The first thing you’ll want to do is apply for a new credit card. See, most card issuers charge fees for overseas transactions. American Express, for example, adds 2.7 percent to every overseas transaction (up from 2 percent last summer), while Bank of America, Chase, Citibank and HSBC tack on 3 percent, according to Curtis Arnold, who runs CardRatings.com, a Web site that tracks credit card fees.
Thursday, January 29, 2009
Packing the Right Credit Card
Traveling frugally means more than just cadging free bar snacks in Bologna or hopping low-cost flights between third-tier European airports. To keep costs to a minimum, you have to plan well in advance, and that means getting your finances in order.
The first thing you’ll want to do is apply for a new credit card. See, most card issuers charge fees for overseas transactions. American Express, for example, adds 2.7 percent to every overseas transaction (up from 2 percent last summer), while Bank of America, Chase, Citibank and HSBC tack on 3 percent, according to Curtis Arnold, who runs CardRatings.com, a Web site that tracks credit card fees.
The first thing you’ll want to do is apply for a new credit card. See, most card issuers charge fees for overseas transactions. American Express, for example, adds 2.7 percent to every overseas transaction (up from 2 percent last summer), while Bank of America, Chase, Citibank and HSBC tack on 3 percent, according to Curtis Arnold, who runs CardRatings.com, a Web site that tracks credit card fees.
Wednesday, January 28, 2009
Tuesday, January 27, 2009
Spread of Malaria Feared as Drug Loses Potency
TASANH, Cambodia — The afflictions of this impoverished nation are on full display in its western corner: the girls for hire outside restaurants, the badly rutted dirt roads and the ubiquitous signs that warn “Danger Mines!”
Chet Chen, 18, lying listless with malaria in Tasanh, Cambodia.
But what eludes the naked eye is a potentially graver problem, especially for the outside world. The parasite that causes the deadliest form of malaria is showing the first signs of resistance to the best new drug against it.
Combination treatments using artemisinin, an antimalaria drug extracted from a plant used in traditional Chinese medicine, have been hailed in recent years as the biggest hope for eradicating malaria from Africa, where more than 2,000 children die from the disease each day.
Now a series of studies, including one recently published in The New England Journal of Medicine and one due out soon, have cemented a consensus among researchers that artemisinin is losing its potency here and that increased efforts are needed to prevent the drug-resistant malaria from leaving here and spreading across the globe.
(..)
“Many of us think this should be treated on the same order as SARS,” said Col. Alan J. Magill, a researcher at the Walter Reed Army Institute of Research in Maryland. “This should be a global emergency that is addressed in a global fashion.” SARS, the respiratory disease that spread rapidly through Asia and beyond in 2003, killed more than 700 people.
(..)
Different regions rely on different artemisinin combinations. The Cambodian government recommends that artemisinin be combined with mefloquine, which was developed by the American military and is known commercially as Lariam. Artemether, a derivative of artemisinin, is often combined with another antimalarial drug, lumefantrine. This was recently judged to be the most effective combination in a study of children in Papua New Guinea.
The same combination is also expected to be approved for sale in the United States soon, marketed by Novartis and mainly intended for people traveling overseas or for those who arrive in the United States with malaria.
The mosquito responsible for transmission of malaria is still endemic in the United States. But modern housing, better access to health care and the use of insecticides have virtually eradicated the disease in wealthier countries.
Chet Chen, 18, lying listless with malaria in Tasanh, Cambodia.
But what eludes the naked eye is a potentially graver problem, especially for the outside world. The parasite that causes the deadliest form of malaria is showing the first signs of resistance to the best new drug against it.
Combination treatments using artemisinin, an antimalaria drug extracted from a plant used in traditional Chinese medicine, have been hailed in recent years as the biggest hope for eradicating malaria from Africa, where more than 2,000 children die from the disease each day.
Now a series of studies, including one recently published in The New England Journal of Medicine and one due out soon, have cemented a consensus among researchers that artemisinin is losing its potency here and that increased efforts are needed to prevent the drug-resistant malaria from leaving here and spreading across the globe.
