In 1968, Chinese-American physician Robert Ho Man Kwok penned what he thought was a lighthearted letter to The New England Journal of Medicine. He wrote of experiencing numbness, palpitations, and weakness after eating in Chinese restaurants in the US, and wondered whether the monosodium glutamate used by the cooks here might be behind his strange illness. The consequences of Kwok’s letter were far-reaching and devastating. MSG, then a common food enhancer, was immediately tagged as a toxin in the public eye, a move supported by flawed “research”, and was removed from nearly every commercially-available food found on store shelves.
Day: January 26, 2023
Why Pro Athletes Get Paid So Much Money
The highest-paid neurosurgeon in the United States makes around $500,000 a year. Their education takes between 14 to 16 years, which means they are well into their 20s when they start working, and they probably won’t be making anywhere near $500,000 until they reach their forties. The average salary of a professional soccer player is 3 million a year, and they’ll be making that sum before their mid-twenties. Is this gap unfair? After all, professional athletes don’t save lives as surgeons do. They don’t have to study for decades, get into school debt, or spend any sleepless nights during residency. The reason behind this difference is a combination of factors, and as with most things in the modern economic system, we have to take supply and demand into consideration.
High-Fat Diets Could Reduce the Brain’s Ability to Regulate Food Intake
When high-fat and high-calorie foods are consumed regularly, our brain’s ability to regulate hunger cues, and calorie intake gets reduced. A new study has shown evidence of how continuously eating a fatty diet seems to disrupt the neurological pathway between the brain and the gut.
The cells in charge of signaling the brain when we’ve had enough food are called astrocytes. According to new research published in The Journal of Physiology, calorie intake is regulated in the short term by astrocytes (large star-shaped cells in the brain that regulate many different functions of neurons in the brain). Astrocytes also control the signaling pathway between the brain and the gut, a path that can get interrupted by high calorie diets.
FDA Proposes Annual COVID Vaccine
The Food and Drug Administration is asking an expert advisory panel to consider the frequency with which people should be boosted against COVID-19 and what those boosters should look like. The FDA also recommended that all vaccines, including initial and boosters, should address the same variants from now on.
Warriors Star Stephen Curry Ejected from Game for Throwing Mouthguard
The Golden State Warriors made their 122-120 comeback Wednesday night against the Memphis Grizzlies, despite the odds being stacked against them after the team’s star Stephen Curry was ejected late in the game’s fourth quarter. The ejection–a rarity for Curry–occurred after Curry saw Jordan Poole take a shot and miss it instead of passing it to him. Curry then clapped his hands at Poole after what Curry later said was an ill-advised 3-point attempt by his teammate. As he was running back on defense, Curry, in a moment of frustration, took out his mouthguard and threw it on the court.
Dutch Officials Advised to Steer Clear of TikTok
Public authorities in the Netherlands have been told to steer clear of TikTok, the popular short-video platform, in light of privacy risks posed by the Chinese app. According to two Dutch government officials who spoke to POLITICO, Dutch ministries and agencies are following recommendations to “shun” TikTok accounts and cease government communication and advertising on the app; the policy does not instruct officials to delete the app. This is despite the app’s growing popularity in the Netherlands, where it has around 3.5 million users, or 20% of the country’s population.
Steinbrenner, Munson Levine…A month of Yankee leadership
January seems to be the month where things get ignited throughout the Yankee Universe. Especially when it came to their leadership. The three greatest leaders that I have witnessed in my 50 years around the Yanks organization naturally starts with George Steinbrenner. On January 3rd of 1973 he along with a group of businessmen purchased […]
