Category: Health

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A Woman Was Found Pecked to Death by Her Pet Rooster

People are killed and eaten by their pets more often than we’d like to think. That said, I bet you’ve never considered the ways your pet fowl could spell the end of your life.

This 76-year-old Australian woman probably didn’t. She probably also didn’t think about the fact that the varicose veins on her legs ran right at beak-level – ripe for the pecking.

Apparently, she was out collecting eggs when her rooster pecked her lower left leg. It caused “significant hemorrhage with collapse and death,” and the autopsy showed two major lacerations – one of which was over a “perforated large varix.”

The official cause of death was exsanguination due to bleeding varicose veins.

Before you go and sell your chickens, know this woman did have a medical history that created a perfect storm that helped the rooster along. She had high blood pressure, high cholesterol, type 2 diabetes, and, yes, varicose veins.

Uncontrolled bleeding from varicose veins has caused people to die before, and one being punctured can be considered a medical emergency.

Pressure can build inside the veins, a condition that affects about 25% of adults 50 and older, and has led directly to several other elderly patients’ deaths.

Fatal rooster attacks are, as you probably expect, very rare, but this instance should serve as a reminder that even relatively small and harmless animals can pose a threat when all of the other factors line up just right, say the researchers who wrote up the case study.

“This case demonstrates that even relatively small domestic animals may be able to inflict lethal injuries in individuals if there are specific vascular vulnerabilities present.”

Another option, of course, is to have your veins treated. If you choose not to, though, you’ll want to avoid minor injuries and, if you sustain one, make sure to take it seriously.

“Apply pressure to the bleeding point, lie down, elevate the leg, and get help,” advises one expert.

Good advice, my friends. And now you know.

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10 Fascinating Facts to Get Your Juices Flowing

If you’ve been in a rut lately, let’s put an end to that RIGHT THIS INSTANT!

You know why? And you know how? Because of this stellar fact set!

It covers all kinds of topics and it will give you a big BOOST.

Let’s dig into these facts.

1. Get busy, over 50 folks!

Photo Credit: did you know?

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2. Beware of the Zone of Death

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3. That’s one way to go out

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4. Folks, I really hope this is true

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5. “He was…an American Gravedigger”

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6. Smoke ’em if you got ’em!

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7. I’ll do it if you do it

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8. I did not know that!

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9. Do you see the world differently?

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10. I think women were happy about that

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Now that’s better, wouldn’t you agree!

Work your brain out folks, it’s good for you!

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A New Planned Parenthood App Will Let Users Order Birth Control in Every State in the U.S.

This is important news, so pay attention.

Planned Parenthood (and women’s reproductive rights in general) has been the subject of a lot of scrutiny and argument over the past several years from some politicians and people, but I, for one, think that this is a great development. Why you wouldn’t want affordable birth control to be available to all women in every corner of the United States is beyond me, but that’s just where we are right now.

Luckily, a lot of people and women are still fighting the good fight. It was recently announced that the Planned Parenthood Direct app is now available in 27 states across the U.S., and it will be available in all 50 states in 2020.

In 2019, pretty much everything is on-demand. Why not #birthcontrol, too? Check out Planned Parenthood Direct, the…

Posted by Planned Parenthood Mohawk Hudson Action on Monday, May 13, 2019

The app allows users to order birth control, make appointments at Planned Parenthood clinics, and get prescriptions for antibiotics to treat urinary tract infections.

Alexis McGill Johnson, the acting President and CEO of the organization, said, “As politicians across the country try to restrict or block access to critical reproductive and sexual health care, the Planned Parenthood Direct app is just one part of the work we do to ensure that more people can get the care they need, no matter where they are.”

Planned Parenthood pulled out of the U.S. government’s Title X funding program in August because the Trump administration passed new rules wherein the organization would no longer be allowed to refer patients to abortion services. Planned Parenthood would have received $60 million in federal funding if they had stayed in the Title X program, but its leaders decided to withdraw.

We're committed to helping all patients get the care they deserve. Through the Planned Parenthood Direct app, you can…

Posted by Planned Parenthood of Southern New England on Saturday, September 7, 2019

The Planned Parenthood Direct app doesn’t take insurance, but birth control can cost as little as $20 for a three-month supply, and users can get birth control just by answering standard questions.

You can check to see if the app is available in your state HERE. This is definitely a small step in the right direction, despite all the negative news surrounding reproductive rights in America right now.

