Seniors World Chronicle

PHILIPPINES: Aging is never an excuse not to look sexy, declares Carmi, 46

2010-03-17T18:30:00.010+05:30

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MANILA, Philippines / The Philippines Star / Lifestyle / Fashion & Beauty / March 17, 2010

She has wowed everyone, stirred attention and inspired a lot of women. Carmi Martin personifies what aging gracefully really means with her body, which is unbelievably sexy.

Yes, she’s 46 years old and yet still possesses a 36-25-36 vital statistics. Who wouldn’t flaunt this figure?

“I’m confident with my body, and I love being in my 40s because I’ve proven that aging is never an excuse not to look sexy,” Carmi shares. Indeed, she even broke boundaries so she could inspire women to look their best and be more confident. This summer, Carmi is the only celebrity in her 40s wearing a swimsuit — a gold, sequined, cutout maillot — on her much-talked-about billboard along EDSA, Guadalupe.

“Honestly, I was hesitant at first,” she says. “I had this feeling that I’m already 46, I don’t want to wear a swimsuit for the billboard. I felt like I was finished with that. But I was convinced because I trust the slimming center that I endorse. I’d like to encourage women and say that even in your 40s, you surely can! Marie France makes it possible,” she says.

For 24 years, Marie France has set the bar higher in the slimming industry by introducing the latest, most innovative and highly advanced non-surgical treatments.

“Their treatments are the best! My body has always been voluptuous since the ’80s, but as I age, my metabolism has slowed down and I started to get flab,” Carmi says. “I tried exercising, but it wasn’t enough. That’s why it’s important to get professional help with Marie France. I couldn’t achieve my desired body by myself.”

So how did she achieve her billboard body? “I really prepared. I knew I could do it. In just three weeks, I’ve effortlessly maintained my 25-inch waistline and my curves. No surgery, no cuts. I love the natural way!” she says.

Carmi proves to the world she can. And you can, too. “Start losing excess weight while you’re still young. If you’re growing older, it’s never too late, too. Say, ‘Yes, I can — only at Marie France!’”

Call Marie France at 894-BODY (2639), Cebu (032) 233-7637 or Pampanga (045) 961-2981 for a free consultation.

Carmi’s favorite Marie France treatments

Want to have Carmi’s flaunt-worthy body? Try her secrets and see the results for yourself.

• Plasti-Dermi Treatment (PDT) – Breaks down and releases trapped fat cells and helps eliminate excess inches.

Carmi says: “My thighs were really my problem area. May bulges talaga. I tried exercising but PDT is the only thing that made them smaller.”

• Endermologie (EDM) – FDA-approved for cellulite reduction. It eliminates stubborn fat, trims flab and smoothes out dimpled skin.

Carmi says: “I really like this for my tummy. There was a time before my taping that I had Endermologie first and a day after, wow, my tummy was flatter!”

• Fat Mobilization System (FMS) – Melts off pounds and helps you burn as much as 2,000 calories in just 25 minutes while you’re comfortably lying down.

Carmi says: “I make sure that I regularly undergo FMS so when I wear a swimsuit, it will turn heads. And they’ll see that what’s on the billboard is real!” [rc]

Carmi shows how to bring sexy back

Be sexy and look fabulous at any age with Carmi’s simple yet very practical tips:

FOOD
She says YES to / She says NO to
Fish and veggies / Too much desserts and soft drinks

SLEEPING HABITS
She says YES to / She says NO to
7 to 8 hours of sleep / Staying up late

DRINKS
She says YES to / She says NO to
Drinking water / Soft drinks

TO BE HAPPY EVERY DAY
She says YES to / She says NO to
Always be confident / Being dowdy and flabby

FOR A BEAUTIFUL BODY
She says YES to / She says NO to
Having a flat tummy / Bulges

TO MAINTAIN MY 25-INCH WAISTLINE
She says YES to / She says NO to
Regular treatments at Marie France / Being lazy and not having my treatments

Copyright © 2009. Philstar

USA: Grandparents often forced to become parents, again

2010-03-17T17:58:00.005+05:30

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JACKSONVILLE, Florida / Florida Times-Union / Opinion / March 17, 2010

By Tonyaa Weathersbee

It's easy to be inspired by Communities in Schools.

For the past two decades, this organization has spearheaded initiatives to stop youths from being so weighed down by the baggage in their lives until they see school as part of that burden, instead of as an opportunity.

It tries to do that through initiatives such as Team Up, which provides enrichment activities for students after school; Achievers for Life, which lends academic help to struggling sixth-graders; and Take Stock in Children, which provides scholarships and mentors to high school students.

Duncan Jackson, however, is also inspiring.

Jackson is grandfather to 9-year-old Jason Jackson. When Jason was only 2, his mother's estranged boyfriend killed himself and her, and shot Jason in the head. The child survived, but the shooting robbed him of full mobility on the right side of his body.

Jackson, however, refused to let a limp rob the boy of his confidence. So he enrolled him in Jump Start Strings, a program offered by Communities in Schools and the Jacksonville Symphony Orchestra which has, according to The Times-Union, not only taught Jason how to play the violin, but how to build his esteem. They focused on what he has, rather than on what he's lost.

Yet, it took someone like Jackson to believe in his grandson enough to find a resource like Jump Start Strings. And increasingly, it seems that more grandparents are going to have to muster the moxie to do what Jackson did.

That's because grandparents rearing grandchildren is a trend that isn't going away.

Census figures show that as of 2005, 5.7 million children were living with grandparents. That's 8 percent of all children in the United States, and an increase of 6 million children since 1990.

That's happening for a number of reasons.

In Jackson's case, the murder of Jason's mother and an absent father left him as the primary caretaker. But a more disturbing reason behind this trend is the drug trade and the mass incarceration that it has produced.

According to research by the Annie E. Casey Foundation, on any given day, more than 1.5 million children have a parent serving time in a state or federal prison. That population has swelled because of tougher sentences for nonviolent drug offenses; offenses that are often rooted in addiction.

Between 1995 and 2005, the number of incarcerated women increased by 57 percent, compared to 34 percent for men. On top of that, 75 percent of imprisoned women are mothers. And more than half of all prisoners, both federal and state, are parents of children younger than 18.

Many of those children wind up living with grandparents.

Then there's abuse and neglect. In many cases, outright abandonment puts grandparents in charge of protecting their grandchildren from the demons that claimed their children.

That's why it's good that Communities in Schools exists.

Too many times, when the conversation turns to at-risk youths, people dismiss such programs as a handout for irresponsible parents who want outsiders to do everything for them. But the truth is that many children who benefit from Communities in Schools, and programs like it, aren't even being reared by their parents. Many are being reared by responsible and mature grandparents who care deeply about them, but who don't have access to resources.

Resources like, in Jason's case, after-school violin lessons.

That's why, as Communities in Schools celebrates its 20th anniversary, it's important to remember grandparents like Jackson. Grandparents who see its programs as more than busy work, but as a way to give at least one generation a chance to live up to its potential, and not be dragged down by pathology. [rc]

Tonyaa Weathersbee is a columnist and a member of the Times-Union's Editorial Board. Her columns have earned numerous state and national journalism awards, as well as several community awards, since appearing on the Times-Union's opinion pages in 1998. Tonyaa has also traveled throughout the Caribbean and Latin America to do journalistic work. A resident of Historic Springfield, Tonyaa is a graduate of Raines High School and the University of Florida.

E-Mail: tonyaa.weathersbee@jacksonville.com

© Copyright The Florida Times-Union

USA: How One Can Embrace Old Age with a Positive Attitude

2010-03-17T17:31:00.005+05:30

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BOOKS

New Book Reveals How One Can Embrace Old Age with a Positive Attitude

Seeing Life as a Glorious Voyage

By Donna Devall

WASHINGTON DC / Vocus/PRWEB / March 17, 2010

At what age can a person begin thinking of himself or herself as part of the older generation? The transition occurs differently for each of us but for author Donna Devall, it began the day she turned sixty. She shares her views in The Power of Positive Aging, her new book released through Xlibris.

Turning sixty seemed to signify a huge change in how the author looked at her life. She experienced an internal shift—a shift in her own worldview. In The Power of Positive Aging, Devall reveals a multitude of stories and observations that support the notion that getting older has distinct benefits. While not denying or minimizing the challenges that aging can present, the author maintains that it is entirely possible to approach old age with a positive, even embracing attitude.

The author’s work with elderly clients and their families has contributed to her strong conviction that getting older can be a boon and a privilege. Devall shares the wealth of her experience with the amazing older people in her clientele. They have shown her that keeping an open mind, finding ways to cope with change, accepting loss with grace and figuring out ways to deal with dependency are all part of constructing a positive attitude towards the inevitable challenges of living to be old. She invites readers to discover how to see life as a glorious voyage.

About the Author

Donna Devall has been engaged with elderly clients and their families for over twenty years in her practice of psychotherapy and care management. She also has combined her musical skills with her therapy background to develop a unique group therapy practice with hundreds of participants in various group living situations, including retirement facilities, assisted living and nursing homes. Ms. Devall has a Masters in Social Work from Catholic University in Washington, D.C. She has been a licensed clinical social worker for more than two decades and she is an active member of professional groups focused on the needs of the elderly.

The Power of Positive Aging * by Donna Devall
Seeing Life as a Glorious Voyage
Publication Date: March 11, 2010
Paperback; $15.99; 180 pages
Hardback; $22.99; 180 pages

Description

APPROACHING SIXTY When is the time that we realign our picture of ourselves and move from thinking of ourselves as young to thinking of ourselves as part of the older generation? There’s no doubt that this transition occurs differently for each person. Often we may not notice the exact time until we can look back. For me (looking back), I pinpoint that time as the days when my sixtieth birthday crept closer and closer. From that time on, I have experienced an internal shift—a shift in my own worldview. Turning sixty seemed to signify a huge change in how I looked at my life. I still looked ahead but began to know that I had already lived the larger portion of my life. It felt like time to take stock, time to ponder 2 Donna Devall how I felt about my own aging and aging in general. How did it feel to think of myself as older? The truth is, I’ve had a terrific reverence for and appreciation of older people for a long time. These feelings have been affirmed over and over in the past twenty years that I have worked with the elderly and their families. So the idea of joining their ranks has seemed like a privilege. Getting older carries with it the wonderful chance to continue one’s growth. What a marvel that can be! The specifics of my sixtieth birthday celebration seem particularly pertinent to my own way of moving out of middle age and into life as an older person. I tend to come on like gangbusters. Because I love celebrating, I began to think of how I might want to mark my sixtieth. I considered some of the options: A trip with my husband and adult children? A party with close friends? It wasn’t until we were on a canal trip in the south of France with two other couples that I found the answer to this question. [rc]

For more information on The Power of Positive Aging, log on to Xlibris.com

UK: Innovation is key to Mario Kreft’s Wrexham care home business

2010-03-17T14:29:00.000+05:30

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WREXHAM, North Wales / Daily Post / Business News / March 17, 2010

By Eryl Crump, Daily Post

INNOVATION and development have been the key priorities for an award winning care home company which celebrates its 25th anniversary this year.

Mario Kreft and his wife Gill formed Wrexham-based Pendine Park when they were unable to find suitable residential care for their elderly grandparents.

The couple now run six care homes, a domiciliary care company and a teaching care centre. Mr Kreft is chairman of the North Wales Care Homes Association and the honorary chief executive and a founder member of Care Forum Wales.

Pendine Park already employs 500 people in north east Wales. Bodlondeb, a new, pioneering dementia unit being built at the company’s main site, will create another 100 jobs. A similar number could be created if plans for another scheme get the go-ahead at Caernarfon.

