Eats « Weekly Gravy

A new treatment appears to reduce food allergies in children and teens, according to interim clinical trial results. A lab-made monoclonal antibody called omalizumab (Xolair) significantly increased the amounts of common foods that children could eat without sparking an allergic reaction, the U.S. National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) reported. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration is now reviewing an application for omalizumab to treat food allergies, based on these interim results. The data was collected on 165 children ages 17 and younger who have an allergy to peanut and at least two other foods, NIAID said in a news release. Those who received omalizumab injections could consume more peanut, egg, milk and cashew products without allergic reactions than those who received a placebo jab, results showed. Kids receive the drug in biweekly or monthly injections, according to an NIAID description of the clinical trial. These first-stage results have given NIAID the confidence to launch the next stage of clinical trials, which will be conducted at 10 locations across the United States. Omalizumab has already been approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to treat allergic asthma, chronic hives and nasal polyps, according to the Cleveland Clinic. In 2017, a small study of 48 people found that 83% of participants could consume 2 grams of two food allergens after receiving omalizumab injections,… read on > read on >

Women struggling with fertility and using in vitro fertilization (IVF) to conceive sometimes turn to supplements for help. Unfortunately, a new study finds only weak evidence to support that strategy. In contrast, the same research found that the heart-healthy Mediterranean diet does boost the odds that a woman will become a mother. Compared to the fat- and sugar-rich Western diet, adopting a Mediterranean regimen appears to be a “straightforward approach” to boosting fertility, according to a team led by Roger Hart. He’s a fertility specialist and professor of obstetrics and gynecology at the University of Western Australia, in Perth. The new study was published Dec. 20 in Reproductive Biomedicine Online. As Hart explained in a journal news release, “nutritional supplements are usually not prescribed” for women using IVF. Instead, women typically try them out on their own. Such women are, therefore, “self-medicating” with supplements. “Our information is largely anecdotal but it’s quite clear from online IVF discussion forums that they [supplements] are widely used and of great public interest,” Hart said. But can supplements help women become pregnant? To find out, the new study examined the collected evidence regarding the following products: dehydroepiandrosterone (DHEA), melatonin, co-enzyme Q10 (CoQ1O), carnitine, selenium, Vitamin D, myo-inositol, Omega-3 and Chinese herbs. Researchers also analyzed data on various diets and whether they might help women on IVF conceive. … read on > read on >

Hospital coffee machines have received some side-eye as a potential source of spreading infection, but a new study debunks the belief. “To our great relief…a general ban on coffee makers doesn’t seem necessary,” concluded researchers led by Dr. Sarah Victoria Walker, head of the Institute for Clinical Microbiology and Hospital Hygiene in Ludwigsburg, Germany. For their study, German researchers swabbed 25 automatic capsule coffee makers and espresso machines. Of the machines, 17 were from break rooms and offices in a university hospital in Cologne, Germany, and the other eight were in the homes of staff members. All of the coffee makers had been in use for at least a year. Researchers swabbed them in five specific places – the drip tray, the outlet, the buttons, the handle of the water tank and the inside of the water tank. The researchers focused on what the World Health Organization calls its high-priority ESKAPE pathogens — Enterococcus faecium, Staphylococcus aureus, Klebsiella pneumoniae, Acinetobacter baumannii, Pseudomonas aeruginosa, and Enterobacter species. Those bacteria all pose an increasing threat because they are antibiotic-resistant and can lead to fatal blood infections in a hospital setting. Unsurprisingly, bacterial growth was detected on every coffee machine. What’s more, hospital machines were about three times as heavily colonized with microbes as home machines, with 360 strains isolated from 72 swabs compared to 135 strains from… read on > read on >

The average U.S. adult eats a meal’s worth of snacks every day, a new study suggests. Americans average about 400 to 500 calories in snacks daily, often more than what they ate at breakfast, according to data from more than 23,000 people. These extra calories offer little in the way of actual nutrition, said senior researcher Christopher Taylor, a professor of medical dietetics with Ohio State University’s School of Health and Rehabilitation Sciences. “Snacks are contributing a meal’s worth of intake to what we eat without it actually being a meal,” Taylor noted in a university news release. “You know what dinner is going to be: a protein, a side dish or two,” Taylor added. “But if you eat a meal of what you eat for snacks, it becomes a completely different scenario of, generally, carbohydrates, sugars, not much protein, not much fruit, not a vegetable. So it’s not a fully well-rounded meal.” There’s one bright spot – people with type 2 diabetes tended to eat fewer sugary foods and snacked less overall than either those without diabetes or with prediabetes. “Diabetes education looks like it’s working, but we might need to bump education back to people who are at risk for diabetes and even to people with normal blood glucose levels to start improving dietary behaviors before people develop chronic disease,” Taylor said. For… read on > read on >

Cinnamon used in applesauce pouches that have been tied to high lead levels in kids may have been deliberately tainted with the toxic element, a source at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration says. “We’re still in the midst of our investigation,” Jim Jones, the FDA’s deputy commissioner for human foods, told Politico. “But so far all of the signals we’re getting lead to an intentional act on the part of someone in the supply chain and we’re trying to sort of figure that out.” The applesauce pouches under recall so far are from three brands — Weis, WanaBana and Schnucks. Each is tied to the same manufacturing facility in Ecuador, which the FDA said it is now inspecting. “My instinct is they didn’t think this product was going to end up in a country with a robust regulatory process,” Jones said. “They thought it was going to end up in places that did not have the ability to detect something like this.” As of the latest FDA update on Dec. 12, 65 children under 6 years of age had been diagnosed with symptoms of lead poisoning tied to the recalled applesauce. According to Politico, the FDA suspect the deliberate adulteration of cinnamon included in the applesauce products was “economically motivated.” Typically, that involves boosting the perceived quality of a product while producing it at… read on > read on >

