"ICE" (In Case of Emergency) Campaign

We all carry our mobile phones with names & numbers stored in its memory but nobody, other than ourselves, knows which of these numbers belong to our closest family or friends. If we were to be involved in an accident or were taken ill, the people attending us would have our mobile phone but wouldn't know who to call. Yes, there are hundreds of numbers stored but which one is the contact person in case of an emergency? Hence this "ICE" (In Case of Emergency) Campaign. The concept of "ICE" is catching on quickly. It is a method of contact during emergency situations. As cell phones are carried by the majority of the population, all you need to do is store the number of a contact person or persons who should be contacted during emergency under the name "ICE" ( In Case Of Emergency). The idea was thought up by a paramedic who found that when he went to the scenes of accidents, there were always mobile phones with patients, but they didn't know which number to call. He therefore thought that it would be a good idea if there was a nationally recognized name for this purpose. In an emergency situation, Emergency Service personnel and hospital Staff would be able to quickly contact the right person by simply dialing the number you have stored as "ICE." For more than one contact name simply enter ICE1, ICE2 and ICE3 etc. A great idea that will make a difference! Let's spread the concept of ICE by storing an ICE number in our Mobile phones today! Please forward this. It won't take too many "forwards" before everybody will know about this It really could save your life, or put a loved one's mind at rest. Remember: ICE will speak for you when you are not able to!

2FACE Acquires la cachette

Video – Patience Ozokwo aka Mama G, and Nkem Owoh aka Osuofia Star In New MTN Advert

Video: Don Jazzy Exclusive Interview – We Almost Sold Mo’Hits Records

Police Discovered Ritualists, Fraudsters’ Shrine in Ogun State

Ogun State Police Command has uncovered a shrine which allegedly belongs to ritualists and fraudsters in Ewualase Village, Ogijo, behind NNPC Mosinmi depot, in Sagamu Local Government Area of the state. The new Commissioner of Police in the state, Mr. Ikemefunna Okoye, who conducted newsmen and his men round the shrine for on the-spot assessment yesterday said the discovery was made on Monday. According him, the Ogijo Divisional Headquarters through high level intelligence gathering learnt about the shrine, the operations of the suspected ritualists and went into action. He said: “I gave them directives and they swung action that eventually led to the arrest of two people at the shrine. For now all we can say is that they are using this place for either rituals or to defraud people or both”. Okoye assured that the Command would do thorough investigations on the activities of the suspects, adding that the two suspects arrested would be charged to court after completion of the investigations. In a related development, the Command yesterday arrested an armed robber as well as recovered a snatched vehicle.

47 year-old Married Woman Jailed for Having Sex in Car with 15 year- old Boy

A married woman had *x with a 15-year-old schoolboy in her car after enticing him by flashing flashing her breasts on the internet. Susan Millman, 47, used a webcam to try and tempt other teenage boys by promising them sex in video shows online. Millman, from Grimsby, whose husband runs a coach company, has now been jailed for 18 months after admitting two offenses of causing the teenage boy to engage in s*x with her in her Jeep. Grimsby Crown Court also banned her from working with children for life and ordered to sign on the S*x Offenders’ Register for 10 years. Photographs of her appeared on a social networking site and were viewed by teenagers. Police became aware when an adult was informed and the victim was interviewed. Prosecuting barrister James Byatt said Millman’s initial contact with the youth was on Facebook and was of a friendly nature prior to the two offences between September and November 2010 and January and March 2011. He said: ‘She took a caring attitude and he confided in her. He felt he could unburden himself and they had hugs. After rows with his mother he felt he could go to confide in her. Millman met the boy on one occasion. Mr Byatt added: “The nature of the communication changed and it became more s*xual. She would comment on his good looks. “There was a message for him on Facebook every day and texts of a sexual nature were sent. There were so many he asked her to stop it when he was at school.” Mr Byatt gave details of the first sexual encounter when she picked him up in her Jeep. On another occasion he climbed out of his bedroom window and again she picked him up in the Jeep in which they had intercourse. Detectives later discovered evidence on a webcam of her revealing herself and making provocative statements to one of the boys. She was arrested on May 24 and told police the contact had not been sexual – just kisses. She told police: “He is chatty and bubbly, just like me.” Mr Byatt said the youth could not consent to having sex and she should have been aware of his emotional development. Having had contact with his mother in the past, she ought to have realised the boy’s vulnerable state, he said. In a statement on the impact on her son, his mother said there had been upset and he was “more insecure”. The statement said the youth felt embarrassed and partly to blame. The defendant, dressed in a blouse and black trousers, sobbed throughout, with her head bowed. For Millman, Simon Hirst said his client was adamant it was no fault of the teenager. He said: “She feels she has let a large number of people down. Her life will never be the same. “There was no element of planning. She behaved totally inappropriately and she takes total blame.” Mr Hirst said his client felt low self esteem at the time. Mr Millman went to work at 6.30am, until very late and she gained attention from the youth. Mr Hirst said: “The relationship may have compensated for shortcomings in her marriage. She is remorseful and accepts full responsibility.” Judge David Tremberg told Millman: “You were in a position of trust. You could not have failed to know that any form of amorous relationship, let alone full sexual relations with a boy 30 years your junior would have been wholly inappropriate and illegal. “You were prepared to engage him on Facebook, by telephone and texts. “At the time you were involved he should have been concentrating at school. He did not need to be distracted.” He added she had “willingly” exposed herself to the boys on the internet and that the incident had harmed the boys relationship with his mother. Following the hearing, investigating officer Detective Sergeant Stewart Watson said: “Female sex offenders should not be treated any differently. I am satisfied the court has recognised that.” He said officers at Humberside Police safeguarding team were keen to hear from any other victims: “I would urge victims of sex offences not to be put off by the justice system. There are support mechanisms in place.

