Possible Malware carrier Supposedly from the Post Office

With all the virus warnings I regularly get in email (most of which are hoaxes), I never heard of the email I received today which was most obviously a virus or worm carrier.  Here's what it looks like:

As for what the attachment does, there seems to be a difference of opinion in the "blog-o-sphere".

One blogger said it was something called "malvertising" software which was downloaded when the unsuspecting recipient opens the email. He said he almost fell for it. It, according to him, installs fake "spyware" which tells you that your computer is full of viruses and then, tries to sell you a solution.

Another blogger identifies it as a worm/trojan carrier but he doesn't specify what mischief it might do.  

The Microsoft website identifies the payload as a worm but again doesn't specify much about what it does.

Whatever the case, there is a really good chance you do not want it in your computer so if you get an email looking like the one above, don't open the attachment! :)

Sue

Fast Food Playgrounds - a place you really want your kid to play in?

When scientist - developmental psychologist, Dr Erin Carr-Jordan, college professor, visited a McDonald's playground with her 4 children, she was appalled at the fact that the playground tubes, kids routinely crawl around in, were covered with filth. Some of what she found in the tubes were paper, rotting and dried food, and a lot of dirt - they looked like they had not been washed in a long time. Shocked, she approached the manager about this and raised zero interest in the problem. After talking to another three managers with the same reaction, she crawled up into the tubes herself and made a video. That made the news although the link published on the news website was broken. If I was a more suspicious person, I would wonder if it was broken on purpose (obviously MickyD's is a big advertiser on the networks etc). I managed to put repair the link and watched the video and it was disgusting to the point of making me a bit nauseous.

I get that kids crawl in these things daily with seemingly no repercussions i.e. kids do have strong immune systems and most places they crawl are covered with pathogens, (although no one's really done any studies on whether the pathogens present in the indoor playgrounds are more abundant than in other places) but still, the idea and how the tubes look, is so revolting (some of the dirt in there looks like fecal matter!) that after viewing Dr Carr-Jordan's video, I would not want my kids playing there.

Carr-Jordan found there were no regulations on keeping these playgrounds cleaner and at least one scientist, told the news service that many scientists were well aware of the lack of cleanliness of indoor playgrounds:

"Charles Gerba, a University of Arizona professor with a Ph.D. in microbiology, doesn't know Dr Carr-Jordan but said it was well-known among experts in his field that children's playgrounds are one of the most germ-plagued environments and the pathogens can cause disease. Indoor playgrounds that tend to be warm and moist promote bacterial growth."

Dr Gerba added that if he had a small child, he would not allow him/her to play in those playgrounds.

It should be noted that outside playgrounds are probably less populated with pathogens due to being exposed to sunlight.

If McDonald's doesn't want to put any provisions for regular cleaning of the indoor playgrounds into place (so far they seem to have treated the issue like it was limited to the fast food restaurants Dr Carr-Jordan visited), then the Board of Health should take over and require daily (or even twice daily) cleaning of these!

Cancer and Cell phones?

The latest flap in the news is that a meta study has found an increased risk of brain cancer among people who regularly use cell phones and scary articles make great headlines for the news services.

The metastudy was done by a scientist named Leonart Hardell and has not been published yet (nor peer reviewed). However, Hardell did another similar metastudy of the research about cell phones and cancer in 2007 which is available on line.

The studies reviewed were mostly survey studies and did not control for known risks of brain cancer like Nutrasweet/aspartame. The relative risk factors in much of the research presented was less than 1.8 (has to be over 2.0 to be significant) and only in a couple, was higher like 3.x.

A bit intrigued, I went to the Environmental Health Trust Organization website to look for all this evidence they claim is available. They have safety precautions for the use of cell phones. They have videos. What they do not have any of, are actually study cites.

I watched one of the videos which presented three scientists (none of whom were biologists). The Title is: Expert EMF Workshop at San Leandro High School. It's the second video on the page. The speakers compared cell phones and cigarettes. "The ads encouraged people to smoke" said Dr. Magda Havas, showing the ad from the 1960's, "claiming more doctors smoked that brand!" Problem in logic there - in the 1960's we were only beginning to have an inkling that smoking posed serious risks. That is, now that smoking has been proven to have bad effects on health, one does not see those ads anymore.

