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Peanut Butter by the Tablespoon

Looks like my habit of eating peanut butter directly from the jar paid off.

Dr. Graham Colditz, associate director for cancer prevention and control at Siteman Cancer Center at Barnes-Jewish Hospital and Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, and colleagues at the Harvard Medical School in Boston, said benign breast disease, although non-cancerous, increases risk of breast cancer later in life.

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The researchers found participants who ate peanut butter or nuts two times each week were 39 percent less likely to have developed benign breast disease than those who never ate them.

The study's findings suggest beans, lentils, soybeans and corn also might help prevent benign breast disease, but consumption of these foods were much lower in these girls and thus the evidence was weaker, Colditz said.

They don't say if it does you any good if you keep eating peanut butter past your 30s. Just in case, i'll make sure to have a tablespoon every day. *nom nom nom* (i'm not kidding with that. i eat a tablespoon of pb prolly 4-5days/wk.)

(can anyone tell me why peanut butter that doesn't stick to the roof of your mouth was a selling point in the 40s? i love gooey pb.)

By min | September 26, 2013, 8:19 AM | Science | Link

Mebbe I Don't Really Need That Hernia Surgery That Badly...

Cause having a little bump of intestine pushing out of my abdomen is waaaaaay better than having holes in my brain.

New Hampshire health officials announced last week that hospitals in three New England states may have accidentally exposed 15 people to prions, the infectious protein that ravages the brain and leaves it full of holes.

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To disinfect metal instruments, hospitals put them in an autoclave and steam-heat them to 121 degrees Celsius for about 15 minutes. That's far more than what's needed to wipe out pathogens such as bacteria and viruses, which succumb to mere boiling temperatures in about one minute. Although autoclaving greatly weakens prions, the process may not entirely wipe out these malevolent proteins.

I mean, sure, my hernia's nowhere near my brain, so it's pretty unlikely i'd get infected with the stealth prions, but the sponge brain pathogen is just the thing they know about right now. Who knows what other stealthy, autoclave-resistant pathogens they've got sitting on their surgical tools?