Office desk can jeopardise your
health
Office desks put workers at risk of serious illness
because they are crawling with germs, experts have warned in a new study.
Workplace kitchens and break rooms are also at risk, particularly sinks where staff clean their cups and plates and also microwave door handles.
In a US study, hygienists collected nearly 5,000 swabs from buildings including law firms, insurance offices, call centres and healthcare companies. It found office workers unwittingly spread bugs around on a daily basis.
"No one can avoid it entirely," the Daily Express quoted Richard Millard, of Kimberley-Clark Professional which carried out the research, as saying.
But he added that rigorous hygiene habits and cleaning could reduce office rates of colds, flu and stomach illness by up to 80 per cent.
"This demonstrates that contamination can be spread throughout the workplace when office workers heat up lunch, make coffee or simply type on their keyboards," Study consultant Charles Gerba, professor of microbiology at the University of Arizona, said.
Source:
www.timesofindia.com
29.05.2012
Sleep
disruptions behind fertility problems
Researchers
at Northwestern University disrupted the
circadian rhythms of female mice for five to six days after they mated with
male mice. One group of 18 mice got an extra six hours of light; another 18
mice lost daylight.
By the end of the experiment, only half of the mice with extra daylight had litters. Mice that lost daylight fared worse - only 20 per cent gave birth. Yet 90 per cent of a control group of mice gave birth.
According to the study, these control mice had been exposed to a steady 12 hours of daylight.
Mammals, and even trees, are known to synchronize their internal clocks, which control metabolism and other functions, to cues of night and day. Experts in fertility and circadian rhythms agreed the mouse experiments showed a strong connection between the mouse's internal clock and pregnancy. But what the findings could mean for humans sparked debate.
While the new findings are very solid, the researchers "know very little about the mechanism" that might be at work, said Fred Davis, who studies circadian rhythms and developmental biology as a professor at Northeastern University in Boston.
Keith Summa, lead author of the study, said the details may be different across species, but he suspects that what he found in mice will be relevant to humans. Summa and his colleges pointed to surveys showing that nurses who work night shifts experience a high rate of irregular menstrual periods and other "adverse pregnancy outcomes."
"I think the idea that's really interesting is that (the circadian) timing of the uterus is an important component to either establishing or sustaining early pregnancy," said Summa, a medical student at Northwestern, in Evanston, Ill, said.
However, endocrinologist Dr. Neil Goodman said he doubts there's such a link.
"I wouldn't call the fertility issues in women circadian," Goodman said.
When he worked as a doctor in Boston, Goodman said, he came to expect a surge of female college students who missed periods during final exams. Women came into his office with similar temporary blips after illness, a death in the family or other personal crises.
"Every woman knows that any kind of stress can interrupt her periods," Goodman said.
Source: www.timesofindia.com
29.05.2012
There is
nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so
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