Public Health Scene
July 2, 2009
Minnesota has the lowest obesity rate among kids
 A new report finds Minnesota kids have the lowest rate of obesity -- tying with Utah at just over 23 percent.
"It's wonderful to see Minnesota tied for the lowest spot. I think that's great news for us, but I don't think that that means we don't have work to do still," Jamie Stang, an assistant professor with the University of Minnesota School of Public Health, told KARE 11 News.
Stang says several factors contribute to low obesity rates among Minnesota children, including: higher education levels, ethnic background and socio-economic standards.
The report is from the Trust for America's Health, a health advocacy group in Washington, D.C.
Download the report (PDF)
More from the Star Tribune
See the news story at KARE 11 News
June 25, 2009
The Vitality Project aims to improve health of entire community
 Albert Lea, Minnesota is the center of an innovative, ten-month pilot project designed to improve the health and life expectancy of people who live and work there.
It's called the AARP Blue Zones Vitality Project.
Leslie Lytle, a University of Minnesota epidemiology professor, is co-director of the project.
She says that instead of focusing on diet and exercise, the project encourages the best practices of the world's longest-lived populations with strategies such as making it easier to get around on and encouraging the development of social networks.
Listen to Lytle on Public Health Scene
June 17, 2009
Klobuchar introduces food-safety bill
 Sen. Amy Klobuchar has introduced federal legislation to promote a more rapid and effective national response to outbreaks of foodborne sickness like the recent case of salmonella-tainted peanut butter and last year's outbreak caused by tainted jalapeño peppers.
Last spring, people across the country were getting sick from salmonella. After cases began to show up in Minnesota, public health officials managed to trace the contamination to jalapeno peppers from Mexico. In the fall, people across the country were again getting sick from salmonella, including nine deaths (three of them in Minnesota). Again, the Minnesota team succeeded in tracing the source to peanut butter from a processing facility in Georgia.
Continue reading "Klobuchar introduces food-safety bill" »
June 9, 2009
Smoking bans do not cause economic harm
 Smoking bans do not cause economic harm to bars and restaurants. That’s according to a study led by epidemiologist Jean Forster from the University of Minnesota.
Forster and colleagues used state-mandated reporting data from 10 Minnesota cities for the years 2003 to 2006. That was before the introduction of a statewide smoking ban, but at a time when a number of local cities had adopted their own full or partial bans.
Forster says that smoking bans are an effective way to protect people—especially bar and restaurant employees—from the harmful effects of secondhand smoke.
• Listen to Forster on our Public Health Moment podcast
June 5, 2009
The Economic Case for Health Care Reform
 The American health care system is growing at an unsustainable rate that threatens to have a devastating impact on the growth in workers’ take-home pay and the government budget deficit.
That's according to a new report from the White House Council of Economic Advisors. Jean M. Abraham, University of Minnesota health policy expert, was a co-author. But the report goes on to articulate the advantages of proceeding now with health care reform.
"Our analysis shows that successful health care reform would have major benefits for the U.S. economy," writes Abraham and the co-authors. "Over time, the slowing of cost growth through increased efficiency would bring about substantial increases in Americans’ standard of living. It will also prevent devastating increases in the budget deficit."
Download the report
May 27, 2009
Burned and charred meat can increase your risk of pancreatic cancer
 People who regularly eat red meat that is very well done, burned or charred may increase their risk of pancreatic cancer by almost 60 percent.
That’s according to a 9-year study that involved more than 62,000 people.
The study was led by Kristin Anderson, a University of Minnesota cancer epidemiologist.
Anderson recommends turning down the heat when you grill meats and says that you should trim away any burned or charred portions.
• Listen to Anderson on our Public Health Moment podcast
May 20, 2009
Disparities in Health Coverage
 Overall, Minnesota ranks high for the percentage of residents with health insurance.
But Kathleen Call, a professor and health policy expert at the University of Minnesota, says that when one looks closer, you see great disparity.
She says that providing health care access to the uninsured will actually save money in the long term.
• Listen to Call on our Public Health Moment podcast
May 13, 2009
Ignition locking device targets drunk drivers
 On July 1, Minnesota will expand statewide a voluntary program that encourages repeat drunk driving offenders to use an ignition interlock on their vehicle.
Tracy Toomey, a University of Minnesota expert on impaired driving, is a big fan of ignition interlock devices. She and many others working to reduce death and injury from drunk driving say ignition interlock should be standard equipment on vehicles, the way airbags are today.
"It is crazy that we have people that (are) four times, five times, six times and higher in terms of being repeat offenders," she Minnesota Public Radio. "We need to get these people off the road."
More from MPR
April 28, 2009
Swine Flu: What you should know
April 27, 2009
Swine Flu: Is this the 'Big One?'