Mr Kreft said: “I think it’s fair to say that when you’ve had a personal situation or experience, you see things in a different light.

“It was many years ago in our case but it taught us that you need the very best services possible to meet your relatives’ needs.

“We were in a position where we couldn’t really find those services so we decided to take matters into our own hands and provide the sort of care that we felt was required for our grandparents, providing us with peace of mind and our grandparents with dignity and respect.”

His grandmother, who had Alzheimer’s and whose home in Rhyl was called Bodlondeb, has inspired the Wrexham centre. The unit will be divided into eight small, family-like units so that the residents receive individual care and attention while benefiting from the back-up of a larger organisation.

He added: “My grandmother was a guiding light when I was growing up – she is the inspiration for the new Bodlondeb. Bodlondeb is good news for dementia sufferers and it’s good news for the economy of north east Wales because there will be a significant number of permanent jobs created here.

“The whole concept will provide more than 100 jobs, based primarily around the centre of excellence, and we hope to expand the service through our domiciliary care service, Independent Living Options.

“This is a unique development because we have looked outside the box. Our aim is to provide a joined up approach providing registered care practitioners in the community and our teaching care centre will be training our own staff and assisting partners and families to care for their loved ones in their own homes.

“There is undoubtedly a great need for these services. There is no question we need more facilities both in the community and in care homes and within the NHS for people with dementia.

“What we are aiming for is the best of both worlds – the feel and scale of a family home allied to the expertise and resources of a larger organisation.”

In January Mr Kreft announced plans for a £4m centre on the site of the former Bryn Seiont community hospital in Caernarfon, to be modelled on the Bodlondeb centre.

To ensure suitable staff for the centres and care homes Mr Kreft has signed an agreement with Glyndr University, Wrexham. It will enable health and social care students to go on placements to Pendine Park with staff from the care organisation studying at the university.

Pendine Park has employed an artist in residence at its care homes for more than 15 years and the Hallé orchestra conducted a series of creative music workshops with residents.

Mr Kreft said: “It’s important to remember that elderly people in care are still people. They still have lives and need to be stimulated.” [rc]

Copyright © 2010 Trinity Mirror North West & North Wales Limited.

USA: New Focus on Averting Errors - Hospital Culture

2010-03-16T19:21:00.000+05:30

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NEW YORK, NY / The Wall Street Journal / Business / Health / March 16, 2010

The Informed Patient

By Laura Landro

Errors made by doctors, nurses and other medical caregivers cause 44,000 to 98,000 deaths a year. Hospital infections, many considered preventable, take another 100,000 lives. And mistakes involving medications injure 1.3 million patients annually in the U.S., according to the Food and Drug Administration.

Julie Thao looks at Regina Young, mother of Jasmine Gant, as Ms. Young prepares to read her statement to the court during a hearing in 2006 about her medical error that led to Ms. Gant's death. John Maniaci/Wisconsin State Journal.

Hospitals are taking what might seem like a surprising approach to confronting the problem: Not only are they trying to improve safety and reduce malpractice claims, they're also coming up with procedures for handling—and even consoling—staffers who make inadvertent mistakes.

The National Quality Forum, a government-advisory body that sets voluntary safety standards for hospitals, has developed a Care of the Caregiver standard, calling on hospitals to treat traumatized staffers involved in errors as patients requiring care, then involving them in the investigation of what went wrong if their behavior was not found to be reckless or intentional. Just Culture, a model developed by engineer David Marx, stresses finding a middle ground between a blame-free culture, which attributes all errors to system failure and says no individual is held accountable, and overly punitive culture, where individuals are blamed for all mistakes.

A new study published in the April edition of the Joint Commission Journal on Quality and Patient Safety, which examines one fatal medical mistake to analyze what went wrong, shows how assigning blame for errors can be a murky exercise.

Four years ago, nurse Julie Thao mistook a bag of epidural painkiller for penicillin and hooked it up to an IV line that pumped the painkiller—meant to be injected into the spine later—into the bloodstream of Jasmine Gant, a 16-year-old who was about to deliver a baby at St. Mary's Hospital in Madison, Wis. The teen's heart collapsed. Her baby was delivered successfully by emergency Caesarean section, but Ms. Gant didn't survive. Ms. Thao says she was fired from the hospital after the death, and she was later prosecuted by the state for criminal negligence. Ms. Thao's case has helped galvanize efforts to ensure that caregivers are treated fairly—without absolving them of responsibility for risky behavior.

The study, led by researchers at the non-profit Institute for Safe Medication Practices, concludes that while Ms. Thao consciously bypassed multiple safety procedures, there were also a host of system flaws that allowed and even encouraged her to do so, contributing to the fatal error.

Researchers found that Ms. Thao failed to put an identification bracelet on her patient or use the hospital's bar-coding system, designed to match the right medication to the right patient. But the bar-coding system had glitches, and nurses hadn't been adequately trained on it, so they often bypassed it.

Both medications—which looked alike—were brought into the patient's room before orders were given, a violation of policy. Fatigue increased Ms. Thao's likelihood of making a mistake, the study found. Ms Thao had worked two consecutive eight-hour shifts the day before and then slept in the hospital before coming on duty again the next morning, but there were no rules at the hospital to prevent her from being overworked.

In editorials accompanying the study, patient-safety experts, including Charles Denham, co-chairman of a National Quality Forum safe-practices committee, and Harvard University health-policy professor Lucian Leape are harshly critical of the way Ms. Thao was fired by the hospital and then left to fend for herself with no income and no financial resources to defend herself in charges later brought by the state. "We all believe that Julie should be held accountable for her behavior, but she didn't receive support from her organization or treatment that was just," says Dr. Denham. "It is clear that other nurses might have made the same error due to the social conditions and technical systems in the hospital.

Officials at St. Mary's, which paid $1.9 million to settle a malpractice suit brought by Ms. Gant's family, say they treated Ms. Thao properly. The hospital's president, Frank Byrne declines to discuss the specifics of Ms. Thao's dismissal, but says the hospital was supportive; when it learned the state planned to bring criminal charges, Dr. Byrne says he did everything he could to stop it and appeared at court proceedings to lend moral support. He included his own commentary in the patient-safety journal, describing safety steps taken after Ms. Gant's death, including limiting work hours for nurses. "We never attempted to shirk acknowledgment of our system issues," he says.

In Ms. Thao's case, under a plea agreement, felony charges were amended to two misdemeanor counts. Afterward, her nursing license was suspended and she was barred for several years from working for any hospital that accepts federal funding from Medicare.

Safety advocates and nursing groups also question the use of criminal charges brought against nurses and doctors who make unintentional mistakes, saying they set a chilling precedent. "Criminal accusations against health care providers who work in a system set up to fail are extreme," says Sue Sheridan, co-founder of Consumers Advancing Patient Safety. "By the same token, there has to be some accountability when families have suffered a tragic loss."

Dr. Denham took Ms. Thao on as a patient-safety fellow in his own medical-research concern, TMIT, for two years. He now retains her to do contract patient-safety research. Ms. Thao, who was briefly hospitalized for depression after the event, says she considered taking her own life. She says her patient-safety work has helped her to cope with her despair over her errors.

"Every hospital in America is wrestling with how to hold practitioners accountable for key safety behaviors," says Mr. Marx, whose company, Outcome Engineering, consults with hospitals, states and nursing boards on the Just Culture Model and helped train 20,000 employees at St. Mary's after the Thao case. It's designed to "address risky behaviors before they lead to the death of a patient," he says, coaching those who make risky decisions, such as failing to wash hands before touching patients or skipping important checks in administering medications.

"We know just punishing human error does not improve safety," says St. Mary's Dr. Byrne. "But we have to separate unavoidable error from reckless behavior and unjustifiable risk." [rc]

Laura Landro
E-Mail: laura.landro@wsj.com

Copyright 2009 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.

USA: Aging is a hard pill to swallow

2010-03-16T19:15:00.013+05:30

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SAN LUIS OBISPO, California / The Tribune / Living / Family-Relationships / March 16, 2010

By Lori Borgman | McClatchy-Tribune News Service

We knew this day would come eventually the day our bodies turned on us.

We were married for five years before we ever owned a bottle of aspirin.

Now all of a sudden we are people who "travel with medication."

We were packing for a long weekend when the husband set out a prescription pill bottle an entire 30-day supply of an anti-inflammatory for his tennis elbow.

"Do you really need to take the whole bottle?" I ask. "Maybe you could just put four in a baggie."

"What about airport security? Do they allow that?"

The husband is a very by-the-letter person, all about labels and being legal.

"I think they have a special line for people with medications," I say. "If they don't like how you packed your meds, they make you swallow them all right there on the spot."

The husband is only mildly amused, although I think I see his elbow laughing.

He turns the tables and asks how I plan on packing my medication.

He is referring to the fact that a bone density scan revealed that my bones are far more aged than the rest of me. It was my destiny Caucasian, small frame and family history.

Sally Field is my new best friend. Or should I say was.

Do you know why she sits in the Boniva commercial wearing that T-shirt and yoga pants with one leg folded way under the other leg? Because she is in excruciating pain and cannot move. That's what the drug did for me. I didn't feel old before I took it, but two days after taking it, I was ready to get one of those medic-alert necklaces and do some on-line shopping for a walker. Every joint in my body ached.

What I do travel with are calcium chews, vitamin supplements that are the color of mud and flavored with a hint of Georgia clay. I pretend they are Tootsie Rolls, as I am less likely to gag on them that way.

The doctor said that, unfortunately, obesity is actually one of the best protections against osteoporosis. Finally things were looking up.

"You're saying I should gain 100 pounds?" I asked, perhaps displaying a little too much enthusiasm.

"No, I'm saying you don't want to lose what little padding you have. Your weight is just fine; keep it where it is."

"Write me a script for an anti-depressant, will you, doctor?"

"Why?"
--------------------------------------------
Laff it over! Courtesy: FloridaDude.com

"Because when I leave here I'm going to be depressed. The first time in 15 years someone says my weight is fine and I don't have a witness or a tape recorder."

At least I am not alone.

When my literary agent hit 50, she said she weighed exactly the same as when she was 18 - but all of it was in a different place.

Another friend claims that for everything to be where it used to be, she'd have to walk on her hands.

Aging is like skiing downhill. Once you start, it's hard to stop

Here, have a Tootsie Roll. [rc]

----------------------------------------
Lori Borgman is the author of the humorous holiday read "Catching Christmas."
Reach her at lori@loriborgman.com

Copyright: SanLuisObispo.com

UK: Net offers lifeline for nonliners

2010-03-16T15:33:00.007+05:30

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LONDON, England / BBC News / UK / Technology / March 16, 2010

By Jane Wakefield
Technology reporter, BBC News

Ten years ago a job seeker would have gone to a job centre to find work, a hobbyist might have joined an evening class to pursue a love of art and a person struggling to pay their bills may have turned to social services. Now they go online.

There is still a digital divide in the UK with 20% of the population - about 10 million people - still having no experience of using computers or the internet.

But increasingly people are seeing a value in technology and many are getting their first taste of the internet at one of 6,000 UK Online centres dotted around the country.

Heeley Online Centre in Sheffield is typical, and its daily sessions are always busy.

John Smylie, an 80-year-old retired engineer, is a frequent visitor.

He bought a computer in December after "negotiating" with his wife but quickly realised he didn't really know how to use it.

"I was at the wheelbarrow stage. It was going in every direction apart from the one I wanted it to go in," he said.

What he wanted to do was some quite sophisticated web browsing.

"I wanted to look at work from the Whitbread Gallery and the Louvre and I'd heard about a man on YouTube who did practical art demonstrations," he said.

