5 natural foods to provide instant gas relief!

New Delhi: It is a common fact that most people tend to eat more when the food is just too delicious But, overindulgence in food can take your health for a toss and may lead to a bloated stomach due to indigestion which ultimately leads to excessive gas in the stomach.

This painful gas if not passed out either through burping or while flatulence, not just puts you in an uncomfortable situation but can also be a warning of serious health issue.

Here are few natural remedies to provide immediate gas relief:

Ginger:

Consume just the right amount of ginger about half an hour before each meal and feel the difference.

Garlic:

Garlic is one of the oldest medicinal plants and is widely recognised as a health enhancing supplement. It not just gives flavour to your food, but can also help aid stomach gas as it has high fiber content.

Cumin:

Add a tablespoon of crushed cumin seeds to the soup to soothe the intestinal gases.

Basil:

Taking juice of basil leaves with water empty stomach in the morning enhances digestive power and hence prevents bloated stomach.

Peppermint:

Adding peppermint to your tea or eating them raw can help a lot in easing gastric problem.

Smoking and drinking down but obesity continues to rise: survey

The latest snapshot of the nation's health shows that smoking and heavy drinking are on the decline but the war on obesity has failed to trim Australian waistlines.

About 19,000 Australians took part in the 2014-15 National Health Survey, compiled by the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS).

It found 63.4 per cent of Australian adults are now overweight or obese, slightly up on the 62.8 per cent recorded in last survey in 2011-12.

Around one in four children aged five to 17 are overweight or obese, again slightly up on the 25.7 per cent in 2011-12.

Louise Gates from the ABS said one in three adults, or 29.7 per cent, are not getting enough exercise, while a further 15 per cent do no exercise whatsoever.

"Overall, more men are overweight or obese (71 per cent) than women (56 per cent)," Ms Gates said.

Smoking continues to go out of fashion with 14.5 per cent of adults lighting up daily, compared with 16.1 per cent three years ago.

Young adults are also giving up cigarettes, with 16.3 per cent smoking every day, down from 28.2 per cent in 2001.

"Across the board, smoking rates reflect a decrease over the last 15 years, particularly for people under 45," Ms Gates said.

The Northern Territory has the highest rate of smokers at 21 per cent, followed by Tasmania with 18 per cent, while the ACT has the lowest at 12 per cent.

Risky drinking has shown a decline, with 17.4 per cent of adults consuming more than the recommended two standard drinks a day, down from 19.5 per cent in 2011-12.

Asia's first facility for Open Foetal Surgery unveiled

New DelhI: India has become the fifth country in the world to have a facility for Open Foetal Surgery after Union Minister for Health and Family Welfare J P Nadda unveiled the first such facility in Asia at Amrita Institute of Medical Sciences and Research Centre, Kochi.
Open Foetal Surgery entails, taking the baby with birth defects out of mother's womb, doing surgery and putting back inside the womb. The pregnancy is allowed to continue. Later a Cesarean section is done and the baby is delivered.
This prevents the damage that would have occurred to the baby in the uterus before delivery and helps in obtaining normal baby.

News digest – tobacco company allegations, cold sores, a jab to prevent cancer and…potatoes?