Federal agents have seized more than 1.4 million illegal vaping products being smuggled into the United States from China. A three-day operation at Los Angeles International Airport resulted in the seizure of 41 shipments of illegal e-cigarettes worth more than $18 million, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration said. The products included the hugely popular brand Elf Bar, as well as other flavored vapes that have been banned by the FDA. The seized vaping products will be destroyed, the FDA said. Many of the products were intentionally mis-declared as items like toys, shoes or household items in an attempt to evade customs, the FDA said. “Those shamelessly attempting to smuggle illegal e-cigarettes, particularly those that appeal to youth, into this country should take heed of today’s announcement,” Brian King, director of the FDA’s Center for Tobacco Products, said in an agency news release. “Federal agencies are on to their antics and will not hesitate to take action.” “The significant value of these seized products is also a sobering reminder to these bad actors that their time and money would be better spent complying with the law,” King added. The Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids applauded the news, noting that Elf Bar was the most commonly used brand among young vapers in the 2023 National Youth Tobacco Survey. “This is the strongest enforcement action the government has… read on > read on >

A California company has asked the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to approve MDMA, the active ingredient in party drugs like molly and ecstasy, as a treatment for post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). When announcing the new drug application (NDA) filing on Tuesday, MAPS Public Benefit Corp. noted it has been studying the drug for this use for years. The FDA has 60 days to decide whether whether MDMA will be accepted for review and whether it will be fast-tracked through the approval process, the company said. The drug would be given in concert with talk therapy. “The filing of our NDA is the culmination of more than 30 years of clinical research, advocacy, collaboration and dedication to bring a potential new option to adults living with PTSD, a patient group that has experienced little innovation in decades,” MAPS CEO Amy Emerson said in a company news release. “If approved, MDMA-assisted therapy would be the first psychedelic-assisted therapy, which we hope will drive additional investment into new research in mental health.” MDMA belongs to a class of psychoactive drugs that produce experiences of emotional connection, relatedness and emotional openness. Meanwhile, roughly 13 million Americans suffer from PTSD each year, the company said. The symptoms can be debilitating, and patients can also suffer anxiety, depression and substance use disorder. That doesn’t include the economic burden of treating PTSD,… read on > read on >

The Biden administration has again delayed enacting a ban on menthol cigarettes following intense lobbying from the tobacco industry. Along with that pressure, other critics of the ban have warned that it might anger Black smokers, who use menthol cigarettes at far higher rates than whites — just as President Biden gears up to run for re-election, administration officials told the Washington Post. The delay, which was posted Wednesday, now says officials plan to finalize rules to put the ban in place in March. Officials had originally planned to finalize the rules last August and later signaled to public health groups that they hoped to finish them by January, the Post reported. Still, the ban would not likely go into effect for several years because of the legal challenges that many expect will come. But anti-smoking advocates aren’t waiting to push passage of the ban. Karen Knudsen, chief executive of the American Cancer Society, said her organization is among a coalition of public health associations that this month will take out ads in national newspapers, send letters to lawmakers and use other measures to push the Biden administration to finalize the rule sooner rather than later. “The cost of inaction is high,” Knudsen told the Post, citing projections that a ban on menthol cigarettes would save up to 650,000 lives over the next four decades. Many of the lives… read on > read on >

In a win for telemedicine, new research shows that folks fighting high cholesterol benefit just as much from online coaching as they do from in-person visits with a dietitian. “This study reinforces the idea that comparable clinical outcomes can be achieved using the virtual format,” said lead researcher Dr. Shannon Zoulek, a resident physician at University of Michigan Health. “Improving cholesterol levels may reduce cardiovascular events, and having additional options to access treatment will benefit patients who seek treatment,” Zoulek added in a Michigan news release. More than 20% of American adults are currently using telemedicine, taking their health appointments online rather than traveling to an office, the researchers said in background notes. For the study, the investigators tracked more than 250 patients seen by a registered dietitian between early 2019 and late 2022 at the Preventative Cardiology Clinic of the University of Michigan’s Frankel Cardiovascular Center. Around one in five patients opted for a virtual visit, while the rest had face-to-face visits with their dietitian, the researchers said. Patients who received this diet coaching experienced significant declines in their “bad” LDL cholesterol and triglycerides, both of which decrease the risk of heart disease. In the end, the researchers found no significant difference in results between telemedicine and in-person visits. The new study was published recently in the Journal of Clinical Lipidology. “Access to nutrition… read on > read on >

In sickness and in health — and in blood pressure, too? A new international study finds that if your blood pressure rises with time, your spouse’s might, also. “Many people know that high blood pressure is common in middle-aged and older adults, yet we were surprised to find that among many older couples, both husband and wife had high blood pressure in the U.S., England, China and India,” said study senior author Dr. Chihua Li, a post-doctoral fellow at the University of Michigan. “For instance, in the U.S., among more than 35% of couples who were ages 50 or older, both had high blood pressure,” Li said in a news release from the American Heart Association (AHA). Li’s team published its findings Dec. 6 in the Journal of the American Heart Association. High blood pressure is a common complaint among Americans, and the risk of hypertension rises with age. According to the AHA, almost half (about 47%) of adult Americans had high blood pressure in 2020, and it contributed to 120,000 deaths that year. In the new study, Li and colleagues looked at rates of high blood pressure among nearly 34,000 heterosexual couples worldwide: 4,000 U.S. couples, 1,100 couples in England, more than 6,500 Chinese couples and over 22,000 Indian couples. Data was collected between 2015 and 2019, depending on the country. High blood pressure… read on > read on >