War In Lagos House-Remi Tinubu,Joke Adefulire Battle First Lady Abimbola Fashola

The tales flying over the relationship between ex Gov. Bola Tinubu’s wife,Senator Oluremi Tinubu and Deputy Governor of Lagos,Hon.Joke Adefulire on one hand and the First Lady of the state,Chief Mrs.Abimbola Fashola,is not palatable at all. Gist bearers are alleging that Remi Tinubu and her pal Deputy Gov.Adefulire are at daggers drawn against Fashola’s wife. Insiders say the battle developed because First Lady Abimbola a few months ago,just after Adefulire has been named as the Deputy Governorship candidate,confronted her at a function,with the comment that she (Adefulire) did not inform anyone that she wanted the Deputy Governorship job.This remark was alleged to have infuriated the Deputy Governor who reported the matter to her godmother,Senator Remi Tinubu. Those who bear the gist say the First Lady was summoned to Bourdillon,Ikoyi the home of ACN leader,Asiwaju Tinubu where she was berated for her comments. Those in the know say this incident is the main reason Abimbola Fashola is keeping away from the company of the Deputy Governor and her predecessor,Sen.Remi Tinubu.

Obama Vs. Obama, Part 2: Of 'Grand Bargains' and Lost Hope

I can't stop thinking about the Washington Post's long tick-tock piece detailing the collapse of the debt-reduction negotiations between President Obama and John Boehner. The piece, by Peter Wallsten, Lori Montgomery, and Scott Wilson, was titled "Obama's Evolution: Behind the Failed 'Grand Bargain' on the Debt," but it might just as well have been called "Obama's Devolution." A few days before the piece came out, I made the case that the 2012 election has two tracks: Obama vs. Mitt Romney (assuming he'll be the GOP nominee) and Obama vs. Obama. This second track pits the soaring, audacious, hope-generating, change-seeking Campaigning Obama against the cautious, compromising, status-quo-maintaining Governing Obama. Campaign Obama came to Washington promising to change the way the system works, but in many instances he let himself become captive to the most destructive and entrenched Washington shibboleths. One of these is the very notion of a big, bipartisan "Grand Bargain" in which the Very Serious Wise Elders of Washington finally have the courage to do the right thing about entitlements and the budget, and bravely stand up to seniors, the middle class, students, the disabled, the working poor, and children (whose influence, according to the Grand Bargain theory, dominates our political system), and tell them the party is over. And it's never questioned why this courageously-doing-the-right-thing-bipartisan-Grand-Bargain somehow always means screwing the middle class and working people. It's just assumed, as it is in the Post story, that there's no other way to do business in DC. At least not any way that is considered Very Serious. Getting out of wars not in our national security interest? Not Serious. And a sign of being the party of wimps. Asking the wealthy to pay more? Not Serious. And class warfare to boot! It's further assumed that the Grand Bargain, almost regardless of the policy details, is in-and-of-itself a good thing. Reaching a Grand Bargain deal is itself the win -- because it means Washington's actually doing something. Unasked is whether that something is actually good for the country. It's just assumed that it is. So, according to the piece, while the Grand Bargain on the debt was on the table, the White House saw Obama as "a politically selfless president willing to rise above the partisan fray and make difficult choices for the good of the country." What is alarming is that President Obama himself bought into these establishment assumptions. Of course, it was known at the time that the president was seeking the Grand Bargain, and was in on-again, off-again negotiations with John Boehner. But what wasn't known was how committed he was to making it happen. As Jonathan Chait put it in his excellent post on the piece, "Obama was even more desperate to cut a deal than previously believed -- dangerously desperate, in fact." The details of the deal included $1.2 trillion in government cuts, reductions in cost-of-living raises on Social Security recipients (Very Serious!), around $250 billion in cuts from Medicare by raising the eligibility age (Even More Serious!), and $800 billion in new tax revenues. This last part was pretty much total nonsense -- it was the estimated rise in revenue due to the growth that would come from reforming the tax code. And last but definitely not least, because a proposal is not Very Serious if it just screws middle class and working families without also containing giveaways to the rich (finally, someone brave enough to do that), the Grand Bargain would have extended the Bush tax cuts -- and dropped the tax rate even lower. Chait's summary: Okay, so the Republicans were demanding big tax cuts for the rich -- lower income tax rates, and keeping in place the tax breaks that most benefit the rich, thereby insuring that the burden of any higher revenue would fall on the non-rich. Obama, incredibly, agreed to that -- he agreed to a debt reduction plan that would exempt the wealthy from any sacrifice, and indeed protect them from the possibility that their tax rates would rise when the Bush tax cuts expire. Not