Ok, science reporting isn’t always this bad, but there’s some stuff that comes close…

According to the Association’s latest scientific statement:

…most women should consume no more than 100 calories (about 25 grams) of added sugars per day. Most men should consume no more than 150 calories (about 37.5 grams) each day. That’s about six teaspoons of added sugar a day for women and nine for men.

In contrast, the statement cites a report from the 2001–04 National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) that showed the average intake of added sugars for all Americans was 22.2 teaspoons per day (355 calories).

Soft drinks and other sugar-sweetened beverages are the number one source of added sugars in Americans’ diet, according to the statement. “One 12-ounce can of regular soda contains about 130 calories and eight teaspoons of sugar,” Johnson said.

So that works out to about 1 soda/day for men, and about 3/4 of one for women…assuming there’s no added sugar consumed from other sources, such as processed foods.

This goes for “natural” sweeteners like honey, too… as noted in this LA Times article, “Sweet Stuffed“:

Research on sweeteners has a long way to go before nutrition scientists will be able to say for certain whether some are less healthful than others. There’s debate, too, over whether the body is more apt to put on weight when sugars are slurped down in soft drinks than when consumed in solid foods.

For now, there’s agreement on one thing — we’re eating too much sugar, regardless of which kind we’re talking about.

There’s an interesting discussion in today’s NYT about the relationship between exercise and the (reduced) risk of certain cancers. What I found intriguing about the Finnish study highlighted in the article, was the association of cancer risk with exercise intensity.

What these recent studies, including the one from Finland, share is the suggestion that, in order to use exercise to reduce the risk of cancer, you must make yourself sweat. In the Finnish study, the most beneficial exercise was both frequent and demanding. The researchers used METs (an acronym for metabolic equivalent of task, a numerical comparison of the oxygen or energy used during an activity versus the amount used at rest) to characterize their subjects’ exercise habits. A MET of 1 is the equivalent of lolling inertly on the couch. In his study, jogging steadily for 30 minutes or so represented a MET of about 10. The men whose METs reached at least 5 almost every day were the least likely to die of cancer, especially of the lung or the gastrointestinal tract.

Just one more reason to break a sweat in the gym (not that any more are needed)!

First, Oprah… according to the Chicago Tribune:

Alleging Internet marketers are using her name without permission, Oprah Winfrey–through her corporate vehicle, Harpo Inc.–on Wednesday filed a federal trademark infringement suit against 40 peddlers of dietary supplements.

…Last year, Oz praised the anti-aging properties of the acai berry.

Not long after, Internet marketers began to sell acai products with implications that they had been endorsed by Winfrey or Oz, said Marc Rachman, an attorney for Harpo. But neither has ever sponsored such a product, he said.

The same phenomenon has occurred involving the health benefits of other substances aside from acai berries. “The subject is discussed on the show, then the scams start. It’s brazen,” Rachman said. But acai berries have been a particular magnet for alleged misdeeds.

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It’s 20 years old!

I almost never attend aerobics classes (I like to move to my own beat, not someone else’s), but these days, I’m 100% for anything that gets people moving on a regular basis.  Step aerobics was one of the first popular alternatives to traditional aerobics, and – after all these years – it’s still hanging in there.

Needless to state, I rarely stroll down the cereal aisle at the supermarket… it’s been years since I’ve eaten anything more processed than old fashioned rolled oats.  Roald Dahl neatly summed up my opinion of most ready-to-eat breakfast cereals in “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory”…

“Do you know what breakfast cereal is made of? It’s made of all those little curly wooden shavings you find in pencil sharpeners!

It’s only a slight exaggeration.  As far as I’m concerned, most of ‘em are fortified junk food.  So I’m definitely with the author of this Washington Post article…

Kellogg’s has reformulated its Rice Krispies and Cocoa Krispies cereals, fortifying them with vitamins A, C, and E and a bunch of B vitamins. The boxes and ads now tout that “each and every box” of Krispies has ingredients that “help support your child’s immunity.”

…Rice Krispies aren’t the worst cereal in the world. They’re pretty low-calorie and less sugary than most. But to suggest to parents that feeding them to kids will help protect the little ones against disease — and that’s what they mean when they talk about “boosting immunity” — seems absurd.

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I wrote a bit about NYT restaurant critic Frank Bruni’s struggle with overweight and bulimia a few weeks ago.  The Times just posted a Q & A with him that’s also worth a read.

Here’s a couple of points I thought were especially relevant:

Before becoming the restaurant critic, you had already lost a significant amount of weight. How did you do it?