He is now learning how to use e-mail and wants to be able to send pictures to his two sons in Australia.

"I've discovered it isn't called a photograph, it is called an attachment. You have to learn a whole new vocabulary," he said.

But it is worth it, he thinks.

"It opens up a lot of windows on the world. I am not just looking at art galleries but other information on the cultures in other countries. It was a narrow world that I was brought up in and now I have a much wider picture of the world," he said.

Suzanne Gambles has more dramatic praise for the centre, claiming it has "saved her life".

Initially it provided her with an e-mail account which allowed her to communicate with her utility company over bills she was unable to pay.

But, after years out of work and without any self-confidence, she also used it to build social skills and find a job. She has recently started work as a cleaner.

"It has changed my life amazingly. Without it I wouldn't have sorted out the bills, I wouldn't have got a job. For me it's the best thing in the area," she said.

And it hasn't just been the big things in her life that the net has helped with.

"I saw a bird on my doorstep and I came here and we typed in the details and found out it was a woodpecker," she said.

Social help

----------------------------------------------------

A season of reports exploring the extraordinary power of the internet, including:

* Digital giants - top thinkers in the business on the future of the web

* Mapping the internet - a visual representation of the spread of the web over the last 20 years

* Global Voices - the BBC links up with an online community of bloggers around the world

* What is SuperPower?

-------------------------------------------------
Maxine Bowler runs the Heeley online centre and has recently successfully bid for an extra £45,000 in funding out of a pot of £32 million made available to UK Online centres.

She plans to use the money to extend the number of outreach projects she does in the area.

Currently she works with 15 sheltered housing units in the city as well as running classes for people with learning difficulties on a nearby estate.

These classes are not without their difficulties - laptops do not always work, access is not easy to get and, currently the centre is relying on a set of dongles - devices which allow machines to connect to the internet over a 3G mobile connection - which don't always connect.

The BBC went with Ms Bowler on her first visit to the Park View Lodge sheltered housing unit.

The new recruits were keen but the registration process - to a course known as myguide - was very slow and in the hour's session none of them actually got beyond the myguide site.

The myguide course has been criticised by some as not being the best introduction to the web although UK Online Centres report a 98% satisfaction rate among those who use the training scheme.

Getting older people online is one of the main priorities of the UK's Digital Champion Martha Lane Fox. It is estimated that only 30% of those of retirement age are online.

Residents of sheltered housing units in Sheffield actively voted to boost their computer literacy skills which illustrates how computers are starting to have an impact on the traditional turned-off older generation.

"The reps from each centre had to vote for which activity they wanted. We were up against chairobic classes and Age Concern who were offering day trips and other activities. I thought trips out would win but they chose us," explained Ms Bowler.

One resident, 63 year old Chris Garrett, is very computer-literate and has his own PC on which he is writing about his life as a singer with sixties rock and roll group Raye Duvall and the Rockmates. But others had never touched a computer in their lives.

Irene struggled to see the screen

Mr Garrett is keen to persuade his partner, Kathy Skinner, to give it a go and both of them see the internet as a powerful tool in their campaign to get better living conditions for older people.

82-year-old John Beachell has several good reasons to go online. He wants to e-mail his sister in Melbourne who he is no longer able to visit in person as well as explore his own colourful past as an actor with parts in films including the British comedy Brassed Off.

He doesn't seem particularly impressed by his first taste of computers.

"What I've learnt today is not a lot and I'll have forgotten it again in 24 hours," he said.

85-year-old Irene Thorpe has never used a computer but comes with her own set of skills as she used to be a typist.

Her issue is that she "can't see the screen very well" and she finds the keyboard fiddly.

She is not entirely sure why she wants to go online although contact with her grandson, a footballer with Sheffield Wednesday's youth team, is a big incentive.

For residents in the sheltering housing unit as well as at the day centre which caters for people with learning difficulties, the classes have a value beyond the key skills they are teaching.

"Loneliness is one of our biggest problems. This doesn't replace face to face contact but it makes a huge difference to people's lives," said Ms Bowler. [rc]

© BBC MMX

USA: Erectile dysfunction is strong predictor of fatal heart ailments, study finds

2010-03-16T15:10:00.006+05:30

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LOS ANGELES, California / Los Angeles Times / US & World / Health / March 16, 2010

Erectile dysfunction is strong predictor of fatal heart ailments, study finds

By Thomas H. Maugh II

For the first time, researchers have shown that erectile dysfunction is a strong predictor of the likelihood that men will die of heart disease.

Men who suffer from the problem, which some consider more an emotional than a physical issue, are twice as likely to succumb to cardiovascular disease or heart attacks as those who do not have the problem, German researchers reported Monday in Circulation: Journal of the American Heart Assn.

Researchers have known for years that there is a link between erectile dysfunction, commonly abbreviated as ED, and heart disease, said Dr. Sahil Parikh, an interventional cardiologist from University Hospitals Case Medical Center in Cleveland who was not involved in the study. "But now there is pretty clear evidence that there is a substantially increased risk of heart attack and death when patients have erectile dysfunction."

The results are probably not too surprising, added Dr. Robert Kloner, a cardiologist at USC's Keck School of Medicine, "because arteries in the penis are smaller, so atherosclerosis shows up there sooner," perhaps three to four years before the onset of cardiovascular disease.

The take-home message, both experts said, is that when a patient seeks treatment for ED, typically from a general practitioner, he should be given a full physical work-up to look for heart disease and referred to a cardiologist.

"When they are treated aggressively early, we can prevent heart attacks and stroke and they can have many years added to their lives," Parikh said.

Existing guidelines for treating men with ED from the Princeton Consensus Conference already state that "a man with ED and no cardiac symptoms is a cardiac (or vascular) patient until proven otherwise." Kloner, a coauthor of those guidelines, said that when the guidelines are updated this year, they will probably carry a stronger recommendation that a patient presenting with ED get a cardiovascular examination.

Dr. Michael Bohm, a cardiologist at Germany's Saarland University, and his colleagues studied 1,519 men from 13 countries who were involved in a study of two drugs to treat cardiovascular disease. The men were also queried about their ED at the beginning of the study, two years into it and at the end at five years. A full 55% of the men had ED at the beginning of the trial, nearly double the normal incidence of about 30% in the population at large.

The team reported that, in the five years of follow-up, men with ED were 1.9 times as likely to die from heart disease, twice as likely to have a heart attack, 1.2 times as likely to be hospitalized for heart failure and 1.1 times more likely to have a stroke. The risks increased with the severity of the ED.

Disappointingly, the two drugs tested in the study, ramipril and telmisartan, did not improve the course of the ED.

That's not surprising, said Dr. Peter Pelikan, a cardiologist at Saint John's Health Center in Santa Monica, "because it takes years and years and years to get any resorption of cholesterol" that would reduce blockage of the penile arteries. "The study was too small and too short to see that."

Many men with ED see a general practitioner or a urologist to get treatment and are prescribed drugs like Viagra or Cialis, Bohm said in a statement. "The drug works and the patient doesn't show up any more. These men are being treated for ED, but not the underlying cardiovascular disease. A whole segment of men is being placed at risk." [rc]

Thomas Maugh
E-Mail: thomas.maugh@latimes.com

Copyright © 2010, The Los Angeles Times

UK: "Individuals should pay toward personal care in old age"

2010-03-16T12:17:00.001+05:30

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LONDON, England / The Guardian / Society / Care / March 16, 2010

Universal system paid for by taxation would disproportionately benefit the very wealthy, thinktank warns

By Randeep Ramesh,
Social affairs editor, The Guardian

The government has been told not to consider setting up a tax funded universal personal care service for older people, because it would disproportionately benefit the very wealthy.

Related news report
'Middle class pensioners will be spared spiralling care bills'

Currently, pensioners with more than £23,000 in savings and assets have to pay the full cost with no financial help from the state. Photo: PHOTOLIBRARY/Telegraph

The King's Fund thinktank has waded into the minefield which has seen angry exchanges between all three parties, by arguing for a "partnership" where the Treasury funds half of old age care costs, and the remaining bill is paid for by "a £1 matching government contribution for every £2 individuals pay themselves".

The system would also have a safety net for the poor. It would not be cheap, and is projected to cost the government £10.1bn in 2015, rising to £15.5bn by 2026 – 90% more than the existing system would cost in 2015. But it would benefit people with modest means, the fund said, "as they would no longer face the 'cliff-edge' of the current means-tested system if they have savings or assets of £23,000 or more".

Since 1997 adult social care has enjoyed a 53% real-terms increase in resources, yet the impact of demographic and funding pressures has meant an ever tighter rationing of services, with the "safety net of public support cast even higher".

Richard Humphries, the lead author of a King's Fund report, Securing Good Care for More People, published today, said that the existing system was a bargain-basement version of care which had seen councils contain demand by restricting access. By 2006, fewer households were receiving supported home care than in 1997, and fewer older people got publicly funded care at home than did in 2003. Three-quarters of councils now treat old people only if they have "substantial or critical" needs. "We have means-tested the soul out of the system," said Humphries. "The debate has become about the 45,000 people forced to sell their homes to get care, but there are 1.8 million people who use adult social services."

The report says that Britain is now the only rich country to "restrict access to publicly funded social care only to poorer people"; reforms in Austria, Germany and Japan have widened access to their provision. However, Humphries said it would be wrong to assume that this meant Britain needed universal free care funded out of taxation. This, the report says, would "disproportionately benefit wealthier people at the point of need". The question was a political and moral one, he argued. "Why should a cleaner on £8,000 a year pay taxes to fund the care of a person who lives in a £400,000 property that will be left to their children but does not have to find a penny?"

The fund says individuals should contribute to cost of care in old age, as there is a "growing awareness" of the affluence of the newly retiring baby-boomer generation who will control £2tr in housing wealth by 2026; otherwise we would have "by far the richest cohort in history becoming the first to receive universal free care ... paid for, to a significant extent, by the most indebted cohort in modern times". [rc]

© Guardian News and Media Limited 2010

MALAYSIA: Senior citizens will soon get letter of appreciation with cheque

2010-03-16T05:18:00.001+05:30

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SELANGOR, Penang / The Star / Nation / March 16, 2010

Senior citizens’ reward comes with letter from Penang Govt

By Manjit Kaur

GEORGE TOWN: Some 80,000 senior citizens will receive their first annual payment of RM100 and a letter from Chief Minister Lim Guan Eng listing out the state government’s achievements.

According to a statement from the Chief Minister’s office, the letter and the money would be sent after the launch of a senior citizen appreciation programme on March 21.
In the letter, Lim said the RM100 reward was a symbolic present from the state government for the contribution and efforts of senior citizens that had enabled the state to progress.

“The state government is disappointed with the political enemies who have tried to sabotage the programme by claiming that the cash given is tantamount to corruption.

“We will continue with the programme, and we are ready to face any investigation or action by the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission,” he added.

The letter ends with a poem.

In an immediate reaction, state MCA deputy chief Eng Hiap Boon advised Lim to stop the “publicity stunt” and start working.

“It has been a year since Lim and others have been doing public relations work on the RM100 reward. The Federal Government through the Welfare Department hands out a higher amount to the disabled and single mothers, but it does not go around making an issue out of it.

“I am not saying it is not a good job. The state government can even increase it to RM1,000, but there is no necessity to go overboard,” he added.

State Gerakan chairman Datuk Dr Teng Hock Nan said the time had come for Lim to stop campaigning and begin working.

The reward programme was announced during the first anniversary of Pakatan’s rule in Penang in March last year.