(..)
“Many of us think this should be treated on the same order as SARS,” said Col. Alan J. Magill, a researcher at the Walter Reed Army Institute of Research in Maryland. “This should be a global emergency that is addressed in a global fashion.” SARS, the respiratory disease that spread rapidly through Asia and beyond in 2003, killed more than 700 people.
(..)
Different regions rely on different artemisinin combinations. The Cambodian government recommends that artemisinin be combined with mefloquine, which was developed by the American military and is known commercially as Lariam. Artemether, a derivative of artemisinin, is often combined with another antimalarial drug, lumefantrine. This was recently judged to be the most effective combination in a study of children in Papua New Guinea.
The same combination is also expected to be approved for sale in the United States soon, marketed by Novartis and mainly intended for people traveling overseas or for those who arrive in the United States with malaria.
The mosquito responsible for transmission of malaria is still endemic in the United States. But modern housing, better access to health care and the use of insecticides have virtually eradicated the disease in wealthier countries.
Sunday, January 25, 2009
Coffee Linked to Lower Dementia Risk
After controlling for numerous socioeconomic and health factors, including high cholesterol and high blood pressure, the scientists found that the subjects who had reported drinking three to five cups of coffee daily were 65 percent less likely to have developed dementia, compared with those who drank two cups or less. People who drank more than five cups a day also were at reduced risk of dementia, the researchers said, but there were not enough people in this group to draw statistically significant conclusions.
(..)
Dr. Kivipelto and her colleagues suggest several possibilities for why coffee might reduce the risk of dementia later in life. First, earlier studies have linked coffee consumption with a decreased risk of type 2 diabetes, which in turn has been associated with a greater risk of dementia. In animal studies, caffeine has been shown to reduce the formation of amyloid plaques in the brain, one of the hallmarks of Alzheimer’s disease. Finally, coffee may have an antioxidant effect in the bloodstream, reducing vascular risk factors for dementia.
Dr. Kivipelto noted that previous studies have shown that coffee drinking may also be linked to a reduced risk of Parkinson’s disease.
(..)
Dr. Kivipelto and her colleagues suggest several possibilities for why coffee might reduce the risk of dementia later in life. First, earlier studies have linked coffee consumption with a decreased risk of type 2 diabetes, which in turn has been associated with a greater risk of dementia. In animal studies, caffeine has been shown to reduce the formation of amyloid plaques in the brain, one of the hallmarks of Alzheimer’s disease. Finally, coffee may have an antioxidant effect in the bloodstream, reducing vascular risk factors for dementia.
Dr. Kivipelto noted that previous studies have shown that coffee drinking may also be linked to a reduced risk of Parkinson’s disease.
Saturday, January 24, 2009
Desperate Children Flee Zimbabwe, for Lives Just as Bleak
Joao Silva for The New York Times
Williad Fire, 16, crossed illegally into South Africa from Zimbabwe with eight friends after the deaths of his parents and an uncle.
MUSINA, South Africa — They bear the look of street urchins, their eyes on the prowl for useful scraps of garbage and their bodies covered in clothes no cleaner than a mechanic’s rags.
Musina has 57,000 residents, plus 15,000 foreigners.
Near midnight, these Zimbabwean children can be found sleeping outside almost anywhere in this border city. A 12-year-old girl named No Matter Hungwe, hunched beneath the reassuring exterior light of the post office, said it was hunger that had pushed her across the border alone.
Her father is dead, and she wanted to help her mother and younger brothers by earning what she could here in South Africa — within certain limits, anyway. “Some men — men with cars — want to sleep with me,” she said, considering the upside against the down. “They have offered me 100 rand,” about $10.
With their nation in a prolonged sequence of crises, more unaccompanied children and women than ever are joining the rush of desperate Zimbabweans illegally crossing the frontier at the Limpopo River, according to the police, local officials and aid workers.