exactly the kind of change he campaigned on. Could such an odious deal have been what anybody was hoping for when they watched that beautiful moment of Obama and his family standing in front of the emotion-filled crowd in Grant Park on election night? Apparently the biggest sticking point wasn't the fact that the deal called for reducing the budget deficit on the backs of seniors, the middle class, and the poor, or that it was a huge giveaway to the rich. It was the $800 billion in bogus revenue. But, according to Bill Daley, Obama's chief of staff at the time, "everybody was saying the right thing," and "we walked away feeling that we were 80 percent there." Characterizing support of most of the details of that deal as "saying the right thing" captures everything that's wrong with Washington. And a president who was "80 percent" okay with that deal is a far cry from the president most Obama supporters thought they were supporting. Then there's this gem: "A senior administration official said the White House team recognized that the two offers were coalescing and that the time for a decision was at hand. People asked themselves, the official said: Is this something we can sell? Is this a deal we can live with?" What they failed to ask themselves, it seems, is whether it was a deal millions of struggling Americans could live with. Of course, for those Americans, unlike the dealmakers, this wouldn't be a metaphorical question. But, as their lives got tougher, they could at least console themselves with the knowledge that some rich politicians in Washington were finally brave enough to stand up to them and give the money that used to pay for their benefits to some other rich people. The piece goes on to detail that the deal collapsed when Obama tried to include elements of a bipartisan Senate deal floated during the White House/Boehner negotiations. Though, as Chait notes, the real collapse was likely because Boehner never had the votes in his caucus for a deal that included even phony revenue increases. And that's why, at the end of the process, after the president offered to accept the original deal, Boehner turned him down. And that's how the intransigence of those newly-elected Tea Party freshmen ended up saving Obama from himself. After the deal collapsed, Obama made the "pivot" to jobs, but did so without ever acknowledging how far down the road of Republican dogma he'd gone. The deal fell through, the president said that week in a prime time address about the debt ceiling, because "a significant number of Republicans in Congress are insisting on a different approach -- a cuts-only approach -- an approach that doesn't ask the wealthiest Americans or biggest corporations to contribute anything at all." But, in fact, it would appear from this piece that the president was fine, or at least 80 percent fine, with not asking the wealthiest Americans to contribute anything at all. Since then, the president has continued to pivot away from prioritizing the deficit and has been focusing on jobs. And he repeatedly lets his base know it. This is great, but it's a bit like a husband wanting credit for being faithful -- and then you find out later that it was only because he tried to have an affair but got turned down. The piece also ominously notes that "White House officials said this week that the offer is still on the table." The White House disputes this, but, until now, they weren't exactly forthcoming about the extent to which it was not only on the table -- but on the verge of being served. Why did the administration prioritize debt reduction in the first place? The answer is found in this excerpt from David Corn's new book, Showdown: "Plouffe was concerned that voter unease about the deficit could become unease about the president. The budget issue was easy to understand; you shouldn't spend more money than you have." But in fact, unlike a family, the government doesn't have to tighten its belt in lean times. Indeed, the government can create demand by expanding when families are forced to contract -- and by growing the economy, it can help reduce the deficit. This isn't that hard to understand (though much of Washington and the media don't seem to), but Obama never trusted the American people enough to even try to make that case. Instead, his reaction to the midterm disaster was to pivot to the worst sort of Washington dogmas. Rather than double down on his own message, he adopted 80 percent of the other side's. "The depth of political malpractice here is just mind-blowing," writes Paul Krugman of the Plouffe excerpt. "It's the economy, stupid, not the deficit." Or, as Greg Sargent put it, "Dems and White House officials knew that the policy justification for the pivot to deficit reduction was flimsy at best. But they decided they couldn't win the short-term argument, and went ahead and pivoted, anyway." So now that the president has pivoted to jobs and growth, will there be any more pivots away from them in the second term? Will the lure of the Grand Bargain return? And if it does, how much is Obama willing to give up to sign it? Millions did what he asked in the first campaign and voted their hopes, but how many were hoping for the Grand Bargain we really got? Hope is great, but what the country needs in an Obama second term is not hope, but real change.

