Color Daily Health

.
A new U.S. study shows modest reductions in dietary salt intake can reduce the risk of cardiovascular disease while at the same time significantly lowering health care costs.

The U.S. government recommends that Americans limit their salt intake no more than 5.8 grams per day to reduce their likelihood of developing high blood pressure, a risk factor cardiovascular disease.
Yet the average man in this country consumes over 10 grams per day, and women consume more than seven grams of salt - most of it coming from prepared and processed fast foods.
Investigators, led by Kirsten Bibbens-Domingo of the University of California San Francisco, used a model to calculate what the health and economic impact would be if Americans reduced their salt intake by three grams per day or approximately one third of a teaspoon.
Researchers found the results from a modest reduction in salt consumption were striking. "About 100,000 fewer heart attacks each year, about 92,000 fewer deaths each year; 66,000 fewer strokes each year," she said.
Researchers concluded that a population-wide reduction in salt would reduce health care costs each year in the US by between $10 and $24 billion.
Investigators say even a modest one gram reduction of salt each day per person in the US between now and 2019 would be more cost-effective than the use of medications to lower the blood pressure of all people with hypertension.
Bibbins-Domingo notes salt is put in packaged food to make it taste better. And many people find less salty food is bland.
But in other countries, such as Great Britain where salt reductions have been mandated, she says people quickly became accustomed to the taste of less salt in their diet. "Our taste receptors we know down-regulate as we start to eat slightly less salt. And so we start to expect and become accustomed to slightly less salt in the food," she aid.
The study by Bibbins-Domingo and colleagues on the health and economic benefits of less dietary salt in the U.S. is published this week in the New England Journal of Medicine.

.
An international team of researchers looking for the cause of severe bacterial epidemics has deciphered the genome of group A streptococcus, a normally harmless sore throat pathogen that occasionally turns deadly.

Experts say the breakthrough could speed the development of a vaccine to prevent the leading cause of heart disease in children.

The scientists mapped the genetic material of nearly 100 samples of strep-A bacteria involved in three severe epidemics in Ontario, Canada, during the past 17 years.
The focus of their interest was strep A's ability to transform itself from a relatively benign microbe into a potent pathogen responsible for the lethal disease known as necrotizing fasciitis, which causes widespread skin destruction. It can also lead to a deadly blood infection, according to Jim Musser, co-director of the Methodist Research Institute in Houston, Texas.
Musser says patients may be extremely sick before seeking medical help because severe strep-A infections may at first mimic other milder diseases like the flu. Musser says lethal forms of strep A often go undetected by physicians, because such infections occur infrequently and many doctors fail to recognize them.
"Many of these patients show up at their doctor or the hospital too late in the course of their disease to be adequately treated," he explained. "There is too much tissue destruction; the disease has progressed too far to be able to really save the patient."
Musser led the team of researchers that deciphered the genetic make-up of bacteria responsible three successive epidemics in Canada, hoping to learn the molecular underpinnings of the bacteria.
"This has permitted us for the first time to have a precise molecular portrait of how the organisms change over this time, which organisms have the propensity to cause a more severe type of illness and the exact molecular changes in the pathogen that are responsible," he added.
Musser says having the bacterial genome helps researchers understand how the flesh-eating pathogen takes advantage of people who become infected with it so better diagnostics and treatments can be developed.
Musser is hopeful the work also leads to the development of a vaccine against group-A streptococcus to prevent rheumatic fever, the leading cause of childhood heart disease in developing countries, where poverty is widespread. Strep A causes inflammation of the heart muscle and damages the internal valves.
According to the World Health Organization, the infection is responsible for more than three million cardiovascular deaths each year.
"Rheumatic fever, followed by rheumatic heart disease remains the most common cause of preventable childhood heart disease globally," he added. "So we really need to develop vaccines not against for rheumatic fever and rheumatic heart disease caused by streptococcus but also sore throat and the invasive disease."
An article on the genetics of aggressive streptococcus, by Methodist University's Jim Musser and colleagues, is published this week in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Related articles by Zemanta

• Scientists Find Way to Track Flesh-Eating Bacteria (nlm.nih.gov)
• A Sore-Throat Bug That Carries a Deadly Punch (usnews.com)
• Why is Acute Rheumatic Heart Disease a Rare Occurrence? (after50health.com)

14 November 2009 – Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has called for greater support to developing countries in preventing diabetes, which kills at least one million people every year, and in increasing access to health care.

In a message marking World Diabetes Day, Mr. Ban noted that the illness can make other diseases worse, and can have a terrible impact on maternal and child health.
“In some countries, the rapidly rising burden of diabetes is a factor in faltering progress towards achieving the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs),” he said, referring to the pledges world leaders made to slash a host of social ills, including extreme hunger and poverty, infant and maternal mortality, and lack of access to education and health care – all by 2015.
At the same time, the Secretary-General noted that Type 2 diabetes is preventable. It is among the so-called “lifestyle diseases” – along with cardio-vascular disease and some cancers – attributable to unhealthy diets, a lack of exercise, tobacco use and the abuse of alcohol play.
“This means that effective strategies and plans of action will not be limited to the health sector alone,” he said. “Rather, they should involve many areas of government and a wide range of actors, including civil society and the private sector.
“Prevention can help reduce poverty, promote economic productivity and keep countries on track in their efforts to achieve the MDGs,” he added.
More than 220 million people worldwide have diabetes, according to the UN World Health Organization (WHO), which adds that a healthy diet, regular physical activity, maintaining a normal body weight and avoiding tobacco use can prevent or delay the onset of the disease.

Related articles by Zemanta

• Health Canada approves new treatment for adults with type 2 diabetes (newswire.ca)