What they are escaping is a broken country where half the people are going hungry, most schools and hospitals are closed or dysfunctional and a cholera epidemic has taken a toll in the thousands. Yet they are arriving in a place where they are unwelcome and are resented as rivals for jobs. Last year, Zimbabweans were part of the quarry in a spate of mob attacks against foreigners.
Icelandic government becomes first to be brought down by the credit crunch
The government of Iceland today became the first to be effectively brought down by the credit crunch.
After several nights of rioting over the financial crisis, Prime Minister Geir Haarde, surrendered to increasing pressure and called a general election for May.
After several nights of rioting over the financial crisis, Prime Minister Geir Haarde, surrendered to increasing pressure and called a general election for May.
Friday, January 23, 2009
Polio Fight Gets $635 Million from Gates, Rotary & Governments
The eradication of smallpox in the late 1970s was one of the great achievements in global public health, and was accomplished in about a decade. The world has been trying to eradicate polio for more than 20 years now, but we’re not there yet.
A reminder came earlier today when Microsoft founder and uberphilanthropist Bill Gates pledged $255 million toward the ongoing effort to wipe polio from the face of the Earth. He was joined by officials from Rotary International and the governments of Germany and the U.K. Collectively, the group pledged $635 million toward eradicating the disease.
Thursday, January 22, 2009
Quote of the Day
“Don’t ask yourself what the world needs. Ask yourself what makes you come alive, and then go and do that. Because what the world needs is people who have come alive.”
Harold Whitman
Harold Whitman
Meetings Are a Matter of Precious Time
This article from Reid Hastie, Robert S. Hamada Professor of Behavioral Science at the University of Chicago’s Booth School of Busines, hit on one of my fundamental organizing principles: I don't have a vague feeling that there is plenty of time (as Professor Hastie alludes to in this article). For some reason, I know at a visceral level that one moment you exist, and the next you don't. The "ride" is over before you know it...and you can't predict it. I know that I will probably (and thankfully) never run out of money, but for sure I am going to run out of time....and there is so much to do in this world.
In business, we like to convert time to money, and the reverse. But in practice, time and money are different. We can get more money, save it, move it between accounts and use it on demand. These operations don’t apply easily to time.
Time is the most perishable good in the world, and it is not replenishable. You can’t earn an extra hour to use on a busy day. Nonetheless, we usually have a vague feeling that there is plenty of time — somewhere in the future — so we waste it now and carelessly steal time from our families, friends or ourselves when we come up short at the end of a workday and need to stay an extra hour.
Probably most important, we are blind to lost time opportunities. When we choose where to invest our time, as opposed to where to invest money, we are more likely to neglect what else we could have done with it.
And, once meetings are over, we don’t effectively assign responsibility for a bad meeting or take personal responsibility as we should. Sure, someone called the meeting, but we all leave it unhappy and blaming everyone, including ourselves. Psychologists call this “diffusion of responsibility” and one consequence is that no one thinks it’s his or her job to fix it the next time.
In business, we like to convert time to money, and the reverse. But in practice, time and money are different. We can get more money, save it, move it between accounts and use it on demand. These operations don’t apply easily to time.
Time is the most perishable good in the world, and it is not replenishable. You can’t earn an extra hour to use on a busy day. Nonetheless, we usually have a vague feeling that there is plenty of time — somewhere in the future — so we waste it now and carelessly steal time from our families, friends or ourselves when we come up short at the end of a workday and need to stay an extra hour.
Probably most important, we are blind to lost time opportunities. When we choose where to invest our time, as opposed to where to invest money, we are more likely to neglect what else we could have done with it.
And, once meetings are over, we don’t effectively assign responsibility for a bad meeting or take personal responsibility as we should. Sure, someone called the meeting, but we all leave it unhappy and blaming everyone, including ourselves. Psychologists call this “diffusion of responsibility” and one consequence is that no one thinks it’s his or her job to fix it the next time.
Wednesday, January 21, 2009
Too Many Industries Suffering From “Detroititis”
Gary Hamel really hits the nail on the head in this blog posting...