A. I stopped turning to fad diets. I stopped trying to yoke myself to such extreme calorie deprivation regimens that it was bound to fail. Instead I just tried to cut my intake significantly but not in an untenable way, while way way upping the exercise. It was serious sustained exercised married with an absence of binges. It wasn’t 1,200 calories a day. That had always failed me. It wasn’t even 1,500 a day. It was probably like 2,400 a day but with very serious exercise every day.

I’ll be curious to see how this one plays out…

The Food and Drug Administration is being sued. (Not for the first time.) This time, it’s by supplement companies who don’t like the way the agency denies or waters down the “qualified health claims” they can put on their wares.

…You can see why the companies don’t like the way the FDA alters the qualified claims they allow. One claim cited in the lawsuit started out as “Vitamin E may reduce the risk of bladder cancer. The scientific evidence supporting this claim is convincing, but not conclusive.”

It was changed to: “One small study suggests that vitamin E supplements may reduce the risk of bladder cancer. However, two small studies showed no reduction of risk. Based on these studies, the FDA concludes that it is highly unlikely that vitamin E supplements reduce the risk of bladder cancer.”

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I’ve read this article on obesity by NYT columnist David Leonhardt so you don’t have to.  Here’s the short version:

“There’s an obesity crisis and the government needs to do something about it.”

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After several years of snarky comments from the resident teens about our gym habits, both of them have finally joined us in the gym.  Ryan’s (19) been hitting the weights M/W/F and doing cardio Tu/Th.  Nick (16) has settled for combined weight/cardio sessions on Tu/Th/Sat/Sun.  While both of them have full memberships to our gym, Ryan’s been using the facilities at his community college over the summer (he’ll switch over to ours again next week, once the summer term is over).

There’s something to be said for quietly setting an example, vs. nagging.

I’d like to think that this article from the New York Times “Fashion & Style” section is intended to be humorous…

THIS summer the unvarying male uniform in the precincts of Brooklyn cool has been a pair of shorts cut at knickers length, a V-neck Hanes T-shirt, a pair of generic slip-on sneakers and a straw fedora. Add a leather cuff bracelet if the coolster is gay.

In truth this get-up was pretty much the unvarying male uniform last summer also, but this year an unexpected element has been added to the look, and that is a burgeoning potbelly one might term the Ralph Kramden.

Too pronounced to be blamed on the slouchy cut of a T-shirt, too modest in size to be termed a proper beer gut, developed too young to come under the heading of a paunch, the Ralph Kramden is everywhere to be seen lately, or at least it is in the vicinity of the Brooklyn Flea in Fort Greene, the McCarren Park Greenmarket and pretty much any place one is apt to encounter fans of Grizzly Bear.

What the trucker cap and wallet chain were to hipsters of a moment ago, the Kramden is to what my colleague Mike Albo refers to as the “coolios” of now. Leading with a belly is a male privilege of long standing, of course, a symbol of prosperity in most cultures and of freedom from anxieties about body image that have plagued women since Eve.

…but the humor is lost on me.  I know plenty of guys in the gym who don’t have washboard abs – it’s definitely a “problem area” for men (much like “thunder thighs” are for women). Many of them are fairly fit and strong, however: it shows in their arms, shoulders and chests.  By contrast, the bodies pictured in this article not only have obvious guts… they also have nondescript arms and pecs.  In other words, these “hipsters” are soft, flabby, weak and unfit – and there’s NOTHING “coolio” about that.

Urrrrghhh…

As reported by the New York Times, this recent study indicates the effect of diet and exercise on the risk of Alzheimer’s disease are independent and additive.

Elderly people who are physically active appear to be at lower risk of developing Alzheimer’s disease, as are those who eat a heart-healthy Mediterranean style diet, rich in fruits and vegetables and low in red meat. Now, a new study has found that the effects of the two lifestyle behaviors are independent — and the benefits add up.

The Columbia University study followed a diverse group of 1,880 septuagenarian New Yorkers, assessing their diets and levels of physical activity, and screening them periodically for Alzheimer’s disease. After an average of five years, 282 cases of Alzheimer’s were diagnosed.

Those who followed the healthiest diets were 40 percent less likely to develop Alzheimer’s than those with the worst diets, and those who got the most exercise were 37 percent less likely to develop the disease than those who got none. But the greatest benefits occurred in those who both ate healthy and remained active. Participants who scored in the top one-third for both diet and exercise were 59 percent less likely to be diagnosed with Alzheimer’s than those who scored in the lowest one-third.

