Environmental News, Articles & Information | Global Warming News | EcoWorld

KNOXVILLE, Tenn., May 31 (UPI) — U.S. researchers found viruses and bacteria in untreated East Tennessee drinking water, which is treated, but the finding may be a warning for home wells.

Researchers at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville linked the contamination of the community water sources’ limestone, karst aquifers to human feces.

“Karst aquifers have long been recognized as having high susceptibility to fecal contamination because they have features, such as sinkholes and caverns, which act as pathways for rapid flow and transport of contaminants,” Larry McKay said in a statement.

The study, published online in advance of print in a special edition of the journal Pathogens and Fecal Indicators in Ground Water, pointed out all eight of the sampled wells and springs were used for public water supply — water that is treated before being distributed — so the contamination in the study represented no direct risk to consumers.

However, the researchers say the results point to the health hazard potential of non-treated water.

“The real concern is for the numerous small non-community water systems and household wells, where local residents typically drink groundwater that hasn’t been filtered or disinfected,” McKay said. “It’s likely that many of these residents are being exposed to waterborne fecal contamination, both bacterial and viral, but it isn’t clear how big a health risk this represents. Local and regional research is needed to assess the health impacts.”

Fecal contamination of the water may create no symptoms in some, while others may become seriously ill or even die, McKay noted.

Copyright 2010 United Press International, Inc. (UPI). Any reproduction, republication, redistribution and/or modification of any UPI content is expressly prohibited without UPI’s prior written consent.

INDIANAPOLIS, May 31 (UPI) — Dialysis patients with high blood pressure may do well to cut salt and ditch drugs, a U.S. doctor suggests.

Dr. Rajiv Agarwal of the Indiana University School of Medicine and Roudebush Veteran Affairs Medical Center in Indianapolis says reducing fluid build-up in the blood is more effective than using anti-hypertensive medications. He suggests returning to the forgotten but effective strategy of achieving and maintaining dry weight — the lowest weight safely reached immediately after dialysis without developing low blood pressure symptoms.

Cutting salt intake helps control blood pressure and makes it easier for patients to get down to a proper dry-weight, Agarwal said.

Agarwal and Dr. Matthew Weir of the University of Maryland Medical Center in Baltimore looked at medical studies on dry-weight and concluded salt restriction and dry-weight reduction through dialysis together provide more benefits to the heart than anti-hypertensive medications.

“Medication-directed approaches for blood pressure control should be a secondary consideration to manipulating the diet and dialysis prescription in order to achieve dry-weight,” the authors says in a statement.

The study, published in the Clinical Journal of the American Society Nephrology, suggests dry-weight can be assessed inexpensively by using two tests — relative plasma volume monitoring, which detects changes in volume of a patient’s blood, and body impedance analysis, which determines lean body mass.

Copyright 2010 United Press International, Inc. (UPI). Any reproduction, republication, redistribution and/or modification of any UPI content is expressly prohibited without UPI’s prior written consent.

GRANADA, Spain, May 31 (UPI) — Researchers in Spain found the number of teenagers in Europe with excessively low weight was higher than expected.

University of Granada researchers, led by Enrique Garcia Artero, found the rate of teenagers with excessively low weight was 3.9 percent among boys and 4.8 percent among girls. In fact, the percentage among girls was higher than the 3.0 percent found for obesity.

Enrique Garcia Artero said the finding is important because it is easier to make lifestyle changes in teens than in adults.

“Firstly, because their personality, interests and habits are not still formed, so they are not as resistant to change as adults,” the researchers said in a statement. “And secondly, because we have the best environment to model their habits: the educational system — school and high school.”

The researchers found tests easily implemented by a physical education teacher — including the 40-meter race, hand grip strength, the long jump with feet together, body mass index, waist circumference and skin folds — all easily conducted by the physical education teacher, to be valid and reliable assessments of aerobic capacity, muscle strength and body composition.

Study conclusions were based on 3,000 Spanish teenagers, 3,500 European teenagers and an additional sample of 126 teenagers from Granada.

Copyright 2010 United Press International, Inc. (UPI). Any reproduction, republication, redistribution and/or modification of any UPI content is expressly prohibited without UPI’s prior written consent.

ANN ARBOR, Mich., May 31 (UPI) — Some strains of influenza do not die at the end of winter, but move to South America, while some migrate further, U.S. genetic detectives said.

