Health News

More Great News: Red Wine Is Good For The Brain

Elaine Meinel Supkis

The good news just keeps pouring in! Scientists find that mice drinking red wine recover from strokes better than non-drinking mice! So, if you smoke pot and drink wine, this is good for the brain? Whoohoo! And next: brie makes you smarter! We liberals knew all this instinctually.

Burgundy is the best, I guess.

By Deborah Charles Sun Oct 15, 9:10 AM ET
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Red wine might work to protect the brain from damage after a stroke and drinking a couple of glasses a day might provide that protection ahead of time, U.S. researchers reported on Sunday.

In an effort to better understand how red wine works, the scientists from Johns Hopkins University fed mice a moderate dose of a compound found in red grape skins and seeds before inducing stroke-like damage.

Proof that I am very smart is that I like red wines more than white wines. Indeed, I can't stand white wines. I would be drinking Burgundy wine and people wince. But I like it and behold!

Today I can cheerfully drink to my own health. Wasshail!

I also always prefered red grapes to white grapes. I like the aroma and flavor of red grapes. The redder the grapes, the more I pop them in my mouth. This is now highly recommended by myself.

It is so nice to learn these little factoids!

Culture of Life News Main Page

Pot Is Good For Our Brains

Elaine Meinel Supkis

Let's all get stoned. Heh. Well, if one is going to be brainless and forget where the keys are at least one might as well be tripping. Then it doesn't matter much. Cool, man. Oh, look at the pretty flowers. Maybe this will get many Americans more relaxed and happy so they stop chasing pages around the desk or whatever. Cool.

Pot is good, man.

By Andy Sullivan 2 hours, 54 minutes ago
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Good news for aging hippies: smoking pot may stave off Alzheimer's disease.

New research shows that the active ingredient in marijuana may prevent the progression of the disease by preserving levels of an important neurotransmitter that allows the brain to function.

Researchers at the Scripps Research Institute in California found that marijuana's active ingredient, delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol, or THC, can prevent the neurotransmitter acetylcholine from breaking down more effectively than commercially marketed drugs.

Time to release all potheads from prison. This is all so ridiculous. This country always shifts from Dionysian drunken orgies to uptight sexual perverts. I guess both are the same just as ancient people recognized.

Anyway, many elderly lose their appetites. Give them a pot brownie and they will soon be eating happily again. See? Quite simple. And it kills the aches and pains of arthritis and other unhappy plagues of the elderly so why not get stoned? And since the elderly are retired, they don't need to be sharp as a rapier to function, indeed, I suspect the slipping of the mind protects the host from thinking about all the crappy things we did in life or the prospect of looming death.

That alone is good reason to get stoned.

Anyway, the sexual perverts on the right have spooked this country into a War on Drugs even as our biggest industry is the drug manufacturers. But then, they sell a lot of arthritis medicines and don't want us growing pot in pots and then eating it. This cuts their profit margins to near zero.

Mary J is laughably easy to cultivate. Just throw seeds on the ground, they grow like weeds which is why we called it 'weed.' Gads, this takes me back. Way out, man.

Next: LSD is good, too. Oh, wow. Awesome.

Culture of Life News Main Page

New Medicine That Reverses Eye Degeneration

Elaine Meinel Supkis

Great news for me! I used to have near-perfect eyesight. Then, starting in my early 40's, the ability to focus close-up has slowly but relentlessly eroded. Now there seems to be a medicine that can either stop this from happening or even, I do hope, revere it! Wonderful news!

I am seeing my doctor about this next week!

A drug for treating the disease which is the biggest cause of sight loss in the UK could also help people regain some vision, research suggests.
Injections of the drug Lucentis can improve sight in people with a particular form of retina degeneration.

A study involving 716 people in the New England Journal of Medicine found it slowed vision loss in 90% of patients, and improved vision for about a third.

The drug has yet to be granted a European licence.

Ranibizumab is great news for individual patients, as it offers them the chance of having their vision restored
Steve Winyard

Lucentis (ranibizumab), which is used to treat wet age-related macular degeneration (wet AMD), must also be appraised by the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (Nice).

However, it has already been approved for use in the US.

This is wonderful news. I remember when I couldn't thread a needle anymore. It was most annoying. Now, I can't read most ordinary text when it is a book, the computer is no problem yet because it is backlit. But it would be nice to see clearly again. I really do miss that.

And of course, we all fear losing our sight. As the industrialized world ages, there are more and more of us old geezers who need rejuvenation. If I do get this medicine, I will report what happens next, hopefully, good, happy stuff.

Just for our own edification, here is information about this age-related condition:Click on image to enlarge

Age related macular degeneration (AMD) is the leading cause of legal blindness in the elderly Caucasian population, but is relatively rare in other races. The degenerative condition of the central retina (macula) only affects central vision, leaving peripheral vision intact. AMD affects approximately 30% or more of the Caucasian population age 75 and greater and, while no one knows the exact cause of this disorder, a genetic link has been made. The primary lesion appears to occur deep to the central retina with deposits known as drusen. Drusen are thought to be metabolic by-products, the increasing deposition of which may further interfere with the high metabolic activity of the macula.

And all this is a reminder that one of our Founding Fathers, Benjamin Franklin, was an amazing inventor who suffered from this condition. He fixed it by creating bifocals. And he fixed a lot of things. It is most distressing to see all his great works being destroyed by short-sighted people.

Even glasses can't fix their vision thing.

Culture of Life News Main Page