Landon Crabtree, 8-Year-Old, Uses iPad App To Catch Tennessee Burglar

A burglar allegedly responsible for multiple break-ins was outsmarted last week by an 8-year-old boy.

Third-grader Landon Crabtree used a tracking device application he'd downloaded to find an iPad and other possessions recently stolen from his family's home in Manchester, Tenn.

He activated the app from a computer in his house and it revealed that the pilfered iPad was at a nearby motel, the Tennessean reported.

Crabtree told his dad, who called the police. Within the hour Coffee County Sheriff's deputies called to say they'd arrested a suspect, according to the Associated Press.

"You don't mess with our family," said Landon, who wants to be an FBI agent when he grows up, according to WTVF.

Police arrested John Docherty, who they said had used the Ambassador Inn Motel to stash a trove of items stolen during a string of recent burglaries in central Tennessee.

The charges against Docherty widened when a detective in nearby Franklin County saw him on television and recognized that he matched the sketch of a wanted thief there.

DOMESTIC VIOLENCE-A SIGN OF COWARDICE!!!!!

who ever did this must be purnished accordingly

What Happens When You Die?

Hi everybody. Cara Santa Maria here. Perhaps you're one of the eight million Americans who claim to have had a near-death experience. Did you see a bright white light at the end of a tunnel? Maybe you floated above yourself in an out-of-body experience. Overwhelmingly, people who've had so-called near-death symptoms report a calmness, lack of fear, and feeling of being one with the universe.

A relatively simple explanation of the near-death experience requires little scientific reasoning and absolutely no measurable evidence. If someone is on death's door and then suddenly pulled back into the realm of the living, perhaps he or she glimpsed into the moments prior to the soul leaving the body and joining the great cosmic consciousness beyond. This ghost-in-the-shell hypothesis, if you could call it that, is ubiquitous and seems to satisfy the imaginations of the public at large. In fact, 71% of Americans believe in the persistence of the soul after death. And in 1907, Massachusetts physician Duncan MacDougall claims to have measured the mass of the soul as it exited the body upon its passing--21 grams, to be exact.

Granted, nobody has ever managed to reproduce MacDougall's findings, and there exists not a single shred of physical evidence as to the existence of the, lets face it, fundamentally unmeasurable soul. So, scientists have set out to find an evidence-based explanation for near-death phenomena.

First of all, I think it's interesting to note that the vast majority of near-death survivors never actually report having a near-death experience. And in one study, around half of the people who reported one were not actually in danger of dying. What's clear is that when the brain undergoes severe trauma, like reduced oxygen flow, blood pressure drops, or sharp increases in blood carbon dioxide levels, interesting things start to happen psychologically.