Penang-registered voters who are aged 60 and above from March 9 this year are eligible for the reward. [rc]

By Manjit Kaur
E-Mail: manjit@thestar.com.my

Copyright © 1995-2010 Star Publications (M) Bhd

USA: Rare disorder makes people feel off balance for weeks or months

2010-03-16T04:01:00.000+05:30

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WASHINGTON, DC / The Washington Post / Health / March 16, 2010

By Diane Daniel
Special to The Washington Post

When Claudette Broyles tries to describe to friends how she feels, she likens herself to a balloon on a string, tied to a post.

"I'm constantly rocking and swaying, but the level changes," said Broyles, 60, of Woodstock, Va. "If I'm having an average day, then it's like I'm a balloon in a mild breeze. If I'm having a bad day, it's like it's really windy."

I hadn't heard the balloon analogy before, but I could relate.

Broyles and I suffer from mal de debarquement syndrome (MdDS), an uncommon balance disorder that one researcher describes as "motion hallucination." For weeks, months or even years at a time, we feel that we are rocking, bobbing, swaying, even though diagnostic tests for balance, hearing and vision show up normal. The name for the illness is French for "disembarkation sickness," so called because it most frequently occurs after being on a boat.

Of course, many people have experienced the swaying sensations that occur just after a boat trip. But for those with MdDS, that feeling doesn't let up; it persists with varying degrees of severity, causing everything from clumsiness to the inability to walk without some kind of support.

Just how many sufferers there are is unknown, says neurologist Yoon-Hee Cha, who this year launched a study funded in part by the National Institutes of Health, the first time federal money has been used for research into the syndrome.

"We don't know how many people suffer from MdDS since many people are not able to get the right diagnosis," she said. "Until there is more widespread familiarity among physicians, we won't know for sure." She isn't sure who gave MdDS its name, but she believes it was first diagnosed in the late 1980s.

Cha, of UCLA's David Geffen School of Medicine, uses neuro-imaging to try to identify the location in the brain affected during MdDS episodes, with the hope of finding a treatment and a cure.

"It's a real disorder, even though patients don't look sick. It's still very under-recognized among physicians, so a lot of patients are educating their doctors about it," she said.

Broyles is going through her fifth round of MdDS in 28 years. Most episodes, she believes, were triggered by boats, but the latest occurred after a turbulent flight from England. The first two subsided within a few weeks, and the other two within six months. Her most recent? It has lasted eight years -- so far. The disorder prompted her to move from Fairfax to slower-paced Woodstock and has altered her life in many areas, she said.

As for me, I'm on my third bout in as many decades. This time, my brain has been at sea for half a year.

Mercifully, the symptoms disappear when we're in motion, so driving is usually a relief. But they worsen in confined spaces -- for example in a shower, where we have to hold on to walls and bars to stay steady.

Another sufferer, Marilyn Josselyn, 73, of Audubon, Pa., has had only one episode, but it has lasted a dozen years and counting.

Hers set in after a week-long river cruise in Russia. "When we got back from the cruise, I was rocking in my head and was off balance, and I couldn't concentrate," she said.

While I can still push through a work day, both Josselyn and Broyles can no longer muster enough concentration to hold jobs.

Josselyn felt fortunate to not have to fight her way through layers of uninformed doctors, as many have.

"I went to my family doctor, who sent me to a balance clinic. I was lucky because I saw a doctor who had heard of mal de debarquement. A lot of doctors still don't even believe in it."

Thanks in large part to Josselyn and her husband, Roger, that is starting to change. In 2003, they started the nonprofit MdDS Balance Disorder Foundation and an associated online support group. Through donations and grants, the foundation is also funding research in hopes of finding a cause and cure for MdDS.

Using the online support group, sufferers, who are often misdiagnosed, are sharing information about symptoms, possible treatments and doctors who are knowledgeable and empathetic about the syndrome.

One of those is David Zee, a professor of neurology at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine who treats patients with vestibular (inner ear balance) disorders, including MdDS.

"This is one condition where it's more common that the patients diagnose themselves and then tell the doctor," he said. "It's a fascinating disorder where the brain is trying to figure out: Am I moving, or is the world moving?"

Two signs that a patient has mal de debarquement, he said, are if they feel a rocking sensation for weeks or months starting after a cruise and if they're fine when driving but not when standing, walking or sitting.

"In most cases, the symptoms are so stereotypical that it can't be anything else," Zee said. Furthermore, most sufferers are women, many between ages 20 and 50, leading some to believe hormonal levels are involved.

Some sufferers say they have gotten relief from their symptoms by taking clonazepam, a long-acting benzodiazepine used to treat anxiety, but there's no definitive treatment.

"The good news is that mal de debarquement usually subsides on its own," Zee said.

Anecdotal evidence suggests that most sufferers feel the rocking for a few weeks to a few months.

Melissa Choate, 32, of Fairfax, fits that description. Her first case of MdDS began three years ago during a week-long Caribbean cruise. Within six weeks, the rocking was gone.

Choate's second and latest episode, which subsided after seven weeks, started during her honeymoon in Aruba in early January.

"One day we went snorkeling from a catamaran, and the next day I felt the waviness. It was minimal, but later it got worse. For a few weeks, it was like I felt a G-force, where I felt my stomach drop and the sensation of being pulled backward."

She worries about recurrences and has an appointment with a balance specialist in Baltimore.

"What scares me the most is if you've had it once, you're more susceptible to having it again, and each time it gets a little longer," she said.

That's what happened to Broyles, the five-time sufferer, who only recently learned about the online support group.

"It's amazing how all our stories are alike," she said. "I feel like I'm not crazy after all, that there are people out there who understand it." [rc]

Daniel is a freelance writer based in Durham, N.C.

USA: Some older ER patients are getting the wrong medicines, study finds

2010-03-12T19:42:00.003+05:30

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ANN ARBOR, Michigan / University of Michigan Health System / Neurology / March 12, 2010

Certain pain relievers and antihistamines are among most common drugs used in emergency visits, in spite of known risks to those over age 65

A University of Michigan study recently published in Academic Emergency Medicine says that it is common for patients 65 and older to receive potentially inappropriate medications when treated in an emergency room.

Nearly 19.5 million older patients, or 16.8 percent of eligible emergency visits from 2000-2006, received one or more potentially inappropriate medications. The large sample of approximately 470,000 emergency department and outpatient clinic visits, corresponding to a national estimate of about 1.5 billion total visits, allowed the researchers to determine the extent of the problem nationwide.

“There are certain medications that probably are not good to give to older adults because the potential benefits are outweighed by potential problems,” says lead author, William J. Meurer, M.D., M.S., assistant professor, U-M Departments of Emergency Medicine and Neurology.

Patient receiving medication

Researchers looked at a nationwide sample of emergency visits using data from the National Hospital Ambulatory Medical Care Survey, to see how many patients aged 65 and older sent home from the ED were prescribed potentially inappropriate medications.

Ten medications accounted for 86.5 percent of PIMs used in the ED. The five most common ones were promethazine, ketorolac, propoxyphene, meperidine, and diphenhydramine; and two of these – promethazine and ketorolac – accounted for nearly 40 percent.

Meurer suggested that further efforts are needed to educate doctors about the suitability of certain medications for older adults.

He also says the study showed that prescribing inappropriate medications was less likely to occur if a resident or intern was involved in the treatment, probably due to the fact that younger doctors have had recent training about medications.

There was substantial regional and hospital type (teaching vs. non-teaching) variability. PIMs were less likely to occur in visits to hospitals in the Northeast and twice as likely in other parts of the country. And receiving a potentially inappropriate medication was more likely to occur at for-profit hospitals.

The study did not explore the possibility of medication interactions, so it is possible that the potential harm by medications is underestimated.

Meurer offers the following advice to patients:

1. Make sure you talk to your primary care physician, either during or after your ED visit.

2. Know what medications and supplements you are taking and make sure the nurses and doctors at the ED know.

3. Talk to the ED doctors and nurses about how long the medicines they have given you will affect you.

4. Ask for a list of all medications that you received while at the ED before you leave the ED for home or to go to a bed in the hospital. The list should include information on the possible side effects of those medicines.

5. If you leave the ED and then have an adverse event caused by medication, contact your physician immediately or go back to the emergency department.

6. Be proactive with your pharmacy and make sure you understand what you are taking.

Additional authors: Tommy A. Potti; Kevin A. Kerber, M.D., M.S.; Comilla Sasson, M.D., M.S.; Michelle L. Macy, M.D., Brady T. West, M.S.; and Eve D. Losman, M.D. All are part of the University of Michigan Health System.

Funding: The authors have no conflicts of interest to report. Meurer and Potti received support from the Summer Research Training in Aging for Medical Students program from the National Institutes of Health, National Institutes of Aging.

Reference: Academic Emergency Medicine 2010; 17: 231-237

© Copyright 2008 Regents of the University of Michigan
[rc]

CHINA: Smoking years key factor in lower Parkinson's risk

2010-03-11T08:18:00.001+05:30

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BEIJING, China / People's Daily / Life & Culture / Health / March 11, 2010

Several studies have shown that smokers have a lower risk of developing Parkinson's disease. A new study shows that it's how many years of smoking a person has under their belt -- rather than how much they smoke every day -- that matters.

"Smoking is bad for you and no one should advocate smoking just for prevention of Parkinson's," Dr. Honglei Chen of the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences in Research Triangle Park, North Carolina, one of the study's authors, emphasized in comments to Reuters Health. But the findings could help researchers who are trying to figure out the underlying cause of the disease, Chen added.

"Ultimately it's going to take a multidisciplinary approach to understand this question."

Chen's team looked at 305,468 men and women aged 50 and older enrolled in the National Institutes of Health-American Association of Retired Persons Diet and Health Study. Over 10 years of follow-up, 1,662 developed Parkinson's disease, or about one-half of one percent.

The researchers found that the more years that a person had smoked, the lower their risk of Parkinson's disease. For example, past smokers who had smoked at least a pack a day for less than 10 years were 4 percent less likely to develop Parkinson's disease than non-smokers; the risk was 22 percent lower in those who'd smoked for 10 to 19 years; 36 percent lower with 20 to 29 years of smoking; and 41 percent lower with 30 years or more.

The risk of developing Parkinson's disease did not change based on how many cigarettes a person smoked each day.

When the researchers looked back at study participants' early smoking behavior, they found that the people who developed Parkinson's disease were actually less likely to be smokers at a given age than those who didn't develop Parkinson's, and were able to quit sooner; this raises the possibility that Parkinson's patients were somehow less vulnerable to the addictive effects of smoking, the researchers say.

Chen and his colleagues argue that nicotine or other chemicals from tobacco are unlikely to offer a useful way to treat Parkinson's disease. Studies, they note, have shown that smoking does not slow the progression of disease once Parkinson's develops nor does it reduce the risk of death from the disease.

"Although smoking is associated with a lower risk of Parkinson's, it's not associated with survival of patients after they've got the disease," Chen told Reuters Health.

But in an editorial accompanying the study, Drs. Beate Ritz and Shannon L. Rhodes of the UCLA School of Public Health argue that nicotine or other potentially nerve-protecting substances "might be appropriate for study" as treatments.

"Additionally," they ask, "of the 4,000+ cigarette-smoke-derived chemicals, are there other choices that would minimize toxicity and maximize benefit?" [rc]

Source: China Daily/Agencies

CHINA: Do Chinese Seniors Threaten the World?

2010-03-04T11:31:00.004+05:30

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PARIS, France / Money Week / March 4, 2010

By Camille-Yihua Chen, MoneyWeek, France

Currently, 176 million Chinese people--12.79% of the country's population--are 60 years old and over. Four major developments explain this phenomenon: the one-child policy; changing cultural expectations (some young couples don't want to have kids); the celibacy of many men; and increased life expectation. According to projections, in 20 years one-fifth of the Chinese population will be 60 years old and over. Given this imminent change, China will have to reform its pension system.