During the video, one of the speakers showed a cutsie video of people dressed in white suits (looked like teletubby outfits) supposedly illustrating what cell phones do to our DNA (the video didn't make much sense to me).

But all of the over 30 minute presentation was devoid of any real research except the mention of Lennart Hardell, mentioned previously.

The kids who listened to the talk (looked like High School age) seemed extremely bored and totally unconvinced.

And they are not the only ones who are questioning these claims. Scientists in the UK are also questioning it, according to the BBC News which called Leonart's research, flawed.

"The National Radiological Protection Board (NRPB), which advises the government on safety levels, said the study "lacks statistical precision" to draw such conclusions. "

Meanwhile, Dr Lennart stated more research is needed (for which he is, undoubtedly, looking for funding which perhaps might be, at least, some of his underlying motivation for the sensational claims - people do funny things for money and scientists are definitely humans!).

Even the "green folks" say if you use the speaker phone on your cell or portable phone or text (rather than hold the phone against your head), the danger, if at all, is greatly minimized, so that seems like a good solution.

Adding to the confusion is the fact that cancer and other diseases which seem to be 'on the rise' these days, are aging diseases. At the turn of the 20th century, very few cases of cancer were diagnosed, but the average age of death was 45. And now, the average age of death is around 78-80. Oddly though, no one seems to take that aspect in consideration.

As for radiation, it has been pointed out that we receive more radiation from the sun than we do from microwaves and cell phones. We also are exposed to a lot of radiation from some of the tests routinely done like mammograms. Mammograms deliver 3 times the radiation of a chest X-ray to each breast and yet, most medical providers are still highly recommending them. (I don't do mammograms either)

I remain open to definitive research but for now, take the current cell phone fear mongering with a huge grain of salt.

Cell phones and brain cancer?

The latest flap in the news is that a meta study has found an increased risk of brain cancer among people who regularly use cell phones and scary articles make great headlines for the news services.

The metastudy was done by a scientist named Leonart Hardell and has not been published yet (nor peer reviewed). However, Hardell did another similar metastudy of the research about cell phones and cancer in 2007 which is available on line.

The studies reviewed were mostly survey studies and did not control for known risks of brain cancer like Nutrasweet/aspartame. The relative risk factors in much of the research presented was less than 1.8 (has to be over 2.0 to be significant) and only in a couple, was higher like 3.x.

A bit intrigued, I went to the Environmental Health Trust Organization website to look for all this evidence they claim is available. They have safety precautions for the use of cell phones. They have videos. What they do not have any of, are actually study cites.

I watched one of the videos which presented three scientists (none of whom were biologists). The Title is: Expert EMF Workshop at San Leandro High School. It's the second video on the page. The speakers compared cell phones and cigarettes. "The ads encouraged people to smoke" said Dr. Magda Havas, showing the ad from the 1960's, "claiming more doctors smoked that brand!" Problem in logic there - in the 1960's we were only beginning to have an inkling that smoking posed serious risks. That is, now that smoking has been proven to have bad effects on health, one does not see those ads anymore.

During the video, one of the speakers showed a cutsie video of people dressed in white suits (looked like teletubby outfits) supposedly illustrating what cell phones do to our DNA (the video didn't make much sense to me).

But all of the over 30 minute presentation was devoid of any real research except the mention of Lennart Hardell, mentioned previously.

The kids who listened to the talk (looked like High School age) seemed extremely bored and totally unconvinced.

And they are not the only ones who are questioning these claims. Scientists in the UK are also questioning it, according to the BBC News which called Leonart's research, flawed.

"The National Radiological Protection Board (NRPB), which advises the government on safety levels, said the study "lacks statistical precision" to draw such conclusions. "

Meanwhile, Dr Lennart stated more research is needed (for which he is, undoubtedly, looking for funding which perhaps might be, at least, some of his underlying motivation for the sensational claims - people do funny things for money and scientists are definitely humans!).

Even the "green folks" say if you use the speaker phone on your cell or portable phone or text (rather than hold the phone against your head), the danger, if at all, is greatly minimized, so that seems like a good solution.

Adding to the confusion is the fact that cancer and other diseases which seem to be 'on the rise' these days, are aging diseases. At the turn of the 20th century, very few cases of cancer were diagnosed, but the average age of death was 45. And now, the average age of death is around 78-80. Oddly though, no one seems to take that aspect in consideration.

As for radiation, it has been pointed out that we receive more radiation from the sun than we do from microwaves and cell phones. We also are exposed to a lot of radiation from some of the tests routinely done like mammograms. Mammograms deliver 3 times the radiation of a chest X-ray to each breast and yet, most medical providers are still highly recommending them. (I don't do mammograms either)

I remain open to definitive research but for now, take the current cell phone fear mongering with a huge grain of salt.

Microwaving - Examining the claimed risks

I had an inquiry about "the recent discussion about the dangers of microwaves" as a comment in another blog of mine and decided to do a bit of research. The questioner asked me what I thought of the stated dangers. I only found a couple of articles in a search of Google.

One article details the claimed risks of microwaving. This article, found on a website called "global research" (but apparently from an article in "Natural News") included a photo of two plants, supposedly a student science project - the one watered with microwaved water was dead, so went the story. (A student science project where we don't know all the facts? Not exactly hard evidence!) Don't do microwaving, concludes the author. Well, that's fine if you have all the time in the world to cook the slow way but will avoiding the microwave oven really protect from cancer?

To review a couple of the claims from the article:

"Microwaved prepared meats cause the formation of d-Nitrosodienthanolamines, a well-known carcinogen"

Fact remains, cooking meat can cause the formation of carcinogens. For example, if you barbecue your meat, and char the meat, that is considered a carcinogen also.

But is eating small amounts of a carcingen, going to cause cancer? No proof of this. And evidence suggests not - things like heredity, smoking and even consuming trans fat etc are likely, much greater risks. And by the way, the article does not explain how the "d-nitro..." is formed either nor does it give any cites for further study. FYI, giving up fast food, would probably much sooner lower the cancer risk (though probably only slightly) than giving up your microwave, and doing cardio exercise daily can actually lower your cancer risk by 40%!

"Studies have shown that human breast milk heated in microwave ovens is altered and that not only is its vitamin content depleted, but some of the amino acids are also rendered biologically inactive. Some of the altered amino acids are poisons to both the nervous system and the kidneys."

Another undocumented and un-cited statement and fact remains, any time you heat milk, some of the vitamins are altered - regardless of how you heat it which was why even when I was bottle feeding our son in the 1970's, the books suggested it was best to mix the formula from powder in room temperature water (I used bottled water) to preserve the vitamins (rather than preparing a larger amount, keeping it in the fridge and reheating it.

The author also claims that when you microwave broccoli, 97% of the Vitamin C was destroyed. First of all, Broccoli is not that good a source of Vitamin C and then, anytime you cook it, it destroys the vitamin C but few of us can stomach it raw.

A conversation on the Snopes message boards expressed that all of the posters were very skeptical of these claims and several pointed out that there are no studies backing the claims up. Another conversation on the "Physics" message base is also good source reading. Again, the consensus is, the "death by cancer" claims about microwaving are likely not true but there, a person can read some explanations of the nuts and bolts of microwaves which are enlightening.

Microwaves have been around for a long time - and it's good to remember that cancer is not a single cause disease. It's likely that moderate use of the microwave isn't a real danger - and no studies have been done to support the "sky is falling claims" one reads on some of the natural websites.

Cancer update email forward

You might have gotten an email entitled "Cancer update email" or "Johns Hopkins update - very good article", which claims to be from an article sent out by the Johns Hopkins newsletter. The email gets stranger and stranger as you read it. Chemotherapy doesn't work to help cancer, it claims but changing your diet will do it. By the time you get down to the bottom which informs you that milk produces mucus which "feeds the cancer", you might be wondering about it.

This article of unknown origin never went out on Johns Hopkins newsletter according to Snopes and Hoaxslayer, the latter which suggests that especially with medical forwards, it's best to check them out before sending to friends.

