D
    David Katz, MD, PREVENTION

    David Katz, MD, PREVENTION

  • Should you skip C (calcium) and D?

    You are likely aware that a committee of the Institute of Medicine has just issued recommendations for calcium and vitamin D intake. The big news is that the committee is recommending not as much more of both nutrients as enthusiasts might have hoped, and sounds a precautionary note about excess dos

  • Why we're cheering the proposed ban on caffeinated alcohol

    The writing would seem to be on the wall for Four Loko and other beverages that combine alcohol and caffeine, as the FDA considers an outright ban of the combination. Anyone who is for sanity and safety in marketing should read it and cheer, not weep.How bad are your health vices?

  • Getting to the bottom of the great mammogram debate

    Music, we're told, can soothe the savage breast. Data about breasts, in contrast, can ignite rather savage controversy, and propagate confusion.That seems to be the immediate result of a newly reported study that found a 26% mortality reduction with routine mammography for women in their 40s. This w

  • 4 truths about the flu vaccine

    'Tis the season (at least here in New England) for apple picking, county fairs, pumpkins, and a seasonal brew of recommendations, fulminations, recriminations, allegations, and generalized befuddlement regarding the flu vaccine. What to do, this year, about flu?Two words: Get vaccinated. But if only

  • Are you in denial about your weight?

    A poll of a nationally representative sample of Americans, reported recently by HealthDay News, shows us that many of us overlook and/or underestimate our excess body fat. 'Denial,' it seems, is not just a river in Egypt.Leaving aside the particulars of the survey and its findings, let's just addres

  • Can you be fat and fit?

    In a word, yes.Research from the Harvard School of Public Health in roughly 100,000 people shows pretty much what one would expect about the population: lots of people are both heavy and unfit; far fewer are thin and unfit; some are both lean and fit; and only a very small number indeed are heavy, b

  • Are your kids drinking lead in their juice?

    At first glance, a recent report by the Environmental Law Foundation, a California non-profit, indicating there is lead in a variety of popular children's juices, canned fruits, and baby foods-even the organic varieties-almost seems like cause for despair and panic. I can quickly reassure you that i

  • Are pesticides in food making your kids sick?

    Concerns that contaminants in foods-such as trace pesticide residues-can be harmful to health have helped propagate the growth of the organic food movement perhaps as much as devotion to "going green" and protecting the planet. That has at times caused difficulties for a nutrition specialist like me

  • Can your multivitamin give you breast cancer?

    One recent study in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition says yes. The study followed nearly 35,000 women for close to ten years; 25% of the women in the study routinely took a multivitamin and the other 75% did not. Authors found that multivitamin use was associated with a 19% increase in the

  • Are “processed foods” really that horrible?

    Velveeta, FlufferNutter, and Miracle Whip-whatever exactly they are-are processed foods. But so are whole-wheat bread, canned peas, fresh salsa, pure almond butter, and olive oil.The broad, even stunning, range of "processed foods" from the merely flash-frozen to the genuine Frankenfood/chemistry ex

  • One huge reason to care about health care reform

    It comes down to this: people who can't afford health insurance don't get any. People who can't afford health care ... get it anyway. And guess what? You're helping to pay for it.Insurance companies generally make decisions when all is relatively calm. Even a time of crisis for an insurance company

  • The Tiger Scandal: Biological reasons why men cheat

    Ladies and gentlemen, I am venturing onto perilous terrain. I hope you'll still respect me in the morning. I am not guilty of any infidelity. I am, however, guilty of being a heterosexual Homo sapien male.I am not proud to admit how much of the male Homo sapien brain is cluttered up with thoughts of

  • Should the government pay for abortions?

    Abortion is undeniably among the more taxing matters of public debate. I have shared my views on abortion before. It is a last resort, and like all such, rather undesirable. Our first, best defense against it is comprehensive, universal sex education; the availability of barrier contraceptives; and

  • Should you ignore the new mammogram guidelines?

    It may be about time to let the breast cancer screening controversy slip into a state of quiet fermentation. Certainly it isn't front page news any more. But the controversy and confusion are still there, as is the importance of getting past them to take what we know-and put it to good use.So I feel

  • Are mammograms overrated?

    The big (and potentially befuddling) medical news of the day, courtesy of a prominent article in The New York Times, in turn based on an article in the current issue of JAMA is this: Just because we can screen for breast and prostate cancer, doesn't mean we should.As a preventive medicine expert wel

  • Why you should get the H1N1 swine flu vaccine

    A poll conducted by the Associated Press suggests that more than one-third of parents in the U.S. fear adverse effects of the swine flu vaccine, and oppose immunization of their children. As a physician, father of 5, and a member of the body politic-I understand this reticence, but disagree with it.

  • The problem with restaurant calorie listings

    The thing about calories is they really do count-but nobody really wants to count them. It's tedious. Oh, and the other thing about calories is that even if you do count them, it doesn't change how many it takes to feel full. So make that two things about calories.What does a 400-calorie meal look l

  • Are hamburgers horrible for your health?

    Over the weekend, the New York Times served us a gripping and heart-rending tale of how tens of thousands of cattle, millions of pounds of beef, hundreds of miles of transport, and acres of food processing plants all came together to produce devastating illness in one person, Stephanie Smith. Ms. Sm

  • Is football too dangerous--and should we change the rules?

    I am reasonably confident that all moral members of modern society feel disquiet, at least, at the thought of ancient Roman gladiatorial games in which the very goal of the contest was...death. But what about modern games in which one of the goals is disability? This, to me, seems a difference of de

  • HIV Milestone: Have we found a vaccine to prevent it?

    A large trial in Thailand has, for the first time, shown a HIV vaccine to be partially effective. In a study of 16,000 people, the rate of HIV infection was roughly 30% lower in those who were vaccinated than those who were not.Compared to other vaccines, this is not highly effective. But, as those