Income, obesity, and heart disease in US states

The figure below combines data on median income by state (bottom-left and top-right), as well as a plot of heart disease death rates against percentage of population with body mass index (BMI) greater than 30 percent. The data are recent, and have been provided by CNN.com and creativeclass.com, respectively.Heart disease deaths and obesity are strongly associated with each other, and both are inversely associated with median income. US states with lower median income tend to have generally higher rates of obesity and heart disease deaths.The reasons are probably many, complex, and closely interconnected. Low income is usually associated with...

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Baglady's ASAP pledge programme

It's amazing what kids can achieve when given the right resources and inspiration.  Last week, I wrote about an amazing lady who is trying to change the lives of children and their families on a dumpsite in South Africa.  This week, it's the turn of another fabulous woman, from just over the water in Northern Ireland, who's working with schools and politicians to help create a sustainable future for all.The lady I'm talking about is none other than Baglady, aka broadcaster Shirley Lewis, whose action-provoking ASAP pledge programme not only inspires kids to adopt sustainable choices but encourages adults to take the lead too. ...

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Low nonexercise activity thermogenesis: Uncooperative genes or comfy furniture?

The degree of nonexercise activity thermogenesis (NEAT) seems to a major factor influencing the amount of fat gained or lost by an individual. It also seems to be strongly influenced by genetics, because NEAT is largely due to involuntary activities like fidgeting.But why should this be? The degree to which different individuals will develop diseases of civilization in response to consumption of refined carbohydrate-rich foods can also be seen as influenced by genetics. After all, there are many people who eat those foods and are thin and healthy, and that appears to be in part a family trait. But whether we consume those products or not is largely...

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Strong causation can exist without any correlation: The strange case of the chain smokers, and a note about diet

Researchers like to study samples of data and look for associations between variables. Often those associations are represented in the form of correlation coefficients, which go from -1 to 1. Another popular measure of association is the path coefficient, which usually has a narrower range of variation. What many researchers seem to forget is that the associations they find depend heavily on the sample they are looking at, and on the ranges of variation of the variables being analyzed. A forgotten warning: Causation without correlationOften those who conduct multivariate statistical analyses on data are unaware of certain limitations. Many times...

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The China Study II: Wheat flour, rice, and cardiovascular disease

In my last post on the China Study II, I analyzed the effect of total and HDL cholesterol on mortality from all cardiovascular diseases. The main conclusion was that total and HDL cholesterol were protective. Total and HDL cholesterol usually increase with intake of animal foods, and particularly of animal fat. The lowest mortality from all cardiovascular diseases was in the highest total cholesterol range, 172.5 to 180; and the highest mortality in the lowest total cholesterol range, 120 to 127.5. The difference was quite large; the mortality in the lowest range was approximately 3.3 times higher than in the highest.This post...

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Can you help Blue Crane Recycling help people in need?

One of the children who Blue Crane Recycling are trying to helpHave you ever had an email from someone overseas asking for help?  Like me, you've probably had many, marked them as spam and deleted them from your mailbox for good. But one message stood out earlier this year.  It was from a lady called Megan Cockroft, who is fighting to set up a recycling initiative to help some of South Africa's poor and this is what she said."I know I am taking a chance here but I was wondering if you perhaps know of a recycling organisation in your country that might be interested in sponsoring such an undertaking? At the 'dump site' there are scavengers,...

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Friday Fishcakes

On Day 5 of National Zero Waste Week, today's pot-luck lunch at Saints was a fabulous example of why I really should sort out my relationship with the fish that's lurking in my freezer at home.Don't get me wrong, I actually like fish, but my imagination only goes as far as making fish pie, baking cod steaks or getting a battered fish from the chip shop.  It's the kind of thing that I cook at home because I feel I should, but never get excited about otherwise.Hence, I really do have around a dozen pieces of tuna and cod that have been left in a frozen state, waiting for their release date from the freezer.   But eh that's progress,...

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Sardine Surprise

It's Day 4 of my National Zero Waste Week visit to foodie heaven Saints Cafe, and today's "pot luck" lunch revealed another great use for ciabatta, this time served with sardine fillets, which were broken up and combined with a zingy tomato and pepper salsa.So again, I can confirm that this was totally delicious and is indeed a fabulous way of serving sardines, a fish that so rarely gets on my menu at home that I can count the number of times I've cooked it on one finger!And what you see to the right is a strawberry and melon lassi, made from the over-ripe fruit that I mentioned yesterday and blended with yoghurt and milk and a dash of lime...

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The China Study II: Cholesterol seems to protect against cardiovascular disease

First of all, many thanks are due to Dr. Campbell and his collaborators for collecting and compiling the data used in this analysis. This data is from this site, created by those researchers to disseminate the data from a study often referred to as the “China Study II”. It has already been analyzed by other bloggers. Notable analyses have been conducted by Ricardo at Canibais e Reis, Stan at Heretic, and Denise at Raw Food SOS.The analyses in this post differ from those other analyses in various aspects. One of them is that data for males and females were used separately for each county, instead of the totals per county. Only two data points...

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Feel Good Chicken Soup at Saints Cafe

For anyone who's looking for refreshing ways to use up any excess chicken from their Sunday Roast, here's some more inspiration from Saints Cafe on Day 3 of National Zero Waste Week.Today's lunch was Feel Good Chicken Soup, which regularly features on the Specials menu, using whichever vegetables are available on the day. The contents may change each time but the flavour is consistent thanks to the delicious home-made stock.  This lunchtime, the ingredients included courgettes with onions as well as some leeks.  I've had this soup before and remember there being chunks of potatoes and carrots at other times.Over the autumn and winter...

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The one that doesn't yet have a name

  Take some toasted ciabatta and add a delicious topping of grated parmesan, some over-ripened Suffolk tomatoes, Essex onions, red pesto and local organic free-range chicken and you've got a mouth-watering lunch made especially for me. Yes, it's Day 2 of my mission to pick up some inspiration from Saints Cafe for National Zero Waste Week and I have to say, I could get used to having my own personal chef.Engin would have normally used these ingredients to create a fabulous house stew, but this Zero Waste Week is giving Saints a great excuse to test out some new ideas...and this dish is so new it doesn't even have a name.  Could this...

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Roasted tomato soup madam? Oh yes please.

Bernadette, one of the owners of Saints Cafe, where they always provide a friendly welcome.     As well as its great food, the one thing I especially love about Saints is the fabulous atmosphere and very warm welcome. It's the kind of place where the owners and staff let you get on with your business in a non-intrusive manner, but if you're the type to seek out some friendly chat and humorous banter, there's plenty on offer, to make this one of the most engaging eateries in town.  So, can you imagine how delighted I am to have a valid excuse to dine out at Saints Cafe to celebrate the National Zero Waste Week...

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Low omega-6 to omega-3 ratio: Grain-fed meats or industrial vegetable oils?

Just a little note on the use of language. Clearly there is no such a thing as grain-fed or grass-fed beef, because one does not feed beef anything. One feeds cattle grain or grass, and then the resulting beef is said to be “grain-fed” or “grass-fed”. It is a manner of speaking that facilitates discourse, which is why it is used here.To compensate for this digression, let me show you a graph, which pretty much summarizes the "punch line" of this post. The graph below shows the omega-6 fat contents of 1 lb (454 g) of grain-fed beef and 1 tablespoon (roughly 14 g) of a typical industrial vegetable oil (safflower oil). As you can see, there is a...

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