While one in 5 participants with the lowest scores developed Alzheimer’s, fewer than one in 10 of the top scorers developed the disease.

With all the attention on diet and exercise for weight loss, it’s easy to forget that they’re also  associated with a whole host of health benefits, that have nada to do with having a “beach body”.  There are excellent reasons to develop healthy habits, even if you never shed a pound…and this looks like one of ‘em.

Click here for the full study.

‘Cause it could cost you your job.

PANAMA CITY — Bay County’s Health Department director, who courted controversy with a proposal to ban Gatorade from schools and equated Kentucky Fried Chicken and Dunkin Donuts to obesity and death, resigned Friday.

…Bay County Commissioner Mike Thomas asked for Dr. Newsom’s resignation in a letter released Thursday saying the “vitriolic messages on the billboard outside the health department,” some of which have mentioned specific local businesses such as the soon-to-open Dunkin’ Donuts, could expose the county to a lawsuit.

It’s a sad story, since Dr. Newsom sounds like a dedicated public servant… he’s someone who clearly lives according to his values and sets a high bar for his own performance.  Unfortunately, it’s a case of childish behavior all around: from the thin-skinned local business owners who complained; to the panicky commissioners who demanded the resignation of a valuable asset… to Dr. Newsom himself, whose intemperate choice of words was a) virtually guaranteed to step on some toes; and b) unlikely to yield benefits commensurate with the hassle.

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This ad’s been making the rounds on the internet, so forgive me if you’ve already seen it.

I couldn’t resist showing this to my husband and kids.  They all looked incredulous, but no one said anything until Ryan guffawed, “That is soooo rude!” 

Out of the mouths of babes (ok, he’s 19 – but still…)!

But beyond that, there are two obvious points to make about the Shake Weight:

1. Excess arm fat in the upper arm area will only be lost via a sustained caloric deficit (spot reducing is a myth). 
2. Exercise for muscular development (even “toning”) needs to be progressive. Unfortunately, adaptation to whatever stimulus provided by the Shake Weight will occur pretty quickly.

Ultimately, if you want “strong, sexy, sculpted arms and shoulders”, then you have to do exercises that will build strength… it’s that simple.   If you train to be strong (whole body – not just arms), all you have to do is to tweak your diet and the “sexy, sculpted” part will (eventually) take care of itself.

Back in March, I wrote a brief post on Australian trainer/model Paul James, who decided to gain 40kg of fat in an effort to understand what his clients go through when attempting to lose weight.

He ’s now on his way back down… naturally, he’s finding it difficult.

After months of eating nothing but fatty, fried foods and sugary drinks, James began liking his new diet — perhaps too much.

“I really enjoyed the food,” he said. “But it soon became an addiction and I am currently fighting that addiction as well to sugar and fat.”

James’ first step to getting fit was to break his addiction, but he couldn’t do it cold turkey. He gradually weaned himself off of sugar and fat. Today he believes he has kicked his habit.

…When James finally did make it back to the gym to begin an exercise regimen, he couldn’t do what he used to do. 

He had so much extra weight on his ankles and knees that he couldn’t run because he was afraid of injuring his joints and he was unable to do a set of sit-ups.

Here it is, in his own words:

Adult obesity rates are still rising…

Still, compared with 2008, obesity rates rose in almost half the states, and decreased in none. In four states — Alabama, Mississippi, Tennessee and West Virginia — more than 30 percent of adults are obese. Eight of the 10 states with the highest obesity rates are in the South, and Colorado is the only state with a rate under 20 percent. Seven of the 10 states with the highest poverty levels are also among the 10 states with the highest obesity rates.

The trend is up sharply. In 1991, no state had an obesity rate above 20 percent, and in 1981 the national average was 15 percent.

The study, published by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the Trust for America’s Health, found that in 30 states, 30 percent or more of children ages 10 to 17 were overweight or obese.

Full ”F As In Fat” report here.

Ok, you knew that already, but this German study has some fairly impressive numbers to back that up…

To further describe the reduction in risk associated with these factors, Earl S. Ford, M.D., M.P.H., of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Atlanta, and colleagues assessed data from 23,513 German adults age 35 to 65. At the beginning of the European Prospective Investigation Into Cancer and Nutrition-Potsdam (EPIC-Potsdam) study—between 1994 and 1998—participants completed an assessment of their body weight and height, a personal interview that included questions about diseases, a questionnaire on sociodemographic and lifestyle characteristics and a food frequency questionnaire.

