Prahladananda Swami

BBC NEWS
Hygiene horror in commuter study
More than one in four commuters have bacteria which come from faeces on
their hands, an investigation finds.
Scientists from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine swabbed
409 people at bus and train stations in five major cities around the UK.
The further north they went, the more often they found commuters with faecal
bacteria on their hands – men in Newcastle were the worst offenders.
Experts stressed the importance of hand hygiene for preventing illness.
The bacteria found suggested people were not washing their hands properly
after using the toilet, said the researchers.
Toilet hands
In Newcastle and Liverpool, men were more likely than women to show
contamination – 53% of men compared to 30% of women in Newcastle and 36% of
men compared to 31% of women in Liverpool.
    We were flabbergasted by the finding that so many people had faecal
bugs on their hands
Dr Val Curtis, director of the Hygiene Centre at the London School of
Hygiene and Tropical Medicine
In the other three cities – London, Cardiff and Birmingham – the women’s
hands were dirtier.
People who had used the bus had higher rates of hand contamination than
those who had used the train.
Manual workers had cleaner hands than other professionals, students, retired
people or the unemployed.
Dr Val Curtis, director of the Hygiene Centre at the London School of
Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, said: "We were flabbergasted by the finding
that so many people had faecal bugs on their hands.
"The figures were far higher than we had anticipated, and suggest that there
is a real problem with people washing their hands in the UK.
DIRTY HANDS
Newcastle – men 53%, women 30%
Liverpool – men 36%, women 31%
Birmingham – men 21%, women 26%
Cardiff – men 15%, women 29%
Euston (London) – men 6%, women 21%
"If any of these people had been suffering from a diarrhoeal disease, the
potential for it to be passed around would be greatly increased by their
failure to wash their hands after going to the toilet."
Professor Mike Catchpole, director of the Health Protection Agency’s Centre
for Infections, said: "These results are startling and should be enough to
make anyone reach for the soap.
"It is well known that hand washing is one of the most important ways of
controlling the spread of infections, especially those that cause diarrhoea
and vomiting, colds and flu.
"People should always wash their hands after using the toilet, before eating
or handling food, and after handling animals. And remember to cover all cuts
and scratches with a waterproof dressing."
Winter vomiting
The HPA’s monitoring of infections over recent weeks suggests that cases of
norovirus – the winter vomiting bug – are rising and that the annual
norovirus season is likely to have begun.
Norovirus is the most common cause of gastrointestinal disease in the UK
with peak activity in terms of numbers of cases and outbreaks during the
winter months, from October to March.
It has been estimated that between 600,000 and a million people in the UK
are affected each year.
Professor Catchpole said: "Norovirus is highly infectious and easily spread
in settings where people are in close contact with one another so good
hygiene, including frequent handwashing, is really important."
The study was part of the world’s first Global Handwashing Day, dedicated to
raising awareness about the importance hand hygiene plays in public health.
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/health/7667499.stm # – Prahladananda Swami – 16/10/08

Are you one of those individuals who works through the night? Do you spend
too much time hooked to the computer or the television till the wee hours,
compromising on your sleep?
Beware — apart from leaving you red-eyed, weary and dozing off in the
middle of an office meeting, lack of adequate sleep can also result in heart
disease, obesity, diabetes and other stress-related disorders.
"As our lives get busier and we try to cram more and more activities into
our already-packed schedules, we sacrifice our sleeping hours," says
consulting dietician Priti Apte.
The amount of necessary sleep varies from person to person, with some
breezing through their days on just a few hours’ slumber and others needing
10 hours of sound rest. "If you feel fresh after five hours of sleep and
complete your tasks with ease throughout the day, five hours is enough for
you,’ she explains. "But most people need around seven to nine hours of
sleep and it’s necessary that the person meet this quota for a healthy
life."
"Regular sleep keeps the mind alert and the body healthy, so that one can
complete one’s daily tasks. It also ensures proper distribution and
digestion of all nutrients in the body," says Priti.
Apart from the fact that lack of sleep has a dire effect on general
wellbeing and health, creativity and mental alertness, people who are unable
to sleep properly at night tend to be weary most of the time and lack the
ability to concentrate.
Housewife Kunika Malhotra, 32, complains that she has problems coping with
minor hassles, gets irritated easily and cannot tolerate noise. Kunika has
been trying to juggle her husband’s late working hours and her children’s
early morning school preparations for some time now and can barely squeeze
in five hours of sleep every night.
"I always think that I will catch up on my sleep over the weekend, but that
has never happened," she says.
According to general practitioner Dr Manoj Bhise, this is not the solution.
He explains, "What one needs is regular, consistent sleep — over-sleeping
once in a while to reduce the backlog won’t help."
Apart from psychological effects, lack of sleep also has an adverse effect
on one’s physical health. Dr Bhise informs us that a sleep deficit may put
the body into a state of high alert, increasing the production of stress
hormones and driving up blood pressure, a major risk factor behind heart
attacks and strokes.
The newest study on obesity, conducted by Columbia University, is the latest
to find that adults who sleep the least appear to be the most likely to gain
weight and to become obese. Says Priti, "Researchers have found that even
mild sleep deprivation quickly disrupts normal levels of the
recently-discovered hormones ghrelin and leptin, which regulate appetite.
Adds Dr Bhise, "Patients who do not get their daily dose of sleep also
complain about aching muscles and hand tremors, apart from drowsiness during
the daytime."
Other health problems brought on by sleep-deprivation include, dizziness,
hypertension, memory loss, nausea, fatigue, dramatic weight loss or gain.
Erratic sleep schedules also throw the digestive system for a toss, often
leading to constipation.
Says software engineer Mandar Bhave, "I have a US-based client and I was
working through the night most of the week. As a result, I started suffering
bouts of severe headaches and then one day I just collapsed in the office
due to heartburn. The doctors also diagnosed the formation of an ulcer in my
stomach. My body clock was all erratic thanks to irregular, inconsistent
rest. The first thing my doctor advised was to get eight hours of regular
sleep."
Though most of us know well enough that our bodies need sleep to rest and
recuperate, we continue to reduce our rest time so that we can squeeze in
the increasing demands of our lifestyle.
It’s about time we started listening to our bodies and turning in for a good
night’s sleep everyday. # – Prahladananda Swami – 22/9/08