BBC’s Panorama revealed shocking allegations that people working on behalf of British American Tobacco have offered payments to politicians, civil servants and other Government officials in several African countries. Here’s our analysis.
MPs from across the political spectrum published a report backing the need for measures to tackle childhood obesity – including a sugar tax. The Mail Online and the Guardian were among the many media outlets to cover the report.
A fine balance of genetic damage inside cancer cells could decide how aggressive certain tumours are. New Scientist investigates.
The Express claimed that “cold sores are KEY to destroying cancer tumours”. But the fascinating research featured in the article is actually targeting cancer cells with a modified version of the virus that causes cold sores – the tingling lip lumps themselves can’t destroy tumours.
Our scientists found that spreading cancer cells that arrive in a new part of the body must be able to change their new environment to continue to grow. Here’s our press release with the details.
We asked if it’s possible to develop a jab to prevent cancer.
This Guardian article approached the tough topic of how a parent tells their children they have cancer.
The Telegraph focussed on the challenge of tackling pancreatic cancer.
Could genetics have a part to play in how hard it is to give up smoking? New Scientist explores a recent study.
Scientists moved a step closer to targeting a cancer-causing molecule that has been deemed ‘undruggable’ by many. The Mail Online covered this, but the findings were in mice so it’s definitely too soon to talk of ‘breakthroughs’.
Popular Science picked up on a study testing liquid metal ‘nano terminator’ particles as a way of delivering cancer drugs to tumour cells. But it’s early days as the findings were only shown in mice.
IBM’s data analysis platform – called Watson – could help doctors diagnose and treat cancer patients in India, according to Forbes.
The Mirror featured a fascinating video showing a cancer cell spreading into the bone of a mouse.
A study looking at depression in women who have been diagnosed with breast cancer reinforced the need for patients to speak to their doctor about how they are feeling. The Mail Online has more on this.

Meditation `better pain reliever` than morphine

You may want to get on the "Breathe in, breathe out" bandwagon as a team of boffins has suggested that meditation, a science-backed, no-prescription-needed way to reduce pain, is way better than taking morphine.
The study conducted at the Wake Forest Baptist Medical Centre in North Carolina suggests that just a few minutes of meditation each day could prove better pain relief than powerful drug medication.
The study showed that those individuals who had been taught to use relaxation and breathing techniques to cope with the pain had calmer brain scans. These people reported a 27 per cent reduction in pain intensity and 44 per cent less emotional pain.
Lead researcher Fadel Zeidan believes these findings prove that mindfulness meditation can produce different patterns of brain activity.
He said that based on the findings, they believe that as little as four 20-minute daily sessions of mindfulness meditation could enhance pain treatment in a clinical setting, adding "However, given that the present study examined healthy, pain-free volunteers, we cannot generalise our findings to chronic pain patients at this time."

Dengue cases on rise in Dindigul

Dindigul: Despite an intensive drive undertaken by the administration to control mosquito breeding, dengue cases are on the rise here due to continuous rains, tanks overflowing, rainwater stagnating and plastic wastes and containers being dumped near residential areas.

Officials said former Deputy Director of Animal Husbandry department and veterinary surgeon Murugaiah died of dengue fever.

Many dengue affected people were treated at the government hospital here and taluk hospitals.

In Chinnalapatti alone, four people were diagnosed with the vector-borne disease. The Department of Health Services has already started distributing herbal concoction to the patients at Dindigul GH and primary health centres.

The officials said more cases of dengue were being reported from the areas where poor people lived.

Many cases were detected late, said Elango, former director of public health department.

People who showed symptoms of the disease bough medicines over the counter and approached doctors only when the situation worsened.

Steps were being taken to clear the garbage. Moderate rains were creating ideal ground for breeding of mosquitoes.

Can overweight men pass obesity risk to their children?

"Are you fat because of your dad?" is the Mail Online's bold question to its readers, explaining that "Men's weight directly affects genes in sperm linked to appetite and brain development".
This was based on a new study that found a man's weight influences the genes in his sperm.

This small study showed that DNA in the sperm of obese men differed from that of healthy weight men. The DNA itself wasn't changed, but modifications affecting how it's used by the body were.
These differences raised the possibility that children of overweight men could inherit genetic traits that make them more likely to be overweight themselves.
The researchers then looked at the sperm in six men before and after weight loss surgery, and found that the genes in their sperm changed considerably as they rapidly lost weight. This suggests that losing weight may be able to reverse the genetic changes associated with being overweight.
The results of this study are interesting, but should be treated with caution. The study only compared 13 healthy weight men with 10 overweight or obese men in the first part of the study, and just six men having weight loss surgery. These are very small numbers.
Similarly, we don't yet know whether the genetic changes identified in the overweight men will make their children more or less likely to be obese themselves, as this was not investigated in the study.
If the results of this research are confirmed in larger groups, the findings could lead to men, like women, being advised to eat healthily when trying to start a family.