Unfortunately, one can find Detroit-style thinking in industries other than autos.
Take the PC industry. Years ago, in an article written for the Harvard Business Review, I posed the following question: Why was the most expensive appliance in most homes—the personal computer—also the ugliest? PCs were clunky beige boxes that spewed cords and cables across your desktop like a disemboweled robot. A few years later Apple would introduce its first iMac, the candy-colored, all-in-one home computer that heralded the company’s creative renaissance.
(..)
The same myopic thinking that led America’s car companies to surrender product leadership to Toyota, Honda and BMW, has led U.S. airlines to surrender service leadership to international carriers like Virgin Atlantic, British Airways, and Lufthansa. (My belief: There are only two reasons to fly internationally on a U.S. carrier—to retain your frequent flyer status or keep your boss happy by complying with corporate travel rules. In the last 20 years I’ve crossed the Atlantic more than 300 times—and only twice on a U.S. airline, thank God.)
Unlike the auto makers, the big U.S. airlines have been able to maintain a domestic oligopoly. They haven’t had to face foreign competitors within their home market—thanks to a legal prohibition on the foreign ownership of U.S. air carriers. This blatantly protectionist policy should make U.S. consumers hopping mad. Why should we be able to drive a Toyota from New York to LA, and not be able to cross the continent on Singapore Airlines, for example?
Unfortunately, one can find Detroit-style thinking in industries other than autos.
Take the PC industry. Years ago, in an article written for the Harvard Business Review, I posed the following question: Why was the most expensive appliance in most homes—the personal computer—also the ugliest? PCs were clunky beige boxes that spewed cords and cables across your desktop like a disemboweled robot. A few years later Apple would introduce its first iMac, the candy-colored, all-in-one home computer that heralded the company’s creative renaissance.
(..)
The same myopic thinking that led America’s car companies to surrender product leadership to Toyota, Honda and BMW, has led U.S. airlines to surrender service leadership to international carriers like Virgin Atlantic, British Airways, and Lufthansa. (My belief: There are only two reasons to fly internationally on a U.S. carrier—to retain your frequent flyer status or keep your boss happy by complying with corporate travel rules. In the last 20 years I’ve crossed the Atlantic more than 300 times—and only twice on a U.S. airline, thank God.)
Unlike the auto makers, the big U.S. airlines have been able to maintain a domestic oligopoly. They haven’t had to face foreign competitors within their home market—thanks to a legal prohibition on the foreign ownership of U.S. air carriers. This blatantly protectionist policy should make U.S. consumers hopping mad. Why should we be able to drive a Toyota from New York to LA, and not be able to cross the continent on Singapore Airlines, for example?
BANG the drum to go to school
Aviwe (10 years) and Fuzile (8years) started their own band! They call them selves “Thandabantu”….this Xhosa word means: “the one who loves people”. Their father died in a car accident a few years ago. Their mother, Cordelia, is injured from the accident and unable to walk properly. She can’t really work. She didn’t finish school. She tries to sell as many home baked cookies as possible to her community in township Khayelitsha to make an income for herself and her 2 sons.
Cordelia and her kids constructed their own instrument! It takes: 2 buckets, 4 sticks, a piece of leather, some wire and lots of bottle tops!
The boys started making some noise on the streets of Cape Town, got some money and soon were able to buy a real instrument! The keyboard (600 Rand), together with the drums and the boys’ voices are the current ingredients for the Thandabantu-band.
They now play their music to collect money to go to school. During this summer holiday they made 100-200 Rand a day. School is free, but lunch (3rand/child) and travel (5 rand/child) has to be paid every day.
Pound Takes a Pounding
From ControlledGreed.com...
The British pound reached an 8-year low Tuesday. Ambrose Evans-Pritchard is "Seriously Alarmed" about the slide being "disorderly." Key part:
England has not defaulted since the Middle Ages. There is a real risk it may do so now.And no -- just so there is no misuderstanding -- it would not have been any better if Britain had joined the euro ten years ago. The bubble would have been just as bad, or worse, as Ireland and Spain can attest. We have our disaster. They have their disaster. When the dust has settled in five years we can make a proper judgement on the sterling-EMU issue. Not now.