Source: Global Action on Aging, New York

(Published below is the original article in French)

Les seniors chinois menacent-ils le monde ?

Par Camille-Yihua Chen, MoneyWeek, France
March 4, 2010

La Chine vieillit. Inexorablement. Aujourd'hui, 176 millions de Chinois, soit 12,79 % de la population du pays, ont plus de 60 ans. Avec ses 1,3 milliard d'habitants, l'État le plus peuplé de la planète est également celui qui compte le plus de personnes âgées.

Quatre explications à ce phénomène.

D'abord, la politique de l'enfant unique, lancée en 1979. À l'époque, dans les entreprises publiques, toute femme qui mettait au monde un deuxième enfant écopait d'une double sanction : suspension de salaire pendant plusieurs mois et suppression du droit à la promotion.

Ensuite, le changement des mentalités. Pour diverses raisons, nombre de jeunes couples chinois ne veulent pas d'enfants : il est donc loin le temps où trois, voire quatre générations vivaient sous le même toit.

Troisième raison : le célibat d'un grand nombre d'hommes. Beaucoup ne trouvent pas d'épouse du fait du manque de femmes - conséquence de la pratique de l'infanticide visant les petites filles dans leurs régions.

Enfin, l'allongement de l'espérance de vie en Chine : de 40 ans seulement dans les années 1950, elle est passée aujourd'hui à 73 ans.

Solitude et dépendance

Pas étonnant, alors, que le nombre de personnes âgées ait augmenté rapidement. Or beaucoup d'entre elles vivent seules, leurs enfants étant partis travailler loin du foyer parental. Selon le Beijing Soir, « ces personnes souffrent beaucoup de la solitude, pleurent facilement et ont perdu goût à la vie. Elles reprochent parfois à leurs enfants de les avoir abandonnées ». Et un autre journal local d'expliquer : « Elles sont peu autonomes et ont besoin d'aide pour faire face à des imprévus dans leur vie quotidienne. Fuite d'eau, engorgement des WC, panne d'électricité, etc. : quand on est moins agile et plus fragile, tout est source de problèmes et rien n'est facile à résoudre. »

Plus inquiétant encore : les projections montrent qu'en 2030 la Chine comptera 379 millions de personnes âgées, alors que, d'ici là, sa population se stabilisera autour de 1,39 milliard d'habitants. Cela signifie que dans vingt ans un Chinois sur cinq sera sexagénaire.

Difficile financement des retraites

La rapide progression du nombre de Chinois âgés constitue un défi majeur pour le financement des retraites. Alors que, en 1998, 13 actifs cotisaient pour 1 retraité, ils étaient seulement 3 en 2003 et ne seront que 2,5 en 2020.

Qu'en sera-t-il en 2030, 2040, 2050 ? Qui financera les retraites si le nombre d'actifs continue à diminuer et celui de retraités à augmenter ?

En attendant, la Chine tente de faire face à deux impératifs. Il lui faut mener à bien la réforme de son système de retraite qui reposait sur l'entreprise publique, celle-ci étant chargée de verser les pensions à la place de l'État. Or, depuis l'ouverture économique du pays, les entreprises sont autonomes et celles qui sont peu compétitives ne peuvent plus payer leurs retraités. Pour le gouvernement chinois, il s'agit d'instaurer un régime inspiré des modèles occidentaux, combinant répartition et capitalisation.

Il faut également créer un système de retraite pour la population rurale, qui représente encore 69 % de la population chinoise. Autrefois, les vieux agriculteurs pouvaient compter sur le soutien de leurs enfants et sur l'aide des fermes collectives. Mais la privatisation de l'agriculture et le départ des jeunes dans les grandes villes les ont marginalisés. Beaucoup se retrouvent désormais sans revenus réguliers. Pour la Chine, l'objectif est donc de couvrir l'ensemble des ruraux d'ici à 2020. Un chantier vaste et coûteux.
Moins d'actifs, moins de croissance ?

Finalement, les Chinois paient aujourd'hui les conséquences de leur politique de l'enfant unique. Voici quelques chiffres alarmants : dans les dix ans à venir, le nombre de nouveaux venus sur le marché du travail - qui auront alors entre 20 et 24 ans - va diminuer. De 125 millions en 2010, il ne sera plus que 68 millions en 2020, soit 8 % du total des actifs chinois, contre 15 % aujourd'hui.

Or moins d'actifs jeunes et dynamiques signifient probablement moins de création de richesse, donc moins de croissance, même si, entre-temps, la productivité aura un peu augmenté.

« Si la Chine manque de main-d'oeuvre d'ici à 2030, il lui suffira de reculer d'un an l'âge de la retraite pour conserver 20 millions d'actifs pour l'année concernée », objecte un sociologue chinois.

Mais c'est oublier que sa proposition ne résoudra en rien le problème du vieillissement de la population !

Quels enjeux pour les pays développés ?

Aujourd'hui et pour longtemps encore, la Chine va continuer de jouer son rôle de locomotive de l'économie mondiale. Mais, peu à peu, elle sera supplantée par des pays plus dynamiques, comme l'Inde par exemple, dont les plus de 60 ans ne représentent que 5,6 % de sa population.

En parallèle, le vieillissement de la population entraînera la diminution du taux d'épargne de la Chine, qui finira par ne plus pouvoir financer les dettes de l'Oncle Sam.

Le cercle vicieux sera alors enclenché...

Le senior business a de l'avenir

Le vieillissement de la population n'a pas que des aspects négatifs. Les seniors chinois représentent aussi un marché en plein devenir. Certes, la majorité d'entre eux ont aujourd'hui un pouvoir d'achat plutôt faible. Mais ceux qui suivent seront bien plus riches. Signe éloquent : aujourd'hui, le chiffre d'affaires mondial du marché du luxe vient à 25 % de la clientèle chinoise ! On estime le marché des seniors à 830 Mds¥ (89,5 MdsEuro(s)) en 2010 et à 2 800 Mds¥ (302,1 MdsEuro(s)) en 2020. Plusieurs créneaux ont déjà été pris d'assaut, avec plus ou moins de succès : tourisme, maisons de retraite, soins à domicile, compléments alimentaires, clubs de rencontres, téléphonie portable... [rc]

Camille-Yihua Chen

Camille-Yihua Chen est journaliste pour MoneyWeek. Parfaitement trilingue en chinois, français et anglais, dotée de plus de dix ans d'expérience dans le domaine de la banque et de la bourse, elle a collaboré avec l'Express, le Figaro Economie, Radio France Internationale, la banque Egg... entre autres. Chinoise d'origine, les liens qu'elle a gardés avec son pays lui permettent d'avoir un point de vue unique sur la situation des entreprises et de l'économie de la Chine.

USA: At 95, he feels you're never too old to learn something new

2010-02-28T12:08:00.005+05:30

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CLEVELAND, Ohio / Sun Messenger / February 27, 2010

By Jeff Piorkowski

For example, Lane’s daughter, nicknamed “Pitsy,” has told him he should learn to work a computer. “I’m doing a lot of things my daughter is telling me,” Lane said. “She’s my mentor. She seems to be doing very well doing the things she’s doing.”

So, Lane decided to take advice about learning the workings of the computer from the younger set — his daughter, a clinical psychologist living in Oregon, is 69 years old.

For his part, Lane is a virtual beginner at learning to use a computer as he approaches, in April, his 95th birthday.

Still, he is determined not to be like some other seniors.

“A lot of older people are scared by change,” he said. “They think, ‘I made it through life this far without it, why do I need to know that now?”

Lane is taking computer lessons from Art Kraus, a retired certified public accountant, and volunteer with the Tri-City Consortium on Aging. For the consortium, Kraus has done many jobs to aid seniors where ever he is needed.

At 68, Kraus gets great delight in teaching Lane the workings of the computer.

“He was born the same year as my father (the late Robert Kraus),” said Kraus, a resident of Winchester Road in Lyndhurst. “And, my father was an electrician, too.”

The electrician work holds significance in that Lane, of Green Road in South Euclid, owned for 25 years, until 1984, an electrical construction business.

Lane never graduated from college, although he did attend classes at John Carroll University to learn more about electronics. He initially learned some things about the subject from his years working as a construction estimator.

In addition to a daughter, Lane is father to Stanley, 66, a bio-chemist in Nashville.

Lane modestly brushed off any suggestion that he could be a very smart man, given that he has two PhD.s as children. Instead, he said, his children’s educational aptitude must come from his late wife, Ruth, who died Oct. 3 after nearly 72 years of marriage.

Lane, today, marvels at the intricacy of the needlepoint works of art Ruth left behind, but admitted, “When I look at them, it brings a mist to my eyes.

“The hardest part about being a widower is the loneliness,” he said. It is because of that loneliness that his daughter suggested he take up computers to meaningfully occupy his time.

“The first thing he needs to do is to get a computer,” Kraus said before explaining to Lane how, if he did make the purchase, lessons could then be practiced on a regular basis at home.

Now, the two meet only every two or three weeks in the computer room at Hawken Lower-Middle School, 5000 Clubside Road in Lyndhurst.

Still, with such little chance at repetition of what has just been learned, Kraus said of Lane, “He’s a great student.”

Kraus then joked, “I never have to discipline him.”

Still spry in mind and body, Lane, a 1933 Shaker Heights High School graduate, would like to see other seniors learn how to use a computer, but knows it’s a hard sell.

“I’m not an advisor to them,” he said, “but I’m with seniors a lot. I tell them they should do it. They just look at me. I know they’re not going to do it.”

Lane, who remembers such things from his just-married days in the 1930s as the cost of a quart of milk (five cents), a newspaper (two cents), and a week’s streetcar pass (75 cents), said learning some new facts could help keep his fellow seniors a little younger.

“When I look at other older people,” he said, “people younger than me, they just look too damn old.”

When told he walks like a much younger man, Lane replied, “You don’t know the pain I feel.”

A former avid chess player — his daughter advised him he should again take up the game now that he is single — Lane said, “I want to learn the computer to communicate, and to play games. I know I won’t learn everything because it’s too intricate for that.”

He looks forward to communicating with his two children, and three grandchildren. Lane is especially eager to learn from Kraus how he can exchange photos with his grandchildren via the computer.

Lane said he will soon take Kraus’ advice and buy a new computer, to which Kraus said he could then go to Lane’s home to teach him.

Because he is actively pursuing his daughter’s advice on computers and chess, Lane was asked if she had given him any more mentor-like advice.

Lane thought for a moment, laughed, and said, “Yes, she told me to stay away from women.” [rc]

Jeff Piorkowski
jpiorkowski@sunnews.com

© 2010 Cleveland Live, Inc.

USA: Finding their voice and that old confidence, too

2010-02-27T23:35:00.002+05:30

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BOSTON, Massachusetts / The Bostone Globe / Health & Fitness / February 27, 2010

With age, vocal cords weaken, but these seniors show how singing can help

By Carolyn Y. Johnson, Globe Staff

Gathered around a piano with 15 other Bostonians of a certain age, Dory Tobias was trying to find her voice.

“Come to your life like a warrior,’’ she sang out, joining in the lilting lyric of the “Song of the Soul’’ with a boldness often lacking when she talks.

Tobias has a soft voice, and she said she is often asked to speak up - requests that fill her with doubt and twist her tongue. Now, in this singing for seniors class, she is learning to breathe deeply to support her voice, open her mouth wider, and warm up - basic singing techniques that she can integrate into her speaking voice, too.

A collaboration between Longy School of Music and the United South End Settlements, the class focuses on ensemble singing and harmony, but also on techniques that can strengthen voices that are naturally changing with age.

