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Robot suit designed to aid the physically challenged and elderly gets global safety certificate

“A robot suit that can help the elderly or disabled get around was given its global safety certificate in Japan, paving the way for its worldwide rollout. The Hybrid Assistive Limb, or HAL, is a power-assisted pair of legs developed by Japanese robot maker Cyberdyne, which has also developed similar robot arms. A quality assurance body issued the certificate based on a draft version of an international safety standard for personal robots that is expected to be approved later this year, the ministry for the economy, trade and industry said. The metal-and-plastic exoskeleton has become the first nursing-care robot certified under the draft standard, a ministry official said.” Continue reading →

Patient has 75 per cent of his skull replaced by 3D-printed implant

“A man has had 75 per cent of his skull replaced with a custom-made 3D-printed implant. The un-named patient in the United States had his head imaged by a 3D scanner before the plastic prosthetic was crafted to suit his features. Oxford Performance Materials in Connecticut then gained approval from US regulators before the printed bone replacement was inserted in his skull during a surgical procedure earlier this week. The ground-breaking operation has only now been revealed. The company says it can now provide the 3D printouts to replace bone damaged by disease or trauma after the US Food and Drug Administration granted approval on February 18.” Continue reading →

PETA angry over plan to control Guam’s snake population with toxic dead mice

“Animal activists have dismissed as ‘absurd’ and ‘cruel’ the American government’s plans to bombard Guam from the air with poisoned dead mice in a bid to curtail the spread of invasive snakes. The US air drop over the the Pacific island is due to commence in the spring, and is aimed at addressing the problems caused by non-native brown tree snakes. Having hitched a ride to the island some 60 years ago on military ships, the colony of reptiles have been deemed responsible for killing off native bird species, biting human inhabitants and knocking out electricity by slithering onto power lines.” Continue reading →

Fed’s Big Ag Policy is Anything But “Green”

“Why are high fructose corn syrup and soybean oil in everything? Answer: Corn and soybean subsidies from the period 1995 – 2011 totaled $108 billion. Corn and soy make up almost half of all U.S. farmland. Most of this is GM (genetically modified) foods, allowing the agricultural industry to serve its masters who are the beneficiaries of political-business alliances under the Big Biotech umbrella: Monsanto, Syngenta, Cargill, Archer Daniels Midland, and Tyson.” Continue reading →

Diet soda tied to heart attack, stroke risks

“Diet soda may benefit the waistline, but a new study suggests that people who drink it every day have a heightened risk of heart attack and stroke. The study, which followed almost 2,600 older adults for a decade, found that those who drank diet soda every day were 44 percent more likely than non-drinkers to suffer a heart attack or stroke. The findings, reported in the Journal of General Internal Medicine, don’t prove that the sugar-free drinks are actually to blame. The findings do build on a few recent studies that also found diet-soda drinkers are more likely to have certain cardiovascular risk factors, like high blood pressure or high blood sugar.” Continue reading →

Diet sodas linked to higher risk of Type-2 diabetes in women

“Artificially-sweetened sodas have been linked to a higher risk of Type 2 diabetes for women than sodas sweetened with ordinary sugar, according to French research unveiled on Thursday. ‘Contrary to conventional thinking, the risk of diabetes is higher with ‘light’ beverages compared with ‘regular’ sweetened drinks,’ the National Institute of Health and Medical Research (Inserm) said. The evidence comes from a wide-scale, long-term study, it said in a press release. Sugar-sweetened sodas have previously been linked with an increased risk of diabetes, but less is known about their artificially-sweetened counterparts.” Continue reading →

Here Come the Salt Police!

“Medical researchers at Harvard University have released a report which says that Americans eat too much salt. This is a follow-up report on an earlier report by the same team, authored by the same man with the unpronounceable name, which concluded that Americans eat too much sugar. The author of the report, predictably, called for the federal government to enact legislation to limit the intake of salt in processed foods. In other words, he wants to turn the federal government into the equivalent of Nanny Bloomberg. He doesn’t like sugar. He doesn’t like salt. And, most of all, he doesn’t like liberty.” Continue reading →

1 in 5 American teenage boys diagnosed with ADHD

“Nearly one in five American teenage boys is diagnosed with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, marking a dramatic rise in the past decade. The condition, for which potent stimulant drugs like Adderal or Ritalin are often prescribed, has been previously estimated to affect three to seven percent of children. The newspaper compiled the data from raw figures provided by the Center for Disease Control and Prevention, which took a phone survey of 76,000 parents from 2011 to 2012. The report said that 15 percent of school-age boys in the United States have received an ADHD diagnosis, compared to seven percent among girls.” Continue reading →