Killer part that rings true in many places outside the UK:
The Baby Boomers have had their moment in power. The most spoilt generation in history has handled affairs with its characteristic hedonism. The results are coming in. The blithering idiots.
And Bloomberg quotes Jim Rogers as saying the "UK is finished" and that investors should dump the currency. Rogers never shies away from issuing declarations. But taken together with Evans-Pritchard, it leaves me wondering not just about the pound, but most currencies.
The British pound reached an 8-year low Tuesday. Ambrose Evans-Pritchard is "Seriously Alarmed" about the slide being "disorderly." Key part:
England has not defaulted since the Middle Ages. There is a real risk it may do so now.And no -- just so there is no misuderstanding -- it would not have been any better if Britain had joined the euro ten years ago. The bubble would have been just as bad, or worse, as Ireland and Spain can attest. We have our disaster. They have their disaster. When the dust has settled in five years we can make a proper judgement on the sterling-EMU issue. Not now.
Killer part that rings true in many places outside the UK:
The Baby Boomers have had their moment in power. The most spoilt generation in history has handled affairs with its characteristic hedonism. The results are coming in. The blithering idiots.
And Bloomberg quotes Jim Rogers as saying the "UK is finished" and that investors should dump the currency. Rogers never shies away from issuing declarations. But taken together with Evans-Pritchard, it leaves me wondering not just about the pound, but most currencies.
Carrying Several Passports? It’s Not Just for Spies
Dual passports are no longer the sole province of people who grew up in more than one country. Millions of American citizens potentially qualify for various reasons — ethnic heritage, religion, country of birth or where their spouse was born.
“The fact is people don’t think about it until it is pointed out to them,” said Jan Dvorak, president of Travisa, a passport services company in Washington. Some Americans, he said, “don’t realize that they actually have dual nationality.”
“The fact is people don’t think about it until it is pointed out to them,” said Jan Dvorak, president of Travisa, a passport services company in Washington. Some Americans, he said, “don’t realize that they actually have dual nationality.”
Tuesday, January 20, 2009
Quote of the Day
“Imaginary evil is romantic and varied; real evil is gloomy, monotonous, barren, boring. Imaginary good is boring; real good is always new, marvelous, intoxicating.”
--Simone Weil
(via the Happiness Blog)
--Simone Weil
(via the Happiness Blog)
Sunday, January 18, 2009
Win a Trip You Won’t Forget
I would be applying for this if I could...
A few years ago, soon after I returned disconsolate and shellshocked from a trip to Darfur, I found New Yorkers burning with moral outrage.
The spark wasn’t genocide, war or poverty, but rather homelessness — of a red-tailed hawk nicknamed Pale Male. Managers of a Fifth Avenue apartment building had dismantled his nest.
Fury! Television cameras! And public pressure that led to a solution for rebuilding the nest.
I wondered how some of that compassion for a hawk could be rechanneled to help human beings like those I had just seen dying in Darfur. The potential is vast: just imagine if we felt the same sympathy for the 25,000 children who will die today of poverty as we do for, say, a lost and terrified puppy on the street. But it’s very difficult to generate activism for distant people whom we can’t visualize.
So I concocted a contest to take a university student with me on a reporting trip to Africa. I figured that the student’s journey might help connect American students to truly desperate needs abroad.
We’ve held two of these student trips so far, and today I’m delighted to announce the third.
If you apply, you should know that within The Times, my colleagues say that first prize is one trip with Kristof. Second prize is two trips.
But they’re just jealous. The trip may not be comfortable, but if you don’t obsess about rats under the beds, bats in the outhouses or drunken soldiers at checkpoints, then the trip will be memorable and perhaps even life-changing.
If you win, you won’t be practicing tourism but journalism. You’ll blog for nytimes.com and file videos for The Times and for YouTube.