First, a white light at the end of a tunnel, as David Hovda, of the UCLA Brain Injury Research Center explains, is the only thing we can really expect a person to see as they get closer and closer to death. For efficiency's sake, the brain tends to function only in areas needed for basic survival, like the hindbrain, which includes the pons and medulla. Given that the rest of the higher brain regions are essentially shut down, if visual areas like the superior colliculus or occipital cortex are suddenly activated, no higher-level processing can exist, and a bright light is all we would be able to see.

And in 2005, researchers in Switzerland found that the so-called out-of-body experience so commonly reported in near-death cases can be induced by stimulating the temporo-parietal junction on the right side of the brain. This research offers compelling evidence that disruption of the very brain region thought to be responsible for sensory integration and the so-called sixth sense of proprioception--or understanding where your body is in space--could produce a sensation like we're floating above our own bodies. And anyone who has abused the drugs ketamine or dextromethorphan understands what a dissociative anesthetic can do. These drugs act on NMDA receptors in the brain and can produce a sensation that you're detached from your own body or even from the world. Knowing that out-of-body experiences can be induced both during neurosurgery and recreational drug use provides clues that such experiences likely have a neurological basis.

And in my opinion, one of the most fascinating, yet highly controversial explanations of near-death phenomena comes from Dr. Rick Strassman, who, in the 1990s, proposed that dimethyltryptamine, or DMT, is actually found within the human brain and released in large quantities from the pineal gland during death's approach (and perhaps during birth, as well). DMT is a naturally occurring psychedelic, and it's been dubbed the spirit molecule for its intense psychotropic properties. So, if Strassman's research pans out, it could be the case that the near-death experience is little more than a really good trip.

What do you think? You can reach out me on Twitter, Facebook, or leave your comments right here on The Huffington Post. Come on, talk nerdy to me!

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Molly Brown, Titanic Survivor, Is Honored In New Exhibit (PHOTOS)

This May 29, 1912 photograph on display at the Molly Brown Museum shows Mrs. J.J. "Molly" Brown presenting a trophy cup award to Capt. Arthur Henry Rostron for his service in the rescue of the passengers on Titanic that sunk April 15, 1912. (AP Photo/Molly Brown Museum)

DENVER — Thousands of miles from the ocean, a museum tells the story of a woman made famous by the Titanic. No, her name was not Rose, and a movie about her life, "The Unsinkable Molly Brown," starring Debbie Reynolds as a plucky lifeboat survivor, was a hit decades before Kate Winslet's doomed romance in "Titanic."

Molly Brown was a real person, but the movie created a myth that the museum, located in Brown's Denver home, attempts to dispel.

Born in 1867 to Irish immigrants in Hannibal, Mo., Brown struck it rich, with her husband, from a Colorado gold mine years before she boarded the Titanic, and in later years, she fought for women's suffrage and labor rights.

No one called her Molly during her lifetime – her name was Margaret – and biographer Kristen Iversen, author of "Molly Brown: Unraveling the Myth," writes that there's no proof she ever referred to herself as "unsinkable." The nickname seems to have originated with a Denver gossip columnist who may have been mad that Brown gave her account of the Titanic disaster to a newspaper in Newport, R.I., where she also spent time. Iversen says two books written in the 1930s created the image of Brown as a gun-packing, wisecracking former saloon girl, accounts that became the basis of the Broadway play and later the 1964 musical starring Reynolds. Molly Brown also appears in James Cameron's "Titanic," portrayed by Kathy Bates.

Brown eventually separated from her husband and, unlike on screen, they never reunited. That gave her the freedom to indulge in travel, and in 1912, she headed to Egypt with John Jacob Astor and his wife. She cut the trip short to visit her ailing grandson back in the U.S., and set sail on the Titanic from France, where the ship made one stop to pick up passengers and provisions.

Brown wrote that she was watching from a deck after the Titanic hit the iceberg and was thrown into lifeboat No. 6. She rowed all night with its mostly female crew until the rescue ship Carpathia arrived.

Before the disaster, Brown was well known in the Mile High City for her charity and social reform work, such as fundraising to build Immaculate Conception Cathedral and mountain camps for poor children and orphans. After the sinking, she gained fame for raising money from rich Titanic survivors to help poorer passengers, making sure they had a place to go when they got to New York.

In 1914, she was called on to help ease tensions after 20 people, including women and children, died when the National Guard opened fire on striking coal miners and set fire to a tent colony in Ludlow, