Month: August 2013

By Dorene Internicola NEW YORK (Reuters) – Celebrity trainer Bob Harper, of the weight-loss TV show "The Biggest Loser," has built a career putting very obese people through some grueling fitness paces but if he's learned anything from the experience, it's that diet trumps exercise every time. The Los Angeles-based trainer, who was born on a cattle farm in Tennessee and arrived in California some 20 years ago, said gone are the days when he believed it was possible to just exercise the pounds away. …

WELLINGTON (Reuters) – New Zealand on Monday announced plans for a government inquiry into how ingredients made by dairy giant Fonterra became contaminated with a botulism-causing bacteria, as the country tries to salvage its reputation as an exporter of safe agricultural products. The inquiry, to be held alongside two internal Fonterra investigations and another by the country's agricultural regulator, will examine how the potentially contaminated products entered the international market and whether adequate regulatory practices were in place to deal with the issue. …

By Naomi Tajitsu WELLINGTON (Reuters) – More New Zealand milk products sold to China have been banned after elevated levels of nitrates were found, raising further concerns over quality and testing in the world's largest dairy exporter in the wake of a contamination scare earlier this month. New Zealand's agricultural regulator said on Monday it has revoked export certificates for four China-bound consignments of lactoferrin manufactured by Westland Milk Products after higher- than-acceptable nitrate levels were found by tests in China. …

By Genevra Pittman NEW YORK (Reuters Health) – Children exposed to two chemicals commonly used in food packaging are more likely to be obese or show signs of diabetes precursors than those with lower exposure, new research suggests. Researchers found urine levels of one type of phthalate, used to soften plastic, were tied to a higher risk of insulin resistance among teenagers. Based on data from the same large nutrition survey, another study group linked bisphenol A, or BPA – used to line aluminum cans – to obesity and larger waists in youth. …

Look for these surprising symptoms.        

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Weeks after finishing her sixth trip to rehab, actress Lindsay Lohan said in an interview broadcast on Sunday that she was an addict and realizes she needs "to shut up and listen" because her approach to dealing with personal problems had not worked. "I'm my own worst enemy, and I know that and I admit it," Lohan, 27, told Oprah Winfrey in an interview on the Oprah Winfrey Network (OWN). She said she only realized she had a problem "over a period of time" rather than at any one moment. …

By George Tanber TOLEDO, Ohio (Reuters) – A man in western Ohio found nearly 300 pounds of marijuana stuffed into a Mexican-made gun-storage safe that he recently purchased on the Internet, authorities revealed on Sunday. The 1,000-pound steel safe, ordered from Champion Safe Co. of Provo, Utah, was made in Nogales, Mexico, and shipped by truck from Mexico to Champion’s warehouse near Mansfield, Ohio, Shelby County Sheriff John Lenhart said. The safe was delivered on June 19 to the customer in western Ohio by an independent driver working for Champion, Lenhart said. …

By Lisa Baertlein and P.J. Huffstutter (Reuters) – After nearly a decade of relying on weight-gain feed additives as a lifeline to survival, some of the 75,000 U.S. cattle feedyards that dot rural America in places such as Texas and the Great Plains, suddenly must do without the leading product Zilmax – nicknamed "Vitamin Z." Merck & Co's announcement on Friday that it was suspending the sale of Zilmax in the United States and Canada surprised many cattle owners and feedlot operators, who say Zilmax and other beta-agonists have been a godsend for a struggling U.S. …

Changes in youth football practices cut total hits to the head in half, whereas leaving game situations unaffected. Ingrid Wickelgren reports

JERUSALEM (AP) — Israel is launching a nationwide campaign to give a polio booster to all children under 9 after a rare discovery of the virus.

LONDON (AP) — A man who lacks the capacity to give informed consent can be given a vasectomy after he made repeated requests not to have more children, a British court ruled Friday.