“I’m not much worried about being a singer,’’ the 63-year-old Tobias said during a break. “I just want to speak with confidence.’’

Normal aging causes natural changes in the body and mind, from wrinkles to memory loss. The voice also changes, in a phenomenon called presbyphonia. Older voices become quieter, shakier, reedier. Men’s voices tend to get higher; women’s, lower.

Joseph Stemple, professor of communication sciences and disorders at the University of Kentucky College of Health Sciences, said that aging muscles weaken and vocal cords no longer close completely - creating an airiness or breathiness in speech. Each syllable takes a greater portion of breath.

Such changes are usually not considered a problem, and most people don’t seek help from a voice therapist. But for some, a weakened voice can affect their lives, making them feel isolated or less confident - afraid they won’t be heard in dinnertime conversation, or will be unable to read stories aloud to grandchildren. Tobias finds that being asked to repeat what she says makes her feel nervous and wonder, “What did I say wrong?’’

Daniel Kempler, chairman of the communication sciences and disorders department at Emerson College, is studying whether older people’s voices lead to prejudice or stereotyping of the elderly.

“We treat [presbyphonia] when it affects people’s ability to function in the real world,’’ said Kempler, a consultant to the senior singing class Tobias is part of. “The effect is people can’t hear you or people think something’s wrong and they say, ‘Are you OK?’ ’’

Most of Tobias’s classmates aren’t there with the goal of improving their speaking voices - for most it’s about the singing and camaraderie. But any improvement in the students’ voices will be measured through a survey and by comparing how long they can sing “ah’’ at the start and finish of the class.

For instructor Elizabeth Anker, the aging voice has a distinctive sound.

“What I tend to notice with older voices is the range diminishes - the highs come down,’’ Anker said. “I hear voices being left unsupported and more easily fatigued.’’

So Anker starts class by asking her students to clasp their hands over their head and then to bring their hands down, as a preparation for taking deep breaths that comes not from the shoulders but from the diaphragm. They go to the mirror and trill their lips in an exercise that allows them to practice generating deep breaths - and also amuse their grandchildren at home. And they practice ways of projecting sound and breathing.

The class is free, supported by a grant from the MetLife Foundation Creative Aging Program. Most of the people taking the class didn’t sign up because of problems with their voices, even though they have noticed changes as the years have passed.

Rachel Silva, 67, who crooned a silky solo of “Someone to Watch Over Me’’ at a recent class, said she was hoping her voice would crack less.

“People laugh at me all the time,’’ said Silva.

Joycelyn Harewood, returning to the class for a second year, said that the breathing techniques she learned last year helped her in the three church choirs she sings in.

“As you’re singing, you open up your lungs, you can breathe better, and you become healthier,’’ Harewood said. “I’m 68 this year and as far as my voice, it seems to be getting better instead of weaker.’’

Stemple has found that specific vocal therapies can alter vocal aerodynamics in beneficial ways. One study, he said, found that female singers of all ages had better vocal function than people who did not sing.

While research has yet to show that Do-Re-Mi will turn back time for your voice, one good thing about singing as therapy is that people do it anyway, whether in church or the shower.

“The kinds of things that we would do in standard therapy,’’ Kempler said, “can be done in a context of singing songs from your youth or putting on a show.’’[rc]

Carolyn Y. Johnson
E-Mail: cjohnson@globe.com

© Copyright 2010 The New York Times Company

CHILE: Death toll rising from 8.8 magnitude Chile quake

2010-02-27T15:18:00.001+05:30

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AUCKLAND, New Zealand / The Timaru Herald / Breaking News / February 27, 2010

A massive magnitude-8.8 earthquake struck south-central Chile early on Saturday, killing at least 64 people, knocking down buildings and triggering a tsunami.

[rc]

© 2010 Fairfax New Zealand Limited

USA: 10 Trends in Longevity

2010-02-26T22:53:00.000+05:30

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WASHINGTON, DC / US News & World Report// Money / February 26, 2010

The Best Life
10 Trends in Longevity

By Philip Moeller

The goals of improved health and financial security are to live longer and, presumably, more fulfilling lives. Increases in longevity have certainly been impressive. Not only has 60 become the new 40, but we're well on our way to the day when 80 becomes the new 60. While the victors in the longevity race have many spoils to enjoy, they also have many aches, pains, and other unpleasant reminders of their continued existence. The government pulls together an impressive array of statistical snapshots in its current compendium, "Health, 2009," a 550-page record of the state of the nation's well-being. Here are some of its most compelling findings about the health of an aging America.

[See 10 Ways Baby Boomers Will Reinvent Retirement.]

Life expectancy. Babies will live to average ages of 75 (male) and 80 (female), based on 2006 survey data. For those who reach the age of 65, a man can expect to live until 82, on average, while a woman will live until she's 85. These are averages. Millions of us will live well into our 90s.

Senior power. In 2007, about 12 percent of Americans were 65 or older. By 2050, that will rise to a projected 20 percent—a huge jump in demographic terms. And more of these people will be 75 or older (11 percent) than between the ages of 65 and 74 (9 percent). With the nation's population forecast to be 440 million in 40 years, nearly 90 million of us will be 65 or older.

Financial protection. Social Security and Medicare make a huge difference in the financial security of older Americans. The poverty rate for persons 65 and older in less than 10 percent—the lowest of any large age group and only about half the poverty rate of children under age 18. Still, an additional 25 percent of older people lived near the poverty line. When the recession's financial impact is clearer in a year or two, the picture may get worse, because of rising healthcare costs and the absence of cost-of-living adjustments (COLA) in Social Security benefits. There is no COLA this year because consumer prices did not rise, and no increase is expected next year, either.

Sleeping. Nearly a third of older Americans regularly have trouble getting a good night's sleep (30 percent of men, 34 percent of women). Many take sleeping aids to help—11 percent of men ages 65 and up, and 15 percent of women in that age group.

Depression. People over the age of 60 are less likely to be depressed (4 percent) than other age groups. The rates of depression are 5.5 percent for everyone, including 4.4 percent for males and 6.6 percent for females. Depression rates were highest at 7.3 percent for people 40 to 59 years of age, while the rate was 4.7 percent for the 18-to-39-year-old age group.

Chronic health problems. Persistent ailments are a constant companion for many of us as we age. As of 2007, the most recent data year, 26 percent of people ages 65 to 74 said they had to limit their activities in some way because of a chronic health condition. That compares with 10 percent for persons ages 18 to 64. Activity limitations rose sharply in older age groups, affecting 36 percent of those ages 75 to 84 and 62 percent of persons 85 and older.

Causes of death. More than 2.4 million Americans died in 2006, including nearly 1.8 million persons ages 65 and older. Among this older group, the five leading causes of death were heart disease (29 percent), cancer (22 percent), strokes and other blood-vessel issues in the brain (7 percent), respiratory disease (6 percent), and Alzheimer's disease (4 percent). Over time, Alzheimer's will move toward the top of this list.

Healthcare expenses. Staying alive, let alone healthy, gets increasingly expensive as we age. Impressive longevity gains increase the need to include healthcare costs in your retirement planning. In 2004, average healthcare spending was $10,800 in the 65-to-74-year-old age group, $16,400 for those ages 75 to 84, and $25,700 for people ages 85 and up. Keep in mind that these are averages; you may need to set aside more money based on your personal health needs. In another survey, people who were 65 and older paid about 15 percent of their healthcare expenses out of their own pockets in 2006. That, too, is an average. For those with private health insurance, 21 percent of their health expenses were paid out-of-pocket (that excludes the premiums for the insurance and nonprescription drugs).

Fitness and stress. In our stressed and out-of-shape nation, hypertension, high blood pressure, and high cholesterol are problems that don't go away as we age. Hypertension affects 65 percent of older men and 70 to 80 percent of older women. High blood pressure occurs in 30 to 40 percent of older men and 40 to 55 percent of older women. High cholesterol is found in 10 percent of older men and 19 to 24 percent of older women. Our longevity gains are especially impressive given how poorly we take care of ourselves. Clearly, if you can avoid or minimize these maladies, your odds of reaching 90 or even 100 are substantial.

Weight. In the weight Olympics, we are big winners, too. Among persons ages 65 to 74, upwards of 80 percent of men and 70 percent of women are overweight. The percentages dip, but only a bit, for people ages 75 and up. About a third of older Americans are clinically obese, defined as having body mass indexes above 30. While high blood pressure and cholesterol measurements have improved in recent years, the trend is going the other way in terms of hypertension and obesity.

The Best Life: Contributing editor Philip Moeller writes about the people, ideas and programs that provide "best life" retirement solutions and opportunities. [rc]

Copyright © 2010 U.S.News & World Report LP

GREECE: Somebody has to pay

2010-02-26T19:34:00.003+05:30

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ASHEVILLE, North Carolina / WORLD Magazine / Money / March 13, 2010 edition

Money
The Greek debt crisis has no easy solution

By Timothy Lamer

The problem with out-of-control government spending is that, at some point, somebody has to pay for it. Governments tend to ignore that fact, but Greece, over the last few weeks, provided a reminder that it cannot be ignored forever. The drama of street protests in Athens and angry remarks from leaders across Europe is largely an exercise in determining who will pay for years of Greek profligacy. Nobody wants to pay, but somebody must.

Associated Press/Photo by Petros Giannakouris

The crisis was brought on by a swelling Greek budget deficit and national debt, which have grown to almost 13 percent and 113 percent of GDP, respectively. These numbers raised the possibility of the Greek government defaulting on its debt. Such a move would shake confidence in the European Union and the euro, and so other EU nations, especially financial leader Germany, demanded budgetary reform.

The Greek government responded by freezing the wages of government workers, raising the Greek retirement age from 61 to 63, and raising some taxes. Thousands of Greek government workers, union workers, and pensioners—the biggest beneficiaries of high levels of government spending—in late February took to the streets to protest the moves.

If the Greek protesters get their way and "austerity" measures are repealed or softened, then someone else will have to pay. Observers have pointed to three options:

• Greek taxpayers: Tax avoidance is a problem in Greece, but decades of low fertility rates have created a bigger problem: Greece has a rapidly aging population. The Greek fertility rate dropped below replacement level (2.1 births per woman) in 1981, hit 1.4 in 1990, and has floundered between 1.25 and 1.4 since then. It will be increasingly difficult for Greek taxpayers to bear the burden of their government's debts, because not enough of them exist.

• Those who hold Greek debt, a majority of whom are non-Greek: The Greek government could default on its debt, and those who took the risk of lending to such a demographic basket case would lose money. But this option concerns the rest of Europe, because several other countries—Spain, Ireland, and Italy among them—are on the verge of a Greek-like collapse. If the EU allows the Greeks to default, then investors will likely flee those other countries. Buyers of Spanish government bonds were beginning to demand higher interest rates last week.

• European taxpayers, especially the Germans. The most likely scenario is a bailout led by the Germans, but such a move is extremely unpopular in Germany. Greece's early retirement age is a big sticking point for Germans, who recently raised their own retirement age from 65 to 67. "The Greeks go onto the streets to protest against the increase of the pension age from 61 to 63," said the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung newspaper in an editorial. "Does that mean that the Germans should in the future extend the working age from 67 to 69, so that the Greeks can enjoy their retirement?"

Greek politicians, dismayed by such comments, said the Germans, because of the sins of their grandfathers during World War II, owe at least patience to Greece, if not a bailout: "They took away the Greek gold that was at the Bank of Greece, they took away the Greek money and they never gave it back," Greek Deputy Prime Minister Theodoros Pangalos told the BBC on Feb. 24. "This is an issue that has to be faced sometime in the future."

