the big debate of the day in Washington as the House of Republicans prepared for a high-stakes, too-close-to-call vote on a new health care plan backed by President Donald Trump, who has repeatedly dismissed Obamacare as disastrous.

But in doing away with the Obama law, the Trump plan would cause an estimated 14 million people to lose their health care insurance by next year, according to an assessment by the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office.

President Donald Trump faces a reckoning Thursday as US lawmakers vote on the Republican plan to repeal and replace Obamacare pic.twitter.com/V0LISusIlD

— AFP news agency (@AFP) March 23, 2017

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Amazon tribe has lowest heart risk ever seen: study

Yahoo – AFP, March 17, 2017

Most members of the Tsimane community, an indigenous Amazonian tribe, are
active for between four and seven hours a day --  hunting, gathering, fishing and
farming, the study found (AFP Photo/ANTONIO SCORZA)

Paris (AFP) - Researchers said Friday they had found an indigenous Amazonian tribe with the lowest levels of artery hardening -- a portender of heart disease -- ever observed.

And while they hailed the group's "subsistence lifestyle" as a heart-protecting factor, others cautioned against romanticising the community's hand-to-mouth existence.

Known as the Tsimane, the small forager-farmer community in Bolivia was five times less likely to develop coronary atherosclerosis (artery hardening) than people in the United States -- where it is a major killer, scientists wrote in The Lancet medical journal.

They pointed to the community's low-fat, high-fibre diet and non-smoking, physically active lifestyle -- factors which most scientists agree contribute to good health.

The study was an observational one, meaning it merely uncovered a correlation between lifestyle and heart health, and cannot conclude that one causes the other.

Yet, "the loss of subsistence diets and lifestyles could be classed as a new risk factor for vascular (blood vessel) ageing," study co-author Hillard Kaplan of the University of New Mexico concluded.

"We believe that components of this way of life could benefit contemporary sedentary populations."

The Tsimane diet comprises unprocessed, high-fibre carbohydrates such as rice, corn, nuts and fruit, as well as wild game and fish.

The community eats little fat, few smoke, and most are active for between four and seven hours a day -- hunting, gathering, fishing and farming, the study found.

Observers pointed out that while the Tsimane had lower levels of artery calcification and heart disease, the most common age of death was 70, compared with about 80 in most developed countries.

And these were just the ones who survive childhood -- one in five die in the first year of life.

"There may not be many old Tsimane men with heart disease but that's probably because only the fittest and healthiest Tsimane survive to old age," commented Gavin Sandercock, a cardiology expert from the University of Essex.

For Tim Chico, a University of Sheffield cardiologist, it is important "not to romanticise" the Tsimane existence.

"Two-thirds of them suffer intestinal worms and they have a very hard life without fresh water sewerage or electricity," he said.

Rates of diseases other than heart disease were much higher in the Tsimane -- especially of the infectious kind.

"So, would I live like the Tsimane to reduce my risk of heart disease? No way," Chico said via the Science Media Centre in London.

Researchers took CT scans of the hearts of 705 adults aged 40-94 in 85 villages in 2014 and 2015 for the study.

Based on the results, they concluded that almost nine in 10 Tsimane people (85 percent) had no risk of heart disease, 13 percent had a low risk, and only three percent a moderate or high risk.

By comparison, about half of Americans aged 45-84 have a moderate or high risk of heart disease.

Coca-Cola pulls Sprite from ‘health-conscious’ Dutch market

DutchNews, March 10, 2017

Photo: Despositphotos.com

The world’s largest soft drinks company Coca-Cola is pulling its Sprite brand from the Dutch market from next week because of objections that the drink is a ‘sugar bomb’, the Financieele Dagblad said on Friday. 

The US-based company said it regards the Netherlands as ‘the most health-conscious country in the world’. If the withdrawal of traditional Sprite is seen as a success, it could also be dropped in 100 other countries, Coca-Cola Nederland country manager Richard Schlasberg said. 

Sprite will remain available in sugar- and calorie-free versions. Coca-Cola markets 18 brands of its soft drinks in the Netherlands and one-third of the income at its Dongen bottling plant is derived from zero or low calorie drinks. 

The consumption of soft drinks in the Netherlands fell to an average of 91.5 litres per capital in 2015 from 102.6 litres per capita in 2011. Meanwhile sales of bottled water are increasing, the FD said. 

Related Article:

US beverage giants vow to cut calories to fight obesity

Neanderthal used 'aspirin' for tooth pain: study

Yahoo – AFP, Mariëtte Le Roux, Pascale MOLLARD, March 8, 2017

A handout photo released on March 7, 2017 by Paleoanthropology Group
MNCN-CSIC shows the upper jaw of Neanderthal El Sidron 1, found in what is
 today Spain, with a dental calculus deposit visible on the rear molar (right)
(AFP Photo/Handout)

Paris (AFP) - Nearly 50,000 years before the invention of penicillin, a young Neanderthal tormented by a dental abscess ate greenery containing a natural antibiotic and pain killer, analysis of his teeth revealed Wednesday.

The male, who lived in El Sidron in what is now Spain, ate an antibiotic fungus called Penicillium and chewed on bits of poplar tree containing salicylic acid -- the active ingredient of modern-day aspirin, researchers said.

The youngster's fossilised jawbone reveals the ravages of an abscess, and his dental plaque contained the remnants of an intestinal parasite that causes acute diarrhoea, "so clearly he was quite sick," they wrote in the journal Nature.

"Apparently, Neanderthals possessed a good knowledge of medicinal plants and their various anti-inflammatory and pain-relieving properties, and seem to be self-medicating," said study co-author Alan Cooper of the University of Adelaide's Australian Centre for Ancient DNA (ACAD).

"Certainly, our findings contrast markedly with the rather simplistic view of our ancient relatives in popular imagination," he added.

The study is the latest to recast our long-extinct cousins, long thought of as thick-skulled and slow-witted, in a more positive light.

Other recent findings have started to paint a picture of Neanderthals as sophisticated beings who made cave art, took care of the elderly, buried their dead and may have been the first jewellers -- though they were probably also cannibals.

In 2012, a study in the journal Naturwissenschaften said Neanderthals appeared to have used medicinal herbs such as yarrow and chamomile.

Neanderthals lived in parts of Europe, Central Asia and the Middle East for up to 300,000 years but appear to have vanished some 40,000 years ago.

This coincided more or less with the arrival of homo sapiens out of Africa, where modern humans emerged some 200,000 years ago.

Vegetarian

Neanderthals and homo sapiens interbred, leaving a small contribution of less than two percent to the DNA of all humans except for people from Africa, where Neanderthals never lived.

For the latest study, an international team did a genetic analysis of DNA trapped in the dental plaque of four Neanderthals -- two from Spy Cave in Belgium and two from El Sidron.

Calcified plaque preserves the DNA of microorganisms that lived in the mouth, windpipe and stomach, as well as bits of food stuck between teeth -- which can later reveal what a creature ate and what its state of health was.

From the oldest plaque ever to be genetically analysed, the team concluded the Belgian Neanderthals ate a diet of woolly rhino, wild sheep and mushrooms, living a hunter-gatherer lifestyle.

"Those from El Sidron Cave, on the other hand, showed no evidence for meat consumption, but appeared instead to have a largely vegetarian diet comprising pine nuts, moss, mushrooms and tree bark," Cooper said in a statement.

El Sidron at the time was in a densely forested environment, added the study's lead author Laura Weyrich, also from ACAD.

"In contrast, the Spy Neanderthals were living in a steppe-like environment, so it's easy to picture large, beastly animals wandering around as a major source of food," she told AFP.

The sick Spanish Neanderthal was the only one with traces of poplar or Penicillium in his dental plaque.

New study finds natural aspirin and penicillin in ailing Neanderthal of 50,000 years ago https://t.co/wgI9pLudMC pic.twitter.com/nTGL4fCezm

— AFP news agency (@AFP) March 9, 2017

Liberal politicians open to idea of assisted suicide for under-75s

DutchNews, March 3, 2017

Politicians have suggested that an assisted suicide bill for the over-75s could in future possibly apply to younger people, reports NOS broadcaster. 

On television programme Nieuwsuur on Thursday evening, Alexander Pechtold, head of the liberal democratic D66, said he personally believed that this option should be open regardless of age. 

Pia Dijkstra, a member of his party has brought a private members bill, proposing to make it legal – with certain safeguards – to arrange the death of anyone over 75 with an ‘intrinsic and consistent’ wish to die. 

Last year the government announced that it wanted to introduce such assisted suicide legislation, despite a report by an independent committee of experts recommending against legal euthanasia for those who consider their lives to be completed. 

Euthanasia was legalised in the Netherlands in 2002 for those over 12 experiencing ‘hopeless and unbearable suffering’, who want to die and have come to the conclusion independently. 

In answer to a question from a 57-year-old man who said he wants to die, Pechtold said the time was not ripe for a broader law, but that he was personally in favour. ‘I think that in a civilization, thoughts about death are for the individual,’ he said. ‘You didn’t ask to be put upon this earth and if you say – with full understanding – that this is enough…That is my personal opinion.’ 

But, he added, ‘We now have support for this initiative [by Pia Dijkstra]. In order not to disrupt this support, we need to take it step by step.’ 

Although Christian parties reacted in shock to Pechtold’s personal opinion, Liberal VVD MP Arno Rutte – whose party is currently in government – agreed. He told NOS on Friday: ‘It would be good if it were possible for people who consider their lives to be completed to have a way to end their lives in a dignified manner,’ he said. 

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