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The common fitness target of 10,000…

The common fitness target of 10,000 steps/day came from a Japanese pedometer company who gave their product a name that means “the 10,000-step meter” because the Japanese character for “10,000” resembles a person walking: 万. There is no known science behind a goal of 10,000 steps.

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10 of the Most Bizarre Declassified Government Documents

Some people are really into conspiracy theories – or more prone to believing that the government is hiding certain truths from us, maybe – and still others have just watched too many episodes of The X-Files to trust that we’re being told every last detail.

But if these 10, slightly terrifying declassified documents are any indication, people are definitely right to ask questions, because the truth is often buried behind miles of red tape.

10. Okay so this needs to be a movie, if it isn’t.

In East Germany a committed freedom fighter and her husband had dealt with having her home raided while she was away, being arrested on the way to protests and all sorts of state sponsored harassment. After the wall fell she was able to read the documents the Stasi had kept on her and found out her own husband was an undercover agent and had written many reports on her activities with a bloodless banality.

9. Everything about the Challenger explosion is horrible.

When the space shuttle Challenger was destroyed, it was reported that all 7 astronauts were killed instantly. It was revealed decades later that some, if not all of the astronauts survived the initial explosion, as the cockpit cabin had enough protection to not be breached. For 2 minutes and 45 seconds, they were awake and aware, as they plummeted toward the Atlantic Ocean.

Understandably, NASA knew that the news of their terrifying death would have crippled the space program even more than it already was.

8. Evil people sometimes have security clearance.

Canadian here… The Somalia Affair Not sure if it was ever classified but definitely a horrific scandal. A now disbanded division of the Canadian military torturing a kid to death in the 90s, and taking hero pics with him while doing it… I think it’s important to remember when your country does something shitty – it’s not always the “bad guys” who can be fucking evil.

7. This seems awfully small and petty when, you know, actual life should scare people enough.

Devil Eyes

The plan after 9/11 to make figurines that look like Osama Bin Laden and give them to kids in South Asia. After it’s left in the sun for a certain amount of time, it’s face would peel off to reveal a “demon-like visage with red skin, green eyes, and black markings,” basically a demon. The objective was to scare kids and their parents so Bin Laden and Al Qaeda would lose support.

6. This idea was actually floated, so what’s not possible?

Operation Northwoods; A plan for a false flag operation that came from the Joint Chiefs of Staff and Department of Defense in 1962 and given to JFK who turned it down. The plan called for the CIA to commit terrorist actions against US Civilians across the United States and frame Cuba, allowing us the right to invade and depose Castro and the communist government there. It was declassified and can be found online at the JFK Library. Terrifying that no one knows or seems to care that this was suggested by our government to the President.

5. We have to prepare for all contingencies.

The Nixon Administration had a speech prepared for if the moon landing had failed, and it’s chilling.

You can read it here

4. The Manhattan Project was terrifying from the ground up.

My hometown was littered woth radioactive waste by the federal government as part of the Manhattan project. https://www.nytimes.com/1981/02/01/nyregion/big-atom-waste-site-reported-found-near-buffalo.html

then we wonder why cancer and thyroid conditions thereare the norm.

3. It really seems likely that we’re going to wipe ourselves out on accident.

There are over 50 mishaps with nuclear weapons by the US Airforce in the 1950s alone.

2. So as you can see, we’ve never been a society that puts children first.

They tested Iodine on “retarded children” as well. In that time, oftentimes orphans and children who were behind in school ended up at these institutions.

The US government also inserted radioactive material into a man after a motorcycle crash and didn’t tell him.

https://www.nytimes.com/1995/10/03/us/panel-urges-us-to-apologize-for-radiation-testing-and-pay-damages.html

1. Drug testing on clueless citizens. That’s not scary.

Operation Midnight Climax

The government hired sex workers to dose “johns” with LSD for research purposes so to speak

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Midnight_Climax

 

Some of these going to haunt my thoughts for weeks, and you know…the truth is out there, y’all.

Are you into conspiracy theories? Do these documents tickle your sixth sense? Let us know!

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A Starbucks Worker Passed Away Because He Couldn’t Afford Kidney Dialysis

To the people out there who continue to argue with their heart and soul that the United States has the best health care on Earth, maybe you should read this story.

Oh, and, you’re wrong.

Most of us know the American health care system is pretty bad for a large segment of the population, but it’s stories like this that really drive the point home.