Study leader Trevor Bedford of the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor and colleagues trace virus genetic information to understand better the cyclical pattern in temperate regions where autumn flu arrives as predictably as falling leaves, and seems to die in the spring and summer.

“We found that although China and Southeast Asia play the largest role in the influenza A migration network, temperate regions — particularly the United States — also make important contributions,” Bedford said in a statement.

The finding may help explain how influenza is prevented in the United States. For instance, there may be cause for caution in the use of anti-virals that could promote drug-resistant strains that could spread. There may also be reason for optimism that U.S. vaccination programs could stem flu spread globally.

The findings are published in Plos Pathogens.

Copyright 2010 United Press International, Inc. (UPI). Any reproduction, republication, redistribution and/or modification of any UPI content is expressly prohibited without UPI’s prior written consent.

PHOENIX, May 29 (UPI) — A dangerous strain of antibiotic-resistant bacteria has been confirmed for the first time in Arizona this year, striking 10 patients in the Phoenix area.

Two people known to be infected with the NAP1 strain of Clostridium difficile have died, The Arizona Republic reports. All of those infected were elderly hospital or nursing-home patients.

“Assuming this continues to evolve, it is going to be a real pain for our healthcare communities,” said Dr. Bob England, who heads the Maricopa County Department of Public Health.

C. difficile is antibiotic resistant in all its forms, but the NAP1 strain is about 20 times as toxic. The bacteria cause diarrhea and can cause a fatal inflammation of the colon.

An alert from the state Department of Health Services did not say where cases of C. difficile have been reported, the newspaper said. The Republic obtained the document by a Freedom of Information request.

The NAP1 strain was first identified in the United States about 10 years ago and has now been reported from at least 39 states.

Copyright 2010 United Press International, Inc. (UPI). Any reproduction, republication, redistribution and/or modification of any UPI content is expressly prohibited without UPI’s prior written consent.

HONOLULU, May 29 (UPI) — Shark conservation groups are praising Hawaii, which has become the first U.S. state to ban the sale, possession or distribution of shark fins.

Violating the ban could prove expensive.

The new ban orders state restaurants to stop selling shark-fin soup by July 2011, or face fines of up to $15,000 for a first offense, the Honolulu Star-Bulletin reported. The fines rise to $35,000 for a second offense, and rise to $50,000 and a year in jail for a third offense, the report said.

Some estimates say up to 70 million sharks are killed annually for their fins, causing scientists and conservation groups to worry about the long-term survival of many species, the newspaper said. Shark-finning consists of slicing fins from live sharks and dumping their bodies overboard.

Gov. Linda Lingle signed the law that tries to halt the importation of shark fins, the primary ingredient in soup sold mostly in Asian communities and markets, the newspaper said.

“People from around the world have been following this Hawaii bill every step of the way,” Mary O’Malley of the New York-based conservation group Shark Savers told the Star-Bulletin. “The success of the bill has motivated people in Hong Kong, Malaysia, other states in the U.S., Canada and even Ireland to seek shark-fin-ban legislation modeled after the Hawaii bill.”

Copyright 2010 United Press International, Inc. (UPI). Any reproduction, republication, redistribution and/or modification of any UPI content is expressly prohibited without UPI’s prior written consent.

BIRMINGHAM, Ala., May 29 (UPI) — A senior film student at the University of Alabama at Birmingham created a 60-second video with a message to kids: Eating healthy is cool.

Anna Lloyd, 22, said her 60-second Internet video “Fresh Grown,” features five children rapping and dancing at a grocery store and at the Pepper Place Farmers’ Market, both in Birmingham.

The pint-size rappers, surrounded by rows of carrots, tomatoes and strawberries, sing the lyrics “I like fresh grown fruits and vegetables.”

The Jefferson County Childhood Obesity Task Force contacted the university to develop a social marketing project Jones Valley Urban Farm, a non-profit organization that grows organic produce and flowers on a 3-acre vacant lot in downtown Birmingham.

Lloyd surveyed fourth-graders at a downtown Birmingham about nutrition, music and their favorite Web sites and television shows.

“I realized that the kids already knew what they should be eating, but they said it just wasn’t cool to eat healthy,” Lloyd said in a statement.

