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Welcome to the quickly expanding, ever-mystifying world of “natural” low-calorie sweeteners, which, reportedly, have all the taste of sugar, without any of its detriments—or the chemicals of artificial brands. These newer, plant-based sweeteners—think stevia and monk fruit—are now showing up in nearly every type of packaged food and drink and even making an appearance in coffee shops where pink and blue packets once reigned supreme. (Lose up to 15 pounds WITHOUT dieting with Eat Clean to Get Lean, our 21-day clean-eating meal plan....

On Sunday, September 29, participating chains like Starbucks, Dunkin’ Donuts, Wawa and even Krispy Kreme will treat their customers to either a taste-test of new blends or coupons for free drinks. Considering the recent study from the National Coffee Association that found coffee consumption has increased 5% over the last year—a grand total of 83% of Americans now get a jolt with java—we imagine a lot of you plan to celebrate....

Find peace with working out less. It’s tough to transition away from an Olympic career to an active, fit existence when there isn’t a specific goal or competition to prepare for. “When I competed in those Olympic years, I trained six days a week, probably two to three hours on the ice and another two off the ice,” Yamaguchi says. “Now, I’m happy with getting active three days a week—it’s a struggle to even commit to that as a mother of two....

Although Americans’ exposure to lead has plummeted in recent years—thanks largely to the removal of lead from most types of fuel—the threat persists, says Howard Mielke, PhD, a professor of environmental health at Tulane. Why should you worry? Even very small doses of lead exposure have been shown to cause kidney and arterial disease in adults, according to a recent government study prepared with help from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health....

Lie on your back with your arms at your sides, legs extended, and heels resting on an exercise ball. Contract your butt, and lift it off the floor. Keeping your butt lifted, bend your knees, and roll the ball toward you until the soles of your feet are flat on it. Reverse the move, returning to the starting position.

This is a meaningful step and in line with what the Natural Resources Defense Council and our allies have been advocating for. But the “Global Vision for Antimicrobial Stewardship in Food Animals” paper McDonald’s published on the same day was disappointing in that it didn’t prohibit the routine use of medically important antibiotics for disease prevention. To truly be a global leader on this critical public health issue, McDonald’s has to say it won’t accept unsafe antibiotics use practices in raising any of the meat served in the company’s restaurants anywhere in the world....

When I shared with someone that a close friend of mine died recently, and that my dad’s cancer is incurable and he was given just a few months to live, she said, “welcome to middle age.” It is true. With middle age comes a few more losses than we’d like. Yes, there are many new rediscoveries and excitements, but it is a time when everywhere I turn I am hearing of or experiencing a loss....

According to the CDC, just today, in one day, 100 people will die from a drug overdose involving some kind of pain med. It’s easy to think that overdoing pain meds is safer than abusing illicit drugs like crack or heroin due to the “regulation” of prescription drugs or because some professional wrote it out on a piece of script paper. Not. Often regulation is a joke. It is too easy to stockpile drugs....

Researchers had a group of adults with MCI, all between the ages of 55 and 90, do a guided meditation for 15 to 30 minutes a day for eight weeks, as well attend weekly mindfulness check-ins. Eight weeks later, MRIs showed improved functional connectivity in the default mode network (translation: the part of your brain that never shuts down activity), and slowed shrinkage of the hippocampus, the main part of the brain responsible for memory that usually shrinks with dementia....

Only microscopic amounts of bacteria are required to cause sickness. Virtually everyone is susceptible to bacterial food poisoning, the symptoms of which can range from modest digestive discomfort to death. Bacteria that cause food poisoning include salmonella, campylobacter, E. coli and several other pathogens. Disease-causing bacteria are most commonly found in meats, seafoods and dairy products, though we have also seen outbreaks of contamination in lettuce, melons, and other fruits and vegetables, as well as a limited number of packaged and prepared foods....

In many cases, people use a combination of supplements, therapies, and mind-body practices to find relief from pain. Ideally, your goal should be to find an approach to pain that alleviates discomfort, addresses its root causes, and promotes health. Cut Refined Sugar You can control inflammation, improve circulation, and reduce pain with smart dietary choices. To reduce chronic pain and support flexibility, avoid inflammatory foods like refined sugar and grains, fried foods, and dairy....

The research: The Dutch study team examined health data on more than 8,400 people, each of whom had been monitored for an average of 13 years. Among those prescribed non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) like aspirin and ibuprofen, the risk of developing atrial fibrillation (A-fib) leapt 76% compared to those who had never been prescribed those drugs. That risk ballooned up to 84% among those who’d stopped taking prescription NSAIDs within the past 30 days, the study data shows....

20 Ways to Prevent Cancer Researchers from the University of Oxford in England analyzed cancer data collected from 47 studies of more than 100,000 women, and made some surprising discoveries. The first involves height. For women over 5 feet tall, every two inches of added height was shown to increase their risk for ovarian cancer by about 7 percent And then there’s your weight. The study finds that every two and a half-point increase in body mass index (BMI) above 20 increases your risk for the cancer by 10 percent....

According to a new Cornell University study in the journal Obesity, kids buy more healthy food when they pay in cash, and much more junk food when they pay with debit cards. “When they have the debit card rather than the cash, we know that it causes them to think about it slightly differently,” says David Just, PhD, lead study author and professor at the Cornell Center for Behavioral Economics in Child Nutrition Programs....

I started thinking that Macy, our beagle-bulldog mix, might have a weight problem when my son began using her as a pillow while watching TV. Turns out Macy’s not alone—more than half of dogs and cats are overweight or obese. You’ve heard of Fitbit or Jawbone—wristbands that track steps, mileage, calorie burn, and active minutes. Now this human technology is being applied to pets, providing a window into their activity levels....

Tossing and turning at night can leave you feeling tired and fatigued during the day. But new research published in the journal Arthritis & Rheumatism suggests poor sleep habits may also put women at increased risk for fibromyalgia, a musculoskeletal disease characterized by chronic pain and stiffness. Researchers from Norway found the risk of developing fibromyalgia increased with the severity of reported sleep problems, particularly among middle-aged and older women....

For more than 30 years health experts have known the erratic heartbeat responsible for SCD strikes most often during these early morning hours. SCD caused by this electrical instability causes an estimated 325,000 deaths annually. And consider who is at risk—those with known heart disease; a family history of heart disease or SCD; prior cardiac arrest or heart attack; high blood pressure/hypertension; abnormal heart rhythms; congestive heart failure; abnormalities on an EKG test or other diagnosed heart muscle weakness; diabetes; smoking; and recreational drug use....

Exfoliate before hair removal7 signs you’re about to get a terrible beauty service The thicker the layer of dead skin, the harder it is for a hair to break through and grow straight. “Exfoliating removes dead skin cells so hairs can grow properly,” says esthetician Sonya Dakkar, founder of the Sonya Dakar Skin Clinic in Los Angeles. You can buy a fancy scrub to get the job done, but simply adding a small scoop of kosher salt to some shower gel and washing with the mixture before shaving or waxing also does the trick....