I’m doing this for two reasons. First, I want to engage young people about global issues that I’m passionate about. Second, it’s good journalism, for you’ll bring a tool to reporting from Africa that I no longer have: a fresh eye.
(..)
One of the failures of the American education system is that it rarely exposes students to life around the world. As Bill Gates put it in his 2007 Harvard commencement address, “I left Harvard with no real awareness of the awful inequities in the world.”
Let’s hope that Barack Obama’s presidency makes public service more appealing. But if you want to save the world, you first must understand it.
So, embed yourself deep within a developing country for a summer or a year. I wish colleges would offer credit for such gritty experiences — and extra credit for getting intestinal worms.
I’ve posted some overseas volunteer possibilities, from helping at a maternity hospital in Somaliland to teaching English to brothel children in India, on my blog. Even if you don’t win my trip, you can still win your own.
A few years ago, soon after I returned disconsolate and shellshocked from a trip to Darfur, I found New Yorkers burning with moral outrage.
The spark wasn’t genocide, war or poverty, but rather homelessness — of a red-tailed hawk nicknamed Pale Male. Managers of a Fifth Avenue apartment building had dismantled his nest.
Fury! Television cameras! And public pressure that led to a solution for rebuilding the nest.
I wondered how some of that compassion for a hawk could be rechanneled to help human beings like those I had just seen dying in Darfur. The potential is vast: just imagine if we felt the same sympathy for the 25,000 children who will die today of poverty as we do for, say, a lost and terrified puppy on the street. But it’s very difficult to generate activism for distant people whom we can’t visualize.
So I concocted a contest to take a university student with me on a reporting trip to Africa. I figured that the student’s journey might help connect American students to truly desperate needs abroad.
We’ve held two of these student trips so far, and today I’m delighted to announce the third.
If you apply, you should know that within The Times, my colleagues say that first prize is one trip with Kristof. Second prize is two trips.
But they’re just jealous. The trip may not be comfortable, but if you don’t obsess about rats under the beds, bats in the outhouses or drunken soldiers at checkpoints, then the trip will be memorable and perhaps even life-changing.
If you win, you won’t be practicing tourism but journalism. You’ll blog for nytimes.com and file videos for The Times and for YouTube.
I’m doing this for two reasons. First, I want to engage young people about global issues that I’m passionate about. Second, it’s good journalism, for you’ll bring a tool to reporting from Africa that I no longer have: a fresh eye.
(..)
One of the failures of the American education system is that it rarely exposes students to life around the world. As Bill Gates put it in his 2007 Harvard commencement address, “I left Harvard with no real awareness of the awful inequities in the world.”
Let’s hope that Barack Obama’s presidency makes public service more appealing. But if you want to save the world, you first must understand it.
So, embed yourself deep within a developing country for a summer or a year. I wish colleges would offer credit for such gritty experiences — and extra credit for getting intestinal worms.
I’ve posted some overseas volunteer possibilities, from helping at a maternity hospital in Somaliland to teaching English to brothel children in India, on my blog. Even if you don’t win my trip, you can still win your own.
Time for (Self) Shock Therapy
Friedman on the banking crisis...
I was walking by a TV the other day and CNN was on, airing a hearing of what seemed to be a banking committee in Congress debating whether to release more bailout money. CNN didn’t identify the lawmaker who was speaking. He had a bit of a Southern drawl. But I burst out laughing when he said something like: “I remember a time when banks lent money to people. Now it’s the other way around.”
Yes, kids, those were the days — when banks lent money to the people not the people to the banks!
(..)
“Right now,” said David Smick, author of “The World Is Curved,” “the bankers are sitting on mountains of cash, including our bailout money, because they know their true balance sheets are a disaster — far worse than publicly stated.” The situation will likely worsen as delinquent consumer and auto loans are piled atop bad mortgages. “Obama needs to inject some truth serum into the banking discussion. No one trusts the banks, and even the bankers don’t trust each other.” Bringing clarity to bank balance sheets, said Smick, “is the first step to fixing America’s bank lending problem.”