James Farmer was an employee at Starbucks who tragically passed away on August 11 due to kidney failure. Farmer was only 22 years old, and his story has gone viral because it highlights the failure of the American health care system to protect its citizens in many cases. James Farmer was unable to take off work to have his dialysis treatments because he couldn’t afford to miss out on any paychecks because, like many Americans, he lived paycheck-to-paycheck.

Posted by James Farmer on Thursday, August 23, 2018

A writer named Allison Robicelli was friends with Farmer, and she shared his sad story on Twitter to shed light on a situation that untold numberas of hourly and low-wage workers across the country have to deal with. Robicelli included the #ChickenSandwich hashtag in her tweet to reference the hoopla surrounding the Popeye’s chicken sandwich and how people should refocus their thoughts and priorities on things that literally amount to life and death.

Robicelli wrote, “The people who serve you coffee and sandwiches, the people who barely get by because a living wage ‘isn’t in the best interest of shareholders,’ the people who so many believe don’t deserve to be paid fairly: they are people.”

For the record, Starbucks says that it offers its baristas healthcare coverage if they work an average of at least 20 hours per week. All Starbucks employees also get one hour of paid time off for sick days for every 30 hours worked.

A sad story and one that will hopefully inspire those in high places in business and government to make a change.

A GoFundMe page to pay for Farmer’s funeral expenses already exceeded its goal, but you can still donate to honor James Farmer’s memory.

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The Deadly Incident at Lake Nyos Is One of History’s Most Bizarre Unknown Natural Disasters

Have you ever heard of this story before?

Lake Nyos in Cameroon is a crater lake – the water there poured in after an incredibly explosive volcanic eruption forged the large divot. It appears innocuous and silent, and even though the view is spectacular, the lake could be easily overlooked.

If you know its eerie history, though, you’ll definitely spend some time contemplating its calm surface.

On August 21, 1986, thousands of cattle and 1746 people living near the lake died within moments of each other.

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On August 21, 1986, a rare natural disaster occurred in the West African country of Cameroon. A large cloud of carbon dioxide gas spewed from Lake Nyos and blanketed nearby villages, killing 1,746 people and 3,500 livestock while they slept. .. News of the tragedy took a few days to reach international newspapers, with the first reports appearing in North American papers around the 24th. (Independent Record, 08.25.1986). . . . . . @independentrecord #cameroon #lakenyos #historybuff #historylover #historygeek #historynerd #historylesson #oldnewspaper #newspaper #newspapers #newspaperclipping #newspaperarticle #historicalnewspapers #doyouremember #otd #onthisday #thisdayinhistory #todayinhistory

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When the bodies were discovered, authorities discovered no signs of physical damage or distress.

Though the locals were ready to blame vengeful spirits or the government testing chemicals, geologists quickly uncovered the real killer: carbon dioxide.

When water from the lake was captured in vials, it popped the lids off the sample jars. It was packed with the colorless, odorless gas, and scientists concluded in their official report that the lake had released a sudden and large amount of the gas. Denser than air, it rolled over fields and down slopes toward the local villages, smothering everything breathing in its path.

The lake sits above a system of still-active volcanos, and since carbon dioxide is a common feature of magmatic systems, the fact that it bubbled up into the water isn’t a surprise. Typically, though, the gas simply leaks out of the water slowly and harms no one – people wouldn’t even be aware of it.

At Lake Nyos, though, the huge amount of very still water ensured that pressure remained high enough to keep the gas dissolved in the water. It hosted a defined layer of CO2 that accumulated for several centuries, undisturbed by any kind of current or waves, until each gallon of water had collected an astonishing 5 gallons of carbon dioxide dissolved inside it.

Obviously, that is unsustainable.

There’s some debate as to what triggered the massive release of the gas. It may have been a landslide that fell into the CO2 layer, or a sudden release of fresh CO2 into the water, but, either way, it was like breaking the seal on an over-carbonated bottle of soda.

Water would have shot up and out in a geyser hundreds of meters tall, expelling 1.2 cubic kilometers of CO2 in a mist that blanketed villages as far as 15.5 miles away. The lake turned from blue to red, a result of the iron at the bottom floating toward the top after the massive disruption.

Entire villages perished – there were only 800 survivors in the area, most of whom suffered symptoms of CO2 poisoning.

Authorities installed a degassing system in the lake, as well as a solar-powered warning system, in the hopes that there will never be another mass asphyxiation event like this in the future.

Lake Kivu, straddling the border between Congo and Rwanda, is 2000x bigger than Lake Nyos, and is full of Co2 as well as methane. With 2 million people living within killing range of either gas, scientists have pointed out that similar precautions should be taken there, as well.