 Public health experts have been warning us about the next flu pandemic. Is swine flu it?
It's too soon to tell, says Michael Osterholm, director of the University of Minnesota Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy.
“What makes this so difficult is we may be somewhere between an important but yet still uneventful public health occurrence here — with something that could literally die out over the next couple of weeks and never show up again — or this could be the opening act of a full-fledged influenza pandemic," Osterholm told Fox News.
“We have no clue right now where we are between those two extremes. That's the problem.”
More from Fox News
More from CIDRAP
April 23, 2009
New findings on lung, pancreatic cancers
 Regularly eating red meat that is burned or charred may increase your risk of pancreatic cancer by almost 60 percent, according to a study by Kristin Anderson, a University of Minnesota cancer researcher.
“Our findings in this study are further evidence that turning down the heat when grilling, frying, and barbecuing to avoid excess burning or charring of the meat may be a sensible way for some people to lower their risk for getting pancreatic cancer,” Anderson said.
 Meanwhile, University of Minnesota researcher Jian-Min Yuan has found a direct link, for the first time, between cigarette smoking and lung cancer.
“We’ve known for a long time that smoking increases a person’s risk for getting lung cancer, but we have not been able to clearly answer why one smoker would eventually develop lung cancer and another one would not. Now we know one definitive link,” Yuan said.
More about Anderson's study from MPR
Read the release about Anderson's study
More about Yuan's study from CNN.com
Read the release about Yuan's study
April 6, 2009
Study: Teens eating more fast food
 Research led by Katherine Bauer at the University of Minnesota found a significant increase in the amount of fast food that adolescents are eating today compared with the late 1990s.
She also discovered increases in the amount of fast food the adolescents ate as they moved from middle school to high school, and in male adolescents as they moved from high school into young adulthood.
Perhaps the most surprising finding is that male high school athletes eat more fast food.
Using data from Project EAT, a study of more than 2,500 Twin Cities adolescents, Bauer found that 27 percent of high school girls reported eating fast food more than three times per week in 2004, compared with only 19 percent in 1999.
Listen to Bauer on this installment of Public Health Scene
March 24, 2009
Older adults not getting enough nutrition
Many middle-aged and older Americans are not getting adequate nutrition -- even those taking dietary supplements.
That’s according to a study involving 6,200 people, ages 45 to 84. The study included African Americans, Chinese, Hispanics, and whites.
Pam Schreiner, a University of Minnesota epidemiologist, led the study.
Schreiner says she believes that more education and more prevention are needed.
Listen to Schreiner on our Public Health Moment podcast
Read more from Science News
March 13, 2009
More about the benefits of home-cooked meals
 The benefits of family meals was in the news again this week. According to research conducted at the University of Minnesota, teens who participated in regular family meals — five or more together each week &mdash reported more healthful diets and meal patterns compared with peers who ate few family meals.
Researchers surveyed 677 boys and girls, aged 12 and 13, about their diet and did so again five years later. Kids who reported eating as a family on a regular basis were more likely to eat breakfast and had a higher intake of vegetables, fibre, calcium, magnesium, potassium and iron at age 17 and 18.
Children who eat home-cooked meals tend to eat more fruits and vegetables and fewer unhealthy foods.
But the study indicates that there's more benefits than just a healthier diet. For example, studies also show that the more families eat together, the less likely kids are to smoke, drink, take drugs and develop eating disorders. Also, these kids are more likely to excel academically.
More from The Globe and Mail
Also in the news this week:
University of Minnesota health policy professor Susan Foote discussed President Obama's health summit on Minnesota Public Radio.
More from Minnesota Public Radio
R.K. Anderson, School of Public Health, and Margaret Duxbury, College of Veterinary Medicine, discussed the benefits of human-animal relationships in an interview with WCCO-TV.
More from WCCO
March 5, 2009
Minnesota's 'Team D' garners praise
Last year Minnesota's food-borne illness group, dubbed "Team D" discovered that hot peppers — not tomatoes — were the cause of the largest salmonella outbreak in a decade.
This year, the Minnesota team was the first to identify King Nut peanut butter as the culprit, and Peanut Corp. of America as the producer. It was the first big break in a case that has sickened more than 677 nationwide.
“People die who don't need to die. It happens all the time in food-borne illness outbreaks,” Michael Osterholm (pictured), director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research & Policy at the University of Minnesota, told USA Today. “If each state was as effective as Minnesota, more of these could be detected.”
When it comes to food-borne illness investigation, "Minnesota is leap years ahead of … most of the rest of the nation," says James Phillips, head of infectious diseases for the Arkansas Department of Health.
More from USA Today
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On April 27, after reviewing information about the confirmed cases of swine flu, the World Health Organization raised the level of influenza pandemic alert from the current phase 3 to phase 4.
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