Johns Hopkins, not real impressed (to put it mildly) about the email stating so many myths about cancer being attributed to them, dedicated a page on their website to deny and debunk the email, point by point.

To "Google" a forward, take the title and put it in quotes. In the case of this, since the title was more generalized, I also took a few key words like "cancer" and "alternate" and "Johns Hopkins" and added them to my search. With the search engines being so comprehensive and computers being so fast, it only takes a couple of seconds to check out a forward and it's really worth doing rather than sending out wrong information especially in the medical arena.

The Krispy Kreme Challenge

Taking place in North Carolina, is a fun run which seems right on the edge.

Sponsored by the manufacturers of artery clogging Krispy Kreme donuts, and raising money for a children's hospital, this competition draws thousands of participants every year.

In 2009, they logged over 5000 runners and in 2011, the expectation was over 7500 runners.

The race, which seems to draw people of all sizes and all ages (although it takes place in a college town and originated with 5 college students) consists of running two miles from the start to the Krispy Kreme store, consuming one dozen Krispy Kreme donuts and then, running back, all in one hour or under, if possible.

The reality of the race from a youtube video, filmed by a participant, seemed less pretty than MSNBC news made it appear. The only concern the news media had was perhaps the runners won't run off the calories contained in 12 donuts.

The video maker described squishing three donuts together in order to gulp them down more quickly. This morphed the donuts into a concoction which was anything but appetizing. He also said to get back into the race, to finish it, he had to walk over several piles of vomit from those less successful in consuming the dozen.

"Some of the participants just did the run and only ate 1 or 2 Krispy Kremes", he commented.

Considerably less people appeared to finish the race than were at the start line and those coming in all looked like they'd been sucked through a keyhole backwards.

Were those who just ate a couple of Krispy Kremes wiser than those who attempted the eating contest? Considering that donuts are among the most artery clogging foods available, probably not.

The race seems the epitomy of American insanity - combining a healthy activity like running with eating the type of food which would seem to negate any good health effects of the exercise.

From regularly reading Runner's magazines for several years, I found that quite often they had articles about folks who had heart attacks or cancer, unusual for regular exercisers. (Many studies suggest those who exercise have a 40 percent lower risk of heart disease, than non exercisers.)

Could it be that the underlying message of such events as the Krispy Kreme Challenge i.e. if one can "run off the calories" than one can consume unhealthy foods with abandon, is very misleading? I vote yes on that question.

A better idea would seem to be to exercise with abandon and skip the donuts. According to a PBS news story video, participants are not required to eat any donuts.

One of the reporters who participated commented that "they have pills for people who do things like this."

Related video: how Krispy Kremes are made.

Bias against female athleticism and muscle again on TV

This is Lauren Powers. She is a gorgeous bodybuilder, 48 years old who has won 30 competitions. She's totally ripped and symmetrical. Naturally she is an awesome athlete who puts in the hours, working out. She was featured on "My strange Addiction" and sorry but I object! Why don't they say Olympian, Michael Phelps has a "strange addiction" when he works out more than Lauren does. To me, this is the typical bias against female muscle in specific and female athletes in general. That is if a female athlete has too many muscles, this is "bad". But if a female is bone slim that is good. Lauren who is 5'5", weighs 180 lbs and is a very low bodyfat percentage. She is a person who should be spoken about with utter respect! Would you believe, later on in the show, they have her going to a psychologist who tells her how "unhealthy" her "strange addiction" i.e. athleticism and successfully winning 30 competitions, is?

Here is a clip from the discovery channel show:

"My Strange Addiction - Lauren"

Here is a partial list of the 30 competitions she has won:

1st place Open Heavyweight in the NPC Orange County Classic, then 1st Place and Overall at the NPC Jan Tana show, and also Overall Ms. Muscle Beach Classic in Venice Beach.

I know she probably did the show to create awareness of female bodybuilding with the idea that "there is no such thing as bad publicity, only publicity". I hope it works in a positive way for her but the jist of the show was that there must be something wrong with her for being an awesome athlete because she is a bodybuilder!

Lauren's official website:

http://www.laurenpowers.com/

Please write to TLC and let them know your feelings. (Click on email address below)

tlc@discovery.com