by Mary Beth Lawton Johnson
the-triton.com

You may think that you are the only chef who is guilty of not always buying extremely healthy items for your yacht. You are not alone. I am guilty of it, too. Sure, I am a chef, and I don’t always buy the healthiest of items, although I do try.

I looked around my house (the yacht is in refit right now), my refrigerator and pie safe to create this list of staple healthy foods.

Keep in mind that these items should be purchased one at a time and slowly incorporated into the diet. Not everyone will share your enthusiasm for healthy eating, especially if it’s an item they have never tried. Go slowly. Read more » »

By JO CIAVAGLIA
phillyBurbs.com

While almost one-quarter of Pennsylvania adults are considered obese, the state is doing better than much of the rest of the country.

Pennsylvania is among 19 states where adult obesity rates didn’t increase over the past year, according to an annual report card on U.S. obesity rates released Monday. No state saw their percentages drop.

Overall, the state ranked 23rd highest in adult obesity in the nation this year, according to the report, meaning that 27 other states had higher rates. Pennsylvania also has the 29th highest rate of overweight children and teens ages 10-17. Read more » »

Crude oil prices were lower on Tuesday after a series of advances that had taken prices 25 percent higher than the year’s low in late January. Much of the recent gains have been due to political tensions between Iran and the West that have only been increased by last week’s capture of 15 British sailors by the Iranians. Refinery closures due to maintenance have also helped send prices higher. In addition, a threatened strike in France has slowed down production there.

Brent crude May contracts were 16 cents lower to $64.25 per barrel late in the afternoon in London, while West Texas Intermediate crude for May delivery dropped 32 cents to $62.59 per barrel by early afternoon on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Meanwhile, April Nymex gasoline dropped 1.5 percent to $2.0532 per gallon after going as high as $2.0850 per gallon during the session. Gasoline futures have added 52 percent since late January. Read more » »

Equities markets in Asia and the Pacific were mostly lower on Tuesday, the main exception being the Straits Times index in Singapore, which added 1.01 percent to 3,230.61. Elsewhere, the Sydney Ordinaries and the Hang Seng Index in Hong Kong each dropped 0.3 percent, to 5,952.3 and 19,706.79 respectively. In India, the Sensex fell 1.22 percent, to 13,124.32. In Tokyo, meanwhile, the Nikkei 225 was 0.9 percent lower to 17,365.05 and the Topix index dropped 1 percent to 1,723.86. Decliner included chip equipment makers, which fell after Credit Suisse (NYSE: CS; SWX: CSGN) cut target share prices on seven companies in the sector. Airlines were also lower as a promotion where new shareholders could get discount tickets ended. The real estate sector, however, added 1.5 percent as a whole after declines on Monday.

European markets were mixed. The FTSE Eurofirst 300 was lower at the close, but only by 0.08 percent, to 1,509.04. Elsewhere on the continent, the CAC-40 was 0.19 percent higher in Paris to 5,587.06 and the Xetra Dax added 0.43 percent to 6,858.34 in Frankfurt. Carmakers were mostly higher earlier in the day, mainly on purchase rumors. Read more » »

(HealthDay News) — A record number of Americans are without health insurance, according to new U.S. Census Bureau statistics released Tuesday.

Some of the trend can be explained by employers who are curtailing coverage or making it too costly for lower income workers to afford, the report said.

“The number of people without health insurance coverage increased from 44.8 million in 2005 to 47 million in 2006,” David S. Johnson, chief of the bureau’s Housing and Household Economic Statistics Division, said during a teleconference Tuesday.

The percentage of Americans without health insurance rose to 15.8 percent in 2006 from 15.3 percent in 2005, Johnson added. “This is the second consecutive year of increase,” he said.
Read more » »

US consumer confidence over the course of August has declined, in the wake of ongoing turbulence on the stock exchange and poor housing results, according to a study released today.

The study conducted by the Conference Board in New York reflected consumer confidence had fallen through a decline in their Consumer Confidence Index, reflecting growing consumer unrest at the health of financial markets.

The index dropped over the course of the month from 111.9 in July to 105.0, which was still beyond widespread expectations. Nevertheless, the drop in figure shows that consumers are beginning to take note of the wider economic situation.

With consumers less confident about the health and near future of their economy, businesses could be in for lower sales, which in turn could lead to further economic worries for the US authorities to content with. Read more » »

Research has found that vitamin E, despite being an antioxidant, does not provide any help in the prevention of heart attacks. Now a new study by researchers at Vanderbilt University Medical Center has found that this reported failure of vitamin E might be on account of lack of proper dosage. When highly reactive molecules known as free radicals go on a rampage and attack cellular proteins, lipids (fats) and DNA, a condition known as oxidative stress or oxidant injury arises. The free radicals are normally byproducts of normal metabolism and present in our body at all times. However, in certain disease states such as heart disease, they are produced in excess and cause damage.

Epidemiological data and animal studies have found that antioxidant compounds such as vitamin E, vitamin C and beta-carotene can shield people who are at risk of heart attack from the action of these free radicals. However, certain other controlled clinical trials of vitamin E found that Read more » »