“So, I wanted a video that would make healthy foods cool, and that’s where the idea for a hip-hop video came from.”

The video is at: www.youtube.com/uabnews.

Copyright 2010 United Press International, Inc. (UPI). Any reproduction, republication, redistribution and/or modification of any UPI content is expressly prohibited without UPI’s prior written consent.

MINNEAPOLIS, May 29 (UPI) — In a study of 2,268 people in Minnesota, researchers said indoor tanning devices increased the risk of melanoma.

Researchers at the University of Minnesota’s School of Public Health and Masonic Cancer Center said people, who use any type of tanning bed for any amount of time, are 74 percent more likely to develop melanoma — the most dangerous type of skin cancer.

Principal investigator DeAnn Lazovich, University of Minnesota’s School of Public Health and co-leader of the Masonic Cancer Center’s Prevention and Etiology Research Program, said frequent users of indoor tanning beds — used indoor tanning for 50 plus hours, more than 100 sessions, or for 10-plus years — are 2.5 to 3 times more likely to develop melanoma than those who never used indoor tanning.

“We found that it didn’t matter the type of tanning device used; there was no safe tanning device,” Lazovich said in a statement. “We also found — and this is new data — that the risk of getting melanoma is associated more with how much a person tans and not the age at which a person starts using tanning devices.”

The findings are published online in Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers and Prevention.

Copyright 2010 United Press International, Inc. (UPI). Any reproduction, republication, redistribution and/or modification of any UPI content is expressly prohibited without UPI’s prior written consent.

OAKLAND, Calif., May 28 (UPI) — U.S. and Chinese researchers have linked bisphenol A in the urine to worsening male sexual function.

BPA is an organic compound commonly used in manufacturing polycarbonate plastic and epoxy resins and is now contained in a wide variety of consumer products.

The 5-year Kaiser Permanente study, published in the Journal of Andrology, linked increasing urine BPA levels with decreased sexual desire, more difficulty having an erection, lower ejaculation strength and lower level of overall satisfaction with sex life. The association was dose-dependent, the study said.

“This is the first human study to show that high urine BPA is associated with lower male sexual function,” lead author Dr. De-Kun Li of Kaiser Permanente’s division of research in Oakland, Calif., said in a statement. “Also, even among men exposed to BPA from only environmental sources — no occupational exposure and with average BPA level lower than the average observed in the American population — there were indications of an increased risk of sexual dysfunction.”

Li and colleagues examined 427 workers in factories in China and compared workers in BPA manufacturing facilities with a control group of workers in factories where no BPA was present.

Li noted the estimates in the environmentally exposed group were not statistically significant due to small sample size, but the finding may enhance the understanding of the BPA effect in human populations with low-dose environmental exposure and have important public health implications.

Copyright 2010 United Press International, Inc. (UPI). Any reproduction, republication, redistribution and/or modification of any UPI content is expressly prohibited without UPI’s prior written consent.

SEATTLE, May 28 (UPI) — Researchers in Seattle question the outcomes of studies that used distance to supermarkets as the best predictor of good diets.

Adam Drewnowski, a professor of epidemiology at the University of Washington and his team combined a telephone survey, modeled on the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Behavioral Risk Factors Surveillance System, with geo-coding techniques and spatial analysis to study where people bought food.

“Six out of seven people shopped for food outside their immediate neighborhood,” Drewnowski said in a statement. “The closest supermarket for most people was less than 1 mile away, but people chose the market that was more than 3 miles away.”

If a person has access to a car, driving further to save money on groceries is common. Therefore, physical proximity to a supermarket may not, by itself, assure a healthy diet.

“Money does matter,” Drewnowski said.

The researchers found Seattle is well-supplied with grocery stores, farmers markets and other vendors but did not see evidence of significant food deserts — areas with limited or no access to healthy foods. Public transportation is prevalent and accessible, so people have access to a supermarket or grocery store even if they do not have vehicle.

However, shoppers and shopping opportunities differed among the stores.

“Consumers who shop at most area supermarket chains have obesity rates at 25 percent and higher,” Drewnowski said. “However, the obesity rate was only 4 percent among Whole Foods and PCC Natural Markets, a certified organic grocery store.”

Copyright 2010 United Press International, Inc. (UPI). Any reproduction, republication, redistribution and/or modification of any UPI content is expressly prohibited without UPI’s prior written consent.