Women are at greater danger because of the lack of attention to HIV/AIDS at home.

Posted July 31, 2008 – What you might not have heard in the new HIV/AIDS reports that have been released in the last couple of days is that Black women are at greater danger from getting HIV/AIDS now more than ever. As Dr. Helene Gayle, President/CEO of CARE, put it during a recent media conference call that the Black AIDS Institute held earlier this week: “Black women are particularly affected by the domestic AIDS response and attention to their needs are inadequate.

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The next possible first lady is taking it from all sides.

Posted July 29, 2008 -She’s been called unpatriotic, an “angry black woman,” the “b” word and much more. But we’ve watched with pride and a little fear as the wife of the first serious African American presidential contender, Michelle Obama, came into her own, weathering the critics and media onslaughts and gracefully soften her image. But we know the attacks will only become more swift and ugly as the campaign gets underway. Will she still be as graceful in her handling of the Republican right’s vitriol? And, what is all of this doing to how Black female’s see themselves?

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Posted July 26, 2008 – There’s new evidence that breast self exams don’t lengthen the life of a breast cancer patient. But what the report doesn’t say is that a lot of women, including my own mother and CBS Morning Show host Robin Roberts have detected cancerous lumps in their breast as a result of the procedure.

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The Bronx native learned to swim in Newark after nearly drowning

Posted July 23, 2008 – It took a near-drowning experience to get Cullen Jones to become a swimmer. Now Jones, 24, is not only hoping to win Olympic Gold, but also to help young African American boys and girls champion over their own water fears.

“It’s just a torch that was passed on to me by many other Black swimmers that have been before me — Maritza Correia, Byron Davis. It’s something that we’ve all tried to push and try and get more and more kid,” he told ABC’s Good Morning America. “It’s definitely not a burden; it’s just a cause of mine.”

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Posted July 21, 2008 – Grammy award winning entertainer Kanye West is doing something good for the human race. He’s performing at the finish line of the Nike+Human Race finish line, capping off a worldwide event that will host one million runners across 25 cities across the globe and 25 acts, including Kelly Rowland, who will perform from Paris on August 31. The 10k race – being billed as the World’s Largest One Day Running Event, celebrates runners and their sport, offering participants across the globe the chance to run and compete together in an unprecedented race experience for charity. Spanning multiple continents, Nike+ Human Race cities will include LA, New York, London, Madrid, Paris, Istanbul, Melbourne, Shanghai, São Paulo and Vancouver among others. Following races in each city, participants will be treated to an exclusive music concert featuring one of today’s top artists. Participants will be able to run for a cause as a portion of funds raised will be donated to three Nike+ Human Race beneficiaries: WWF, the global conservation organization, Lance Armstrong Foundation and UN refugee agency’s ninemillion.org campaign. The race will be open to anyone, anywhere. Runners outside of the 25 race day cities can join by logging into nikeplus.com. Watch what Kanye has to say about it all in his PSA below.

Posted July 17, 2008 – It really takes some guts to come forward with a disease, linked to drug use and exposure to tainted blood. So, I applaud Natalie Cole’s announcement earlier this week that she’s being treated for Hepatitis C, which attacks your  liver and causes a number of side effects such as fatigue, muscle aches and dehydration. It’s not uncommon, health experts say, for the disease to cause problems years after the initial exposure. And doctors like Cole’s illness to her past drug use. As you know, the Grammy-award winning singer battled addiction drug addiction decades ago and may have contracted the disease then. Other ways of being exposed to the infection include blood transfusion, organ transplant, kidney dialysis and sex. The infection often shows no symptoms, but once established, a chronic infection can cause liver scaring or cancer. The African American Council on Liver Awareness has been concerned over the increase in the number of Black folks with Hep C. The seriousness of hepatitis C is compounded by the fact that African Americans tend to get the most resistant strain of the virus, and treatment is not always effective. The group is attempting to get more Black people into trials, and educate people about the disease. If you want more information, call the AACLA at 1.888.436.HEP C (4372) or go here for a fact sheet. And, in the meantime, please send your prayers to Natalie.

Teens, Get Those Bodies Moving!
Posted July 16, 2008 – The lack of activity among today’s teens shocked even the researches who studied them in one of the largest survey’s to date to show that as children age their exercise levels is nearly nonexistent. At 9 years old, the kids got on average about three hours of moderate to vigorous physical activity a day from activities like bike riding, skate boarding, jump rope or basketball. But, by the time they turned 15, their activity had dropped down to about 49 minutes a day. On the weekends, it was even worse – kids got about 35 minutes a day. “What shocked me was the sharp decline in activity,” said Dr. Philip Nader, a former pediatrics professor at the University of California-San Diego and the lead researcher for the study. The truth of the matter is that this inactivity has led to too many teens being entirely too fat. Teen obesity has tripled in the last three decades, government figures show. If that’s not a signal that there’s an epidemic I don’t know what is. Yes, the government is partly to blame for kicking exercise out of our schools. But, what ever happen to dance, and cheerleading practice, and basketball? Aren’t those things cool anymore? Teens: PICK UP THE iPOD AND START DANCING. STEP AWAY FROM THE COMPUTER AND GET MOVING. And if you have a computer, go to an exercise site like at Men’s Health or the hollywoodtrainer.com and kick it to a couple of online videos before you go to school. You can even download a free workout to your iPod here. Walk, ride a bike, get the water gun out, do some calisthenics, do something because fat ain’t sexy. It not only is’t cool, but it’s not healthy. Want to find some activities to get you and your children out of the house and moving? Go to BET.com/Body & Soul.