Their responses were assessed for adherence to four healthy lifestyle factors: never smoking, having a body mass index lower than 30, exercising for at least three and a half hours per week and following healthy dietary principles (for example, having a diet with high consumption of fruits and vegetables while limiting meat consumption). Follow-up questionnaires were administered every two to three years.

Most participants had one to three of these health factors, fewer than 4 percent had zero healthy factors and 9 percent had all four factors. Over an average of 7.8 years of follow-up, 2,006 participants developed new cases of diabetes (3.7 percent), heart attack (0.9 percent), stroke (0.8 percent) or cancer (3.8 percent).

After adjusting for age, sex, education level and occupation, individuals with more healthy lifestyle factors were less likely to develop chronic diseases. Participants who had all four factors at the beginning of the study had a 78 percent lower risk of developing any of the chronic diseases during the follow-up period than those who had none of the healthy factors. The four factors were associated with a 93 percent reduced risk of diabetes, 81 percent reduced risk of heart attack, 50 percent reduced risk of stroke and 36 percent reduced risk of cancer.

I like those odds, myself.  Click here for the full study.

That’s what I felt about this article in Time, “Why Exercise Won’t Make You Thin“, by John Cloud.  It’s 4 pages long, but these two paras tell you all you need to know:

“More than 45 million Americans now belong to a health club, up from 23 million in 1993. We spend some $19 billion a year on gym memberships. Of course, some people join and never go. Still, as one major study — the Minnesota Heart Survey — found, more of us at least say we exercise regularly. The survey ran from 1980, when only 47% of respondents said they engaged in regular exercise, to 2000, when the figure had grown to 57%.

And yet obesity figures have risen dramatically in the same period: a third of Americans are obese, and another third count as overweight by the Federal Government’s definition. Yes, it’s entirely possible that those of us who regularly go to the gym would weigh even more if we exercised less. But like many other people, I get hungry after I exercise, so I often eat more on the days I work out than on the days I don’t. Could exercise actually be keeping me from losing weight?

When I read this, my initial response was, “WTF???”  Even the researchers he quotes, Eric Ravussin and Timothy Church, don’t go that far.  Is he serious?

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“Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day. Teach him how to fish and you feed him for a lifetime.”

Lao Tzu

About a decade ago, my husband, John, was tipping the scales at 257 lbs.  Despite his height (he’s 6′ 3″), he was borderline obese, and – even worse – had a family history of diabetes and cardiovascular disease.  He knew he had to deal with the weight, and was taking action, but had a looong way to go.  Needless to state, I was on the lookout for ways to inspire and motivate him to succeed, and – after some searching - I found what looked like the perfect e-book for him.

It was Burn the Fat, Feed the Muscle by Tom Venuto.

BFFM was my first introduction to Tom’s writings, and I could not have asked for a better one.  Unlike many other programs, it was a detailed roadmap – not only for getting into shape – but for reaching the next level.  Tom truly is one of those ”teachers” alluded to in the above quote… Unlike many other popular and “fad” diet programs, BFFM provides readers with a template for lifelong fitness and maintenance of their ideal weights.

Nonetheless, it’s not for everyone.  Tom is a successful natural bodybuilder, and BFFM reflects his training and discipline.  While it’s “user-friendly”, it’s also fairly detailed – which is why he saw the need for a simpler program that would be just as effective, but more in tune with the “goals of ordinary ‘real people’”.

That program is The Body Fat Solution. It was written for…

…men and women who are overweight…This book is for the busy working person who doesn’t have all day to spend in the gym or in the kitchen preparing complicated meals.  It was not written for the full-time athlete, bodybuilder, fitness professional, or person with unlimited time to exercise.

The Body Fat Solution is for the layperson who wants simple explanations and practical action strategies to apply in daily life.

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Ok, not the beer itself…it’s the yeast the beer’s made from. According to this detailed article in Wired Magazine, a microbrew from the Fossil Fuels Brewing Company in Northern California is being made with a re-animated strain of Saccharomyces cerevisiae extracted from fossil amber from the Eocene epoch. Not exactly “Jurassic Park”, but close…

Evidently, the brew is pretty good, too: there’ve been several “thumbs up” reviews.

I’ve never been a big beer drinker, but I’d love to try it…I’m a science nerd, after all.  Unfortunately, it’s not being distributed outside of Northern California yet.  But who knows?  The hubby and I are considering a short, end-of-summer vacation… and a beer/wine-tasting tour of Northern CA might be just the ticket.

(h/t Slashfood)