As friction between the two nations grows, the next big date to watch for is March 16. That's the deadline EU finance ministers have given for Greece to show progress in bringing its budget under control. If Greece doesn't do so, then the EU may dictate specific reforms.

The really bad news in all of this is that Japan, the United States, and the rest of Europe—all with low fertility rates and big government debts—will soon face their own versions of this Greek tragedy. And somebody will have to pay.
[rc]

Copyright © 2010 WORLD Magazine

IRELAND: Why our kids will reach the ripe old age of . . . 150

2010-02-26T18:09:00.000+05:30

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DUBLIN, Ireland / Irish Independent / Health / Fitness / February 26, 2010

Ed Power on the new technology that is making us live longer

By Ed Power

Spare a thought for Ireland's post-millennium generation. As adults, they will be saddled with the mother of all national debts. Climate change will probably have reached disaster movie proportions by the time they hit middle age. They will grow up traumatised by childhood memories of Jedward.

GROWING APART: Brad Pitt and Cate Blanchett as lovers in Benjamin Button, one getting younger, the other getting older

Still, there is one glimmer of sunshine amid the gloom -- according to experts, those born in Ireland in the year 2010 have a realistic chance of reaching the grand old age of... 150. The infants of today, it is claimed, may well live up to 70 years longer than current average life-spans as science pushes back the boundaries of human life.

The idea of old age stretching far past 100 sounds like something from a science fiction movie. However, scientists say ongoing medical breakthroughs promise to completely redefine our idea of what it is to be elderly. In an article published in medical journal The Lancet several months ago, the Danish Aging Research Centre said that, as a consequence of rising living standards, there is a realistic likelihood most Westerners born since 2000 will make it to age 100 at least (so long as rising obesity problems across the US and Europe are kept in check).

"Very long lives are not the distant privilege of remote future generations," wrote one of the authors of the study, Kaare Christensen. "Very long lives are the probable destiny of most people alive now in developed countries."

In addition to benefiting from higher living standards, many specific new developments have the potential to make the ripe old age of 150 a realistic goal.

Firstly, the medical community is taking huge steps forward in the field of prosthetics. A few decades hence, a non-functioning body part or organ will not longer be necessarily a threat to one's life.

In particular, the science of bone prosthetics is advancing rapidly, raising the possibility that future generations of old people may be spared arthritis, aching joints and impaired mobility.

Rather than having to rely on a walking stick or wheelchair, they will be able to simply book into a bone prosthetics clinic and come out all spruced up and nimble.

Similar breakthroughs will mean deafness and blindness are no longer an issue as we creep into our 80s and 90s. Artificial lenses will make eye-replacement surgery feasible and progression in laser technology means deterioration in vision can be halted and reversed.

"The good news is people will generally be functioning well -- it's more like they're postponing their aging process," said the Danish team.

At a cellular level, meanwhile, researchers are along the road of being able to grow and harvest body tissue by turning on and off genetic triggers in stem cells. They have already achieved this in mice, growing new skin cells from modified stem cells. Should advancements proceed at the present rate, "organ farms" may be only a few decades away.

Furthermore, experts increasingly believe that, by cutting back on our food intake, we could extend our life-span. In Boston, nutritionists have produced evidence that lowering your calorie intake by 25pc might help you live longer.

"I feel better and lighter and healthier," said one of the participants in the study. "But if it could help you live longer, that would be pretty amazing."

At first glance, the idea that eating less could help you carry on longer sounds counter-intuitive. However, experiments on lab rats showed that those whose diets were restricted lived 50pc longer.

More interestingly, work with rhesus monkeys indicates that, by cutting back on calories, we are less susceptible to disease. Monkeys on a restricted diet suffered a much lower incidence of diabetes, heart and brain disease and cancer.

Most intriguing of all is our deepening understanding of the process of aging itself. While factors such as smoking, stress and our level of regular exercise all have a bearing on the rate at which we grow older, geneticists have now uncovered a genetic link to cellular aging.

Studies of human chromosomes have revealed that, at either end of the DNA strands contained in every cell, are protective caps called telomeres. Each time a cell dies and replicates itself, these caps shorten -- the analogy offered by scientists is of plastic tips fraying at the end of shoelaces.

As telomeres grow shorter, the evidence is that we become more vulnerable to age-related ailments such as heart disease and certain kinds of cancer. If researchers can find a way to stop this decline, humanity may have arrived at a way to turn 'off' the aging process.

For kids today, aging may eventually be something you can halt or even reverse. Mind you, they'll still have to overcome those childhood memories of Jedward. [rc]

- Ed Power
Irish Independent

©Independent.ie

USA: Catch 55 - The Beauty Dilemma Facing Modern Women

2010-02-25T23:52:00.002+05:30

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NEW YORK, NY / TheWomenOnTheWeb / Relationships / February 25, 2010

A Friend Stopped By

A model-turned-psychotherapist on a universal midlife quandary.

By Dr. Vivian Diller

Marlene, a woman in her 50s, walked into my office with a problem that has become increasingly common these days. The picture of success, she’s a married mother of two, managing a healthy balance between her family and the demands of her work. But the only thing on her mind was the "work" she was thinking of doing on her face. After consulting with a cosmetic surgeon, she was having difficulty sleeping.

Editor’s Note: Dr. Vivian Diller is the author, with Jill Muir-Sukenick, of Face It: What Women Really Feel As Their Looks Change.

It took only a little bit of prompting to get Marlene to move from advice for insomnia to debating which part of her face she should lift. Soon, she was talking about her deeper concerns. "I’m worried about becoming invisible," she explained. Unless she did something radical, she went on, she was afraid she would lose everything; her power, her career, even her husband. "I’m embarrassed that I have angst about this issue at all — and, worse, that I’m contemplating such radical solutions to relieve it," Marlene confessed. I responded by welcoming her to the "beauty paradox" faced by millions of women who feel pulled in different directions as they try to come to terms with their aging appearance.

We are supposed to be true to ourselves, and now we're being told not to look our age. It's a Catch 22 -- or as we call it, Catch 55.

I understood Marlene’s discomfort, both personally and professionally. Because I was a model before becoming a psychotherapist, I knew all too well what it meant to anticipate being pushed aside by the next one in line. (And I learned all this at 22!) At the end of my modeling career, as I began graduate school, I learned how to balance my investment in youthful beauty with other, more sustainable aspects of myself. And, as I got older, making that shift many times more, I realized that most women face that transition at some point in their lives when their looks inevitably change. An entire generation — Marlene and myself included — is in the midst of a dilemma that needs to be resolved.

Over time, I took Marlene through the six steps described in the book I wrote with another model-turned-therapist. This struggle, I explained, starts with surface concerns that are at the heart of a woman’s identity. After all, for millions of years, our value and self-worth relied largely on our ability to attract men, find a mate and procreate. Women aged — and looked their age — and that was that. It wasn’t until the dawn of full-fledged feminism that a wealth of other options became available. Our worth became less about being "Mrs. Someone" and more about making someone of ourselves. Beauty would no longer determine our future prospects.

Now, things have shifted once more. We continue to live increasingly longer lives. We expect to be admired for our accomplishments and empowered by our years of experience. But we did not expect to feel anxious and depressed the moment those years showed up on our face. Today, smart, savvy women are perplexed. We are supposed to be true to ourselves, and now we’re being told not to look our age. It’s a Catch 22 — or as we call it, Catch 55. The message? If we are to enjoy our ever-expanding lives, we are to use every tool available to defy our age.

The mixed messages are coming at us not only from magazines, movies and advertisements. They also come from our equally confounded contemporaries, who flaunt their feminism only to appear suddenly and mysteriously "rested." And from our loved ones, who give us a year’s supply of Botox as a gift on Valentine’s Day. Surely they know aging is the gift that keeps on giving. Surely we know that the younger we try to look, the less beautiful we feel. Are we back to square one?

We are supposed to be true to ourselves, and now we're being told not to look our age. It's a Catch 22 -- or as we call it, Catch 55.

I believe that women today have lost their equilibrium, and are eager to find a path that will steady them as they age. The first step is to be aware of the paradox in which we live, and think more carefully about how to deal with it. This is not to say that beauty does or does not matter. I’m not anti-surgery, anti-potions or peels or anything else that allows women to feel better about themselves. What I am against is thoughtless, pressured, anxious reactions to what is a natural process. The goal is for women, who have broken through in so many arenas, to make these decisions with a calm, clear head and realistic expectations.

Getting older was never a walk in the park, but it is particularly frightful to a generation who planned to stay "forever young." Once an appealing notion, those words have become a mandatory mantra. We are strong, smart and vital women who have been given the gift of time. Let’s not waste it trying to stop the inevitable. [rc]

© 2010 The Women on the Net Inc

USA: Evidence of benefits of high BP drugs in diabetic eye disease

2010-02-25T15:56:00.006+05:30

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ROCKVILLE, Maryland / Science Daily / February 25, 2010

Scientists in Massachusetts are reporting new evidence that certain high blood pressure drugs may be useful in preventing and treating diabetic retinopathy, the leading cause of vision loss in people with diabetes. The study, the largest to date on proteins in the retina, could lead to new ways to prevent or treat the sight-threatening disease, they say.

The largest study to date of proteins in the retina, above, indicates that high blood pressure drugs may be useful in preventing diabetic eye disease.

Credit:
Wikimedia Commons, Danny Hope

The findings are in the American Chemical Society's Journal of Proteome Research, a monthly publication.

Edward Feener and colleagues point out that diabetic retinopathy is a common complication of diabetes, which affects millions of people worldwide. It involves damage to blood vessels in the retina, the light sensitive tissue in the back of the eye. Previous studies suggested that drugs used to treat high blood pressure, including ACE inhibitors and angiotensin receptor blockers (ARBs), may help prevent the condition.

The scientists analyzed proteins from the retinas laboratory mice with normal blood pressure and diabetes and compared them to those of non-diabetic mice. They identified 65 abnormal proteins in the diabetic mice out of more than 1,700 proteins in the study. Treatment with the ARB medication, candesartan, prevented the abnormal changes in more than 70 percent of the proteins. [rc]

Source: American Chemical Society

Journal Reference:
Gao et al. Angiotensin AT1 Receptor Antagonism Ameliorates Murine Retinal Proteome Changes Induced by Diabetes. Journal of Proteome Research, 2009; 8 (12): 5541 DOI: 10.1021/pr9006415

Copyright © 1995-2009 ScienceDaily LLC

JAPAN: Macrobiotic master extols joys of cooking

2010-02-25T07:48:00.000+05:30

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TOKYO, Japan / The Japan Times / Life in Japan / Lifestyle /February 25, 2010

By Tomoko Otake, Staff writer

At age 51, Madonna still has a fantastic physique, and she has Chef Mayumi Nishimura to thank in part for that.

Macrobiotics, a diet and lifestyle regimen aimed at longer, healthier living, has enjoyed a boom in recent years due to some high-profile celebrity fans. Along with Madonna, actors Tom Cruise and Gwyneth Paltrow are among those thought to be keen on the diet, whose basic principles include eating whole grains, locally-grown organic vegetables, natural seasonings and food without artificial additives.

Act locally: Chef Mayumi Nishimura, who promotes eating a macrobiotic diet consisting of organic and locally grown foods, sits down to one of her creations. Yoshiaki Miura Photo

Nishimura is undoubtedly a leader of the macrobiotic lifestyle, having served as Madonna's private chef for seven years through the end of 2007. She even lived with the singer's family in London and accompanied her on wordwide tours.

Now back home in Japan, 53-year-old Nishimura hopes to promote a more relaxed, contemporary style of macrobiotic cooking that she calls "petit-macro." Nishimura's style sticks to natural seasonings and a largely vegetarian diet, allowing for more flexibility in people's food choices.

