Friends and Family Making You fat?
Health Squeeze
June 16, 2023
It is often the small steps, not the giant leaps, that bring about the most lasting change.
In This Newsletter
🍎 Standing in the way of your weight loss goals? This may be your greatest obstacle to success.
🏒 Hockey players labeled as “enforcers” who engage in frequent fighting are shortening their lifespan, a new study shows.
☣️ Lead, cadmium, and arsenic are all around us in everyday life. These toxic heavy metals can increase your risk of serious disease.
Health Q and A
What are the three macronutrients that the human body requires for energy?
Answer at the bottom
🍎 Family and Friends May Be Sabotaging Your Weight Loss
Is your significant other or friends and family sabotaging your health goals?
A recent study published in the journal Obesity has found that those closest to you might be preventing you from weight loss success.
The study surveyed over 130 couples in which one partner actively tried to lose weight. The results showed that when the partner who was not actively trying to lose weight provided less support, such as making negative comments or deliberately providing food when the person was not hungry, the person trying to lose weight was more likely to struggle with their weight loss goals.
Partners may even inadvertently create obstacles to weight loss without even realizing it.
Jane Ogden, Professor of Health Psychology and lead author of the study from the University of Surrey, said: "Weight loss often results in change, from giving a person more confidence to a change in social dynamics in their relationships. Many do not welcome such changes and may, consciously or subconsciously, try to derail a person's attempts to lose weight in order to keep things the way they are."
This phenomenon, known as "social sabotage," can significantly impact an individual's ability to lose weight. The study suggests that it is essential for both partners in a relationship to communicate openly about their weight loss goals and support each other in healthy ways.
Additionally, the study found that social support from friends and family who were also trying to lose weight was an important factor in successful weight loss. Having a group of people with similar goals can provide motivation and accountability.
Together with Inside Tracker
🩸 What’s Going on Inside Your Body?
Sometimes it can be quite hard to know what’s going on inside your body and the only clear way to see the whole picture is a blood test.
InsideTracker was developed by experts in aging, genetics, and biometric data to help you create optimal health based on your unique needs.
Using your blood test results, they’ll provide you with a detailed personalized health analysis and action plan.
🏒 Hockey Fights May Shorten Lives
A recent study published in JAMA Network Open has found that National Hockey League (NHL) "enforcers," who frequently engage in fights on the ice, tend to die about 10 years earlier than their teammates.
The study analyzed data of 6,039 NHL players who played in the league from 1967 to 2022 and compared enforcers with non-enforcers but similar in terms of age, height, weight, position, and number of games played.
The researchers used fighting and penalty time as proxies for players' exposure to repetitive head trauma.
Though the study did not find a significant difference in mortality rates between enforcers and other players, it did find that enforcers died at a younger age, in their mid to late 40s rather than mid to late 50s.
The study suggests that "fighting exposes players to repetitive head trauma and may be associated with increased risk of developing CTE."
CTE is a degenerative brain disorder linked to repeated head injuries, such as those sustained by football players.
Of the 45 NHL players who died during the years covered by the study, 21 were enforcers. Of those enforcers, 11 died of causes often related to CTE, such as drug overdoses, suicides, neurodegenerative disorders, and motor vehicle crashes. None of the other players died of these causes, except for a single death from a vehicle crash.
☣️ Everyday Exposures to Heavy Metals Linked to Higher Heart Disease Risk
A scientific statement published in the Journal of the American Heart Association has highlighted the link between chronic exposure to contaminant metals found in household products, air, water, soil, and food and an increased risk of cardiovascular disease. The study identified lead, cadmium, and arsenic as the metals with the potential to cause harm.
Even low-level exposure was considered dangerous and linked to coronary artery disease, stroke, and peripheral artery disease.
The researchers found that these metals interfered with essential biological functions impacting most populations globally. After exposure, lead and cadmium accumulate in the body and remain in bones and organs for decades. In the US alone, more than 450,000 deaths annually could be attributed to lead exposure.
There has been evidence of these harmful effects for some time, but many health professionals are only now beginning to understand the severity of this issue. The most surprising finding was the multi-decade disconnect between public health scientists and cardiologists over the validity of environmental cardiology.
Experts are still learning about the science behind this connection, with research to determine if the drug EDTA, which increases lead and cadmium excretion from the body, reduces or prevents cardiac events.
Contaminant metal exposure can lead to inflammation and ultimately cause high blood pressure, high cholesterol, atherosclerosis, and subsequent diseases such as heart attack, stroke, heart failure, and limb loss.
Chronic exposure typically comes from contaminated air, water, and soil, and the best way to limit exposure is by avoiding contaminated environments or having them tested for heavy metals.
📝 Health Snippets
Test Tube Embryos. Researchers have created synthetic human embryos using stem cells, which provide a crucial window for studying the impact of genetic disorders and biological causes of recurrent miscarriage. The breakthrough raises ethical and legal concerns as the lab-grown structures fall outside current legislation in most countries. While the structures do not yet have a beating heart or the beginnings of a brain, it remains unclear whether they could continue maturing beyond the earliest stages of development.
ChatGPT Personal Trainer. As generative AI chatbot ChatGPT gains popularity, some people are turning to it for workout advice and as a cost-effective alternative to personal trainers. While replacing human personal trainers with AI may be cheaper, some trainers say that taking workout advice from a chatbot could have unexpected consequences.
Looming Penicillin Shortage. Pfizer is warning customers of a shortage of its injectable penicillin brand, Bicillin L-A and Bicillin C-R prefilled syringes due to increased demand and diagnoses of syphilis. The stock out situation is expected to occur for select syringes by the end of June and could last until the third quarter of 2024. Penicillin is an antibiotic used to treat infections, including sexually transmitted diseases like syphilis and pneumonia.
Olympian Dies in Childbirth. The death of three-time Olympic medalist Tori Bowie has drawn attention to the maternal mortality crisis in the US after it was revealed she was eight months pregnant and in labor at the time of her death. An autopsy report identified possible complications including respiratory distress and eclampsia, with the baby being stillborn.
Health Q & A Answer
Protein, Carbohydrates, and Fat
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