Efforts to extract the methane to be used as an energy source, or to explore it for potential oil deposits, have been met with words of caution from scientists.

Here’s hoping the governments listen, or another silent, mass annihilation could be on the horizon.

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This Is Why Some People Can Function Well on Less Sleep Than Others

Which category do you fall into?

Some people need a full eight hours of sleep to function no matter what, while others seem to be able to go go go with less than six hours of solid sack time. The latter like to brag about their ability as if it’s something they’ve trained for, or a reason to think themselves a superior human, but what is it about their makeup, really, that leaves them able to function with so few zzz’s?

Cause it’s just unfair.

Well, science has the answer, so hold on.

Neurologists from the University of California San Francisco think they’ve isolated a gene that could directly impact how much a person has to sleep to feel good.

The findings, published in Neuron, show that people with a single-letter gene mutation seem to be able to function well on six hours of sleep or less without suffering any of the adverse heath effects associated with too little time under the covers.

Whereas people without the mutation wake up moody, tired, and subject to the other nasty side effects of sleeping less than six hours a night.

Study author Louis Ptacek explained more in a statement:

“It’s remarkable that we know so little about sleep, given that the average person spends a third of their lives doing it. This research is an exciting new frontier that allows us to dissect the complexity of circuits in the brain and the different types of neurons that contribute to sleep and wakefulness.”

Interestingly, this isn’t the only gene that’s been linked to requiring less sleep – one called DEC2 also typically means a person averages 6.25 hours of sleep per night, as opposed to the 8.06 hours averaged by the people who do not posses the mutation.

This new gene exists in people without the previously known mutation, and it appears to affect neurons and their level of activity in the brain region that controls stages of sleep.

When the mutated gene was engineered into mice, the ones with the new gene mutation not only slept less, but were more active both when they were awake, and when they were in REM sleep. So it seems the mutation affected their circadian rhythms, says Ptacek.

“Sleep is complicated. We don’t think there’s one gene or one region of the brain that’s telling our bodies to sleep or wake. This is only one of many parts.”

One of many parts that I clearly don’t have. Le sigh…

I’m gonna go take a nap.

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A Study Found That Drinking Red Wine Can Contribute to a Healthy Gut

Studies come and go extolling the benefits of having a glass of red wine (aside from stress relief) now and then (and now), so add this one to the mix. It claims that red wine has the potential to improve your gut health.

The study of almost 3,000 drinkers in the U.S., the U.K., and the Netherlands revealed that red wine drinkers have a higher diversity of gut microbiota than those who prefer beer, cider, or white wines, even when controlling for age, weight, diet, and socioeconomic status.

Having a healthy gut microbiome has been linked to physical and mental health, including curbing food cravings and the efficacy of certain medicines.

The King’s College research was led by Caroline Le Roy, who issued a statement about their findings.

“While we have long known of the unexplained benefits of red wine on heart health, this study shows that moderate red wine consumption is associated with greater diversity and healthier gut microbiota that partly explain its long-debated beneficial effects on health.”

They’re still looking into why this might be the case, though they posit it has to do with active compounds called polyphenols that are found in the beverage. The chemicals are found in the grape skins, and have anti-inflammatory and antioxidant properties that may help fuel the microbes living in our guts.

The same chemicals are found in chocolate and coffee, so maybe take a look at those, too.

“Although we observed an association between red wine consumption and the gut microbiota diversity, drinking red wine rarely, such as once every two weeks, seems to be enough to observe an effect. If you must choose one alcoholic drink today, red wine is the one to pick as it seems to potentially exert a beneficial effect on you and your gut microbes, which in turn may also help weight and risk of heart disease. However, it is still advised to consume alcohol with moderation.”

Moderation is key with alcohol consumption, of course, and the authors point out that people often underreport their consumption, for obvious reasons – and also that there was no way for them to determine the causal relationship between drinking red wine and health.

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It's all about the art of the pour. #PerUs

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The scientific community has spent a fair amount of time trying to decide whether the benefits of drinking wine outweigh the potential downsides, so for now, as ever, consume with caution.

But if you’re going to pick up an alcoholic beverage, red wine seems like the best possible choice.

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Willem Kolff created…

Willem Kolff created the first dialysis machine in the Netherlands during WWII. Lacking materials, he used sausage casings, tin cans, a washing machine, and salt water. He also saved more than 800 people from the Nazis by hiding them in his hospital. And he later invented the artificial heart.