Nuts and berries of macrobiotics

The word macrobiotics comes from Greek, meaning "long life." It was coined in the 1950s by Japanese philosopher Yukikazu Sakurazawa (1893-1966), who was known in the West as George Ohsawa. He drew from traditional Japanese and Asian cultures to create his own philosophy of health, which included eating a diet mainly consisting of unmilled, whole-grain rice and vegetables.

His students, Michio Kushi and his wife, Aveline, helped spread the concept more widely in the West. After emigrating to the United States following World War II, Kushi opened the Kushi Institute in Boston in 1978 to promote macrobiotic philosophy and practices.

Today, the standard macrobiotic diet advocates a daily intake of whole grains, organic and locally grown vegetables, beans and sea vegetables such as nori, kombu and wakame. Optionally, fruits, seeds and nuts can be included. Refined foods — such as white rice or white sugar — and artificial additives should be avoided. Macrobiotic teachings also include chewing foods slowly to ease digestion and assimilate nutrients.

Organic vegetables and some ingredients used in the macrobiotic diet, such as brown rice and sea salt, can be found in regular supermarkets, but others, such as organic wholewheat flour and naturally fermented soy sauce are hard to find. In addition, organic foodstuffs are also generally more expensive than regular foods.

"Macrobiotics is not about dos and don'ts, but about trying to have a balanced diet using a variety of ingredients," Nishimura said during a recent interview in Tokyo, while preparing an appetizing platter of vegetable burritos using slices of avocado and carrot, and lentils seasoned with sea salt and a maple syrup-balsamic vinegar mixture.

"As long as you base your diet on the whole grain, vegetables and no refined foods or artificial additives, the rest is free; choices are really up to you."

In her new English-language book, "Mayumi's Kitchen," which was released by Kodansha International earlier this month, Nishimura shares a variety of recipes that defy the dull, stoic images of macrobiotics that she said are often confused with traditional Japanese cuisine.

"Some people say macrobiotics is the same as eating Japanese food," she said. "It's not. I think there should be an Italian-style macrobiotic diet in Italy and British-style macrobiotics in Britain. The most important thing is that each country (and region) has a traditional diet specific to the country or the region. . . . How did the ancient people eat back then? You should study how and what kind of food people in your region used to eat."

On differences between macrobiotics and traditional Japanese food, Nishimura, who long studied and worked in the United States under macrobotics pioneer Michio Kushi, says that the shoyu (soy sauce) used in macrobiotic cooking is naturally fermented with no artificial additives, while shoyu used for everyday Japanese cooking is often made from fermented wheat or has its fermenting process accelerated by artificial additives.

A Western-style presentation is also something Nishimura came up with while working for Madonna. For example, her "spiral rice pasta with salad and soy meat" looks almost identical to chicken pasta salad.

She even has a recipe for chocolate brownies, which she divulges in the book "proved incredibly popular with Madonna's backup dancers." Nishimura's brownies use unbleached white flour or barley flour, and maple sugar instead of white sugar in line with the macrobiotic principles of avoiding refined foods.

While proponents of the diet say it helps to prevent and cure illnesses, including cancer, academic research so far does not support such claims. The American Cancer Society, a nonprofit health organization, states on its Web site that, "A diet consisting mostly of vegetables, fruits, and whole grains is associated with general health benefits and lower risk for several diseases, and a macrobiotic diet, by virtue of its main components, can also achieve these benefits. However, macrobiotic diets can lead to poor nutrition if not properly planned."

Nishimura stresses that followers should not get worked up over rules, and that they can enjoy meat occasionally.

"You can even try macrobiotics only on weekends, as a starter," she says. "If you continue that for a year, I'm sure you will get some results." [rc]

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Healty shopping

While not widespread in shops, the nacrobiotic diet's ingredients are available online:

Lima Shigashi-Kitazawa (Shibuya): www.lima.co.jp/limatenpo-index.html

Anew: www.anew.co.jp/stores/

Shio-no-michi Club (online): www.shionomichi.com/kaimono.html

Seisyoku Society (online): www.macrobiotic.gr.jp/macro_shop/

Warabe Mura (Gifu/online): www.warabe.co.jp/english2.html

Tengu (online): jbayles.netfirms.com/shop/nfoscomm/catalog/index.php

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(C) The Japan Times Ltd

USA: Virtual meetups spark real fitness

2010-02-24T23:47:00.000+05:30

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HUNTINGTON BEACH, California / CNN Health / February 24, 2010

By Ashley Fantz

Spark friends Rebecca Coats and Eve Rasmussen
run in the Surf City marathon in Huntington Beach,
California, February 7.

Becki Coats was embarrassed, so embarrassed that she didn't want to show pictures of herself with her new grandchild.

"I couldn't stand thinking about people saying, 'Oh, my, what happened to you,'" she said. "Well, I'd become a fat, cuddly grandmother who cannot play with her own grandbaby, that's what."

Coats weighed 230 pounds. At 49, she was too heavy -- and sidelined with herniated disks and a bum knee -- to do her job as a firefighter, so her bosses gave her a desk job. But her physical pain was no match for the anguish to come when over the next year and a half her teenage son died in a car wreck, her mother died and she lost a friend to cancer.

"It was just constant bad news. I was told that if I didn't lose weight, I was going to lose my job entirely," she said.

Required to attend a work fitness program, Coats learned about Sparkpeople.com, a free fitness social networking site that, like Facebook, relies on its users to sustain it. They provide basic biographical information and weight loss goals and are automatically transferred to Spark Teams, small chat groups bound by similar shape-up goals.

The ad-supported site lets users build their own Sparkpages -- which can be linked to Facebook -- and have access to the lively written Sparkblog, which offers advice from certified trainers, the latest health articles and studies and recipes.

When Coats logged on she was connected with seven other women in a "40-something with 25 to 49 pounds to lose" message board. She quickly felt a kinship with these women she'd never met.

"They were talking about life -- jobs, husbands, their kids, traveling, getting to know each other like they were your girlfriends sitting at your kitchen table having coffee," she said. "It's not like you sign on and it's all about 'Drop that weight!'

"Here were women who are going to encourage me to get off my butt but weren't going to judge me if I didn't look like a swimsuit model in six months," she said.

Coats and several of the other women in her chat group met for the first time earlier this month to run the Surf City Marathon in Huntington Beach, California. Each ran a different distance, and they met at the finish line.

"It meant a lot to us to do this together, something that each of us never considered that we'd ever do," she said.

Spark was launched 10 years ago by a wealthy early eBay investor. It is among the best known secrets in the weight-loss world. According to Comscore, it's the most visited fitness site with 7 million users (162 million page views in January), but Spark has taken a low-key, word-of-mouth approach compared to its big bucks advertising competitors like Weight Watchers.

"Spark is built on a truth that people love feeling like they're needed on a team," said founder Chris Downie who, along with two business partners, sold his late 1990s online auction site to eBay for a reported $72 million and started Spark.

Downie spends much of his day in his Silicon Valley home messaging back and forth with Spark users or reading what people are talking about in the Sparkcafe. (On February 3, among the 798,784 cafe chatters, nearly 10,000 people were involved in a "Should you eat breakfast?" thread.)

"I always had shyness and anxiety as a kid, and I wanted to create something that would allow users to remain comfortably anonymous if they wanted but still connect," Downie said.

"The key to me is that I felt supported and not judged," said Jennifer Lang, an upstate New York psychotherapist who is part of the group. After having her fourth child at 41, Lang weighed 228 pounds.

"I had not exercised in 20 years," she said. "Really. In 20 years. It just wasn't a part of my life until it had to become my life or else."

She found Spark while surfing the Internet and joined other Spark groups, including the pointedly named "Mothers with 2-year-olds." She faithfully filled in her nutrition tracker every day, a function that not only automates calories but tells you when you type in "Dannon yogurt" what the heck's really in that container and whether it's really good for you. It also provides ideas for substitute meals. Spark's software won't allow someone to program a diet less than 1,200 calories a day.

A year later, Lang is 50 pounds lighter.

Stories like Lang's and Coats' are ubiquitous on Spark. CNN.com signed on to the site and messaged with several users who said they'd shed 5 to 100 pounds.

Many said they didn't even mind being sent the flurry of Spark e-mails they say didn't strike them as spam. A few examples: "Where to find the nearest running trail near your home" and "5 Ways to Avoid Hitting the Snooze." A hip and glute stretch video was short and direct, and another e-mail containing a low-cal recipe did not, like so many in its genre, produce food that tastes like cardboard.

As Lang got healthier, Tammy Rhones signed onto the women's chat group as "Marathon Mom," even though the 49-year-old's problems with weight and a clubbed foot sidelined her from most sports over the past few years.

"I never got past being that little girl who thought she couldn't run," she said, describing how she would watch Ironman competitions with amazement at the monster triathlon. A trainer told her about Sparkpeople.

Shortly after registering, Spark "woggers" (runners who walk) began sending her instant messages, motivating her to join a real-life running club to work on her foot. Months later, in a burst of extra motivation, Rhones completed a 2.4 mile ocean swimming competition and 150-mile bike ride. She also started competing in Spark's online 5K and 10K races where users post their real-life mileage. It might take a week, but in the virtual races, the first one to complete the total distance wins.

"I've always had a competitive side, but Spark has given me the chance to appreciate my successes as opposed to comparing myself to everyone else," Rhones said after running the half portion of the Surf City marathon. "I don't need to look at a magazine anymore and say, 'Oh I need to strive for that.' I'm a size 12, not a size 6, and I'm happy with that, that's OK." [rc]

© 2010 Cable News Network.

USA: Speed dating for an older set

2010-02-24T15:18:00.002+05:30

.
DENVER, Colorado / 9News.com / February 24, 2010

By Kim Christiansen

CENTRAL CITY - If you have ever been set up on a blind date, or attended a singles function, you know the feeling. Butterflies fill your stomach and you might feel flushed and need a glass of water.

A room full of people experienced all of those feelings recently on a trip to Central City.

They were not nervous about losing money in the slot machines. But while this gamble had nothing to do with cash, it certainly involved a little luck, if not guts.

Rocky Mountain Singles organized a first time ever "Speed Dating" event at Fortune Valley for seniors.

For those who do not know what speed dating is, it is an opportunity for a group of single people to meet several people in a short period of time. Each person is assigned a number and moves around a room from table to table to meet several people in roughly an hour's time.

Each date lasts just six minutes, enough time to hopefully decide if you want to meet again.

For this group, there is enough time for eight dates. There are 17 women and 13 men, from Denver, Greeley, Aurora, and as far as Montrose.

Joseph Brady is a Chinese medical doctor and a specialist in healthy aging. He applauds this type of thing.

"Anything to get people to make friends and have relationships, that makes a big difference when it comes to healthy aging," Brady said.

The people in this group are keenly aware of the importance of meeting new people and staying engaged in life.

Carl traveled from Greeley to take part.

"Even if you just make a new friend, you don't have to sit at home and be depressed," he said.

Carl is an outdoorsy type who likes to hunt and fish, but when asked what a woman should know about him, he said, "I'm a good dancer."

For many of the participants, this is a non-threatening environment and more like a social hour. Several told us they would never consider an Internet dating site, and really are not interested in a serious relationship.

Some say they will never marry again, but they would like the chance to go to dinner, dancing or even a movie with a new friend.

After their speed dating session, Rocky Mountain Singles will review the cards they filled out about their dates and match up those that express a mutual interest in seeing each other again.

What happens next? Only time will tell. [rc]

KUSA-TV © 2010 Multimedia Holdings Corporation