Only after we bring full transparency to the bank balance sheets will we see private capital buying into banks again at scale. But have no illusions. There are still real balance sheet problems that have to be surmounted. This is not just a psychological crisis.
I was walking by a TV the other day and CNN was on, airing a hearing of what seemed to be a banking committee in Congress debating whether to release more bailout money. CNN didn’t identify the lawmaker who was speaking. He had a bit of a Southern drawl. But I burst out laughing when he said something like: “I remember a time when banks lent money to people. Now it’s the other way around.”
Yes, kids, those were the days — when banks lent money to the people not the people to the banks!
(..)
“Right now,” said David Smick, author of “The World Is Curved,” “the bankers are sitting on mountains of cash, including our bailout money, because they know their true balance sheets are a disaster — far worse than publicly stated.” The situation will likely worsen as delinquent consumer and auto loans are piled atop bad mortgages. “Obama needs to inject some truth serum into the banking discussion. No one trusts the banks, and even the bankers don’t trust each other.” Bringing clarity to bank balance sheets, said Smick, “is the first step to fixing America’s bank lending problem.”
Only after we bring full transparency to the bank balance sheets will we see private capital buying into banks again at scale. But have no illusions. There are still real balance sheet problems that have to be surmounted. This is not just a psychological crisis.
Gut Reaction: Overeating Can Impair Body Function
The holiday season is pretty much over. But is your body over the holiday season? For many people, indulging during these food-filled celebrations can set the stage for routine overeating.
The problem, some doctors and researchers say, is that overeating causes biological changes in the body that can lead to more food cravings and cause your stomach to send mixed signals about when it's actually full. As the years go by, those holiday pounds add up.
(..)
A Vicious Cycle
Overeating "sets your body chemistry sort of into red alert," says Dr. Sasha Stiles, a family physician who specializes in obesity at Tufts Medical Center. "The kinds of hormone and metabolic processes that normally will try to metabolize food will go into overdrive to make sure they get rid of this huge food load," Stiles explains.
This means that much of what you eat will be stored as fat rather than converted into healthy byproducts.
Excess food can trigger an unfortunate cycle: The pancreas produces extra insulin to process the sugar load and remove it from the bloodstream. It doesn't stop producing insulin until the brain senses that blood sugar levels are safe. But by the time the brain stops insulin production, often too much sugar is removed. Low blood sugar can make you feel tired, dizzy, nauseous, even depressed — a condition often remedied by eating more sugar and more carbohydrates.
This feeling of low blood sugar sends many people after more carbohydrates, says Stiles, and they go for high-sugar foods to bring their blood sugar back up to normal and make them feel better.
The problem, some doctors and researchers say, is that overeating causes biological changes in the body that can lead to more food cravings and cause your stomach to send mixed signals about when it's actually full. As the years go by, those holiday pounds add up.
(..)
A Vicious Cycle
Overeating "sets your body chemistry sort of into red alert," says Dr. Sasha Stiles, a family physician who specializes in obesity at Tufts Medical Center. "The kinds of hormone and metabolic processes that normally will try to metabolize food will go into overdrive to make sure they get rid of this huge food load," Stiles explains.
This means that much of what you eat will be stored as fat rather than converted into healthy byproducts.
Excess food can trigger an unfortunate cycle: The pancreas produces extra insulin to process the sugar load and remove it from the bloodstream. It doesn't stop producing insulin until the brain senses that blood sugar levels are safe. But by the time the brain stops insulin production, often too much sugar is removed. Low blood sugar can make you feel tired, dizzy, nauseous, even depressed — a condition often remedied by eating more sugar and more carbohydrates.
This feeling of low blood sugar sends many people after more carbohydrates, says Stiles, and they go for high-sugar foods to bring their blood sugar back up to normal and make them feel better.
Friday, January 16, 2009
Quote of the Day #2
If popular culture is to revive, it will have to take lessons from African-American church services, where intense, surging music remains the vehicle of spirituality and profound emotion.
--Camille Paglia
--Camille Paglia
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