The health risk was even higher when the noise rose above an average daily exposure of 60 decibels. That accounts for about one in four people in western Europe. No comparable analysis was done on how many people would be affected in the U.S.

“Road traffic noise is the most important source of community noise so we felt it was important to look at this,” says the report’s author Theo Bodin. “I think what we have found is probably linked to the noise triggering stress. Previous research has found this, although we need to look at this issue further before we make firm conclusions.”

However, some experts think that these findings might be on shaky ground.

“It seems to me that they have found an association rather than a cause. Other factors, such as smoking, diet and deprivation, are likely to be playing more of a role,” says Alan Maryon-Davis, president of the UK’s Faculty of Public Health. “However, it is an area of research which merits further work.”

High blood pressure increases the risk of heart disease and stroke.

(via: BBC)

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Researchers tested various combinations of music with silence on volunteers and found that songs that emphasized alternating between fast and slow tempos were most effective in improving circulation and heart health.

“We have seen enormous benefits in people who have had strokes or heart attacks. The power of music is just incredible,” says Diana Greenman, chief executive of Music in Hospitals, a UK-based charity that provides live music to hospital patients.

“I hear time and again of stroke patients who suddenly are able to move in time to the music after previously being paralyzed,” she adds

Greenman emphasized that music has to be tailored to the patients’ taste. No word on whether or not that could include hardcore or thrash metal. The examples given at the BBC website are all classical and opera, with Verdi’s Arias the most effective. It has musical phrases 10 seconds long, which appears to synchronize perfectly with the natural cardiovascular rhythm.

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Researcher Dr. Lewis B. Morgenstern at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor counted 1,247 strokes caused by blood clots in 64 census tracts in Nueces County, Texas, from January 2000 through June 2003.

“The association suggested that the risk of stroke in a neighborhood increased by one percent for every fast-food restaurant,” the authors wrote in a poster presented at the American Stroke Association’s International Stroke Conference.

The phrasing of the findings is kind of peculiar. It’s worded as if simply by living amongst the restaurants, the food makes it into your system via osmosis. It’s attack of the killer fast-food! All kidding aside, the researchers are unsure if strokes are simply caused by people living nearby.

“What we don’t know is whether fast-food actually increased the risk because of its contents or whether fast-food restaurants are a marker of unhealthy neighborhoods,” says Morgenstern.

Is it me, or does this study seem like a waste of time? Since I’m not one of the researchers, and I don’t have the same accountability, I’ll go out on a limb and say that the fast-food is actually increasing the stroke risk. They wouldn’t be open if people weren’t coming. And if people are coming, they are getting the unhealthy side effects.

(via: CNN)

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