Health Issues

Understanding what makes for a healthy diet and lifestyle has never been more important. Shockingly, obesity has now become a greater global health crisis than hunger, and is the leading cause of disability and chronic illness around the world. On average, the global population is plagued by obesity-related pain and illness during the last 14 years of life, which takes a significant toll on quality of life.

People who live near oil and gas operations are more likely to have early indicators of cardiovascular disease than those who don't, according to a recent study. Cardiovascular disease resulted in 900,000 deaths in 2016, and is the leading cause of mortality in the U.S. and more than 17.4 million Americans now live within one mile of an active oil and gas well.

There may be unsafe drug residues in your beef, pork, chicken and turkey, but the U.S. Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS), a branch of the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), doesn't think you should be alarmed. Safety scientists at Consumer Reports disagree and suggest the residues could potentially be dangerous — and at the very least consumers should be alerted when residues are found and the potential risks should be investigated.

Judy Mikovits, Ph.D., a virologist, researcher and founding research director of the Whittemore Peterson Institute — which researches and treats chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS) in Reno, Nevada — got embroiled in controversy when, in 2009, she was the senior author on a paper which reported that a retrovirus known as xenotropic murine leukemia virus-related virus (XMRV) may play a causal role in CFS and other diseases, including autism.