Stress-and-lifestyle-related heart disease is preventable, one doctor told the NAACP
Stress, unequal treatment in the U.S. healthcare system and couch-potato/video-game lifestyles are killing Black Americans, health professionals told an audience at the NAACP on Saturday.

“We have a heart-obsessed society, but not a heart-healthy society,” Dr. Pamela Redden, former chief of staff in the Huron Hospital, a part of Cleveland Clinic Health Systems, said during a health symposium at the 99th Annual NAACP National Convention downtown.”It’s the organ that keeps us alive, but it’s the No. 1 killer in America.”

As you know by now Black Americans — particularly Black women — are more likely to die from heart-related illnesses, such as coronary heart disease, than all other Americans. But what’s different about the message at the NAACP convention is that many of the medical professionals pointed out that stress – worrying over whether you’ve got enough money to take care of your kids, or how you’re going to get done all you need to do, or whatever – is one of the things that’s killing us. Dr. Fleda M. Jackson found that a leading cause of infant mortality was elevated stress levels of Black women.

“We need a revolution. We need a radical change in the way we view our health,” said Dr. Marilyn Gaston, former U.S. assistant surgeon general and one of the panelists Saturday. “These are preventable. They’re not just statistics … They represent us when we fail to make a change.”

And, of course, one of the number one solutions for that stress: GET FIT. That doesn’t mean losing a bunch of weight all at one time, or trying to run a marathon. What the medical experts urged was just start gradually to do something for your health, whether it’s taking a walk after you eat or popping in a 20-minute workout video before you go to work, or taking a boxing class. They drove home the point that women should put their own health first (instead of the well-being of others); determine their own risk factors, like family history; practice prevention; get fit and manage their stress levels.

Find out more about what’s happening at the NAACP Convention here.

Posted July 10, 2008 – O.K., parents, if your child is overweight, it’s not cute any more. Too many little children are getting adult-sized illnesses because they’re eating too much of the wrong foods and not doing anything physical. And playing video games, other than the Wii Fitness doesn’t county. The problem has gotten so bad that now the Feds are telling doctors to begin prescribing statins – those cholesterol fighting drugs grownups take – to children. That’s not a good idea by any measure. First, no one knows what the long-term effects of taking a statin drug will have on young people. Also, in this pop-a-pill-for-every-problem society, why would we put a child on drugs without first figuring out whether changing his or her diet and activities would bring down the catastrophic cholesterol rates in children that can lead to heart problems and diabetes later on. Is that too much like work? I say, get those kids off the couch, stop using the TV as a babysitter and stop substituting fast food for a healthy home-cooked meal. If you can’t cook, there are plenty of fast-frozen vegetables and add-a-meat meals in the freezer section that make for quick, no effort dinners or lunches. Here are some other ways to eat healthy on a budget. Also, BET.com’s Body & Soul has some ideas.

Posted July 7, 2008 – Ladies, you’ve seen the commercials pumping up the One vaccine you should get to protect yourself from type of cervical cancer you get from HPV – Human Papilloma Virus. But this weekend, the vaccine was in the news for a different reason. There are reports that some teen girls who’d been vaccinated with the HPV vaccine Gardasil have suffered paralysis and other ailments. And, at least 10 young women have died since last September soon getting the vaccine, according to Food and Drug Administration records obtained by a private US watchdog group. Judicial Watch, a conservative watchdog group that checks government accountability, said the total number of deaths in the US linked to Gardasil was “at least 18 and as many as 20.” But the group conceded it had no proof the vaccine caused the deaths. It said the FDA records, obtained under freedom-of-information laws, produced 40 serious reports, of which 27 were life threatening. There’s been as many as 2,300 complaints. But the documents do not show a causal link between Gardasil and patient reactions, the FDA says. FDA spokeswoman Kelly Riley said there was nothing in the reports to cause a review of the vaccine. “These adverse-reaction reports have not been analyzed,” she told U.S News & World Report. “If there’s a death after someone received a vaccine, and long after if they had a car crash, a bee sting … these would be filled out. It does not mean that Gardasil caused it.”

For some perspective, the vaccine is a relatively new drug that the government allowed Merck to fast-track to market with less than 2,000 human tests.  The reports of illnesses are true and not to be taken lightly. However, it’s the only vaccine available right now that fights HPV, genital Human Papilloma Virus (HPV), which is one of the most common sexually transmitted infections. The disease causes genital warts, but in many cases cause no other symptoms. Left untreated, though, it can lead to sterility or cervical cancer. By March, close to 20 million vaccine doses had been distributed worldwide. But since the beginning of the fight to get girls vaccinated for HPV across the country there’s been controversy about giving a vaccine to young girls who are not sexually active to ward off a virus that they may or may not get. From a historical perspective, people fought against the polio vaccine when it was first introduced. And they’ll probably fight the wide distribution of an HIV vaccine when it’s finally discovered. Whether you should give your teen daughter a vaccine or take it yourself is a decision not to be taken lightly. Right now, it is the only thing standing between millions of women and most of the common types of HPV that are linked to one of the most deadly forms of cancer. The fact is Black women suffer from way more STDs than the rest of America. Before deciding against being vaccinated against this common STD, talk to your doctors or other medical folks you trust instead of taking for granted the claims of a group that might be fighting this vaccine solely on the basis that at its root is a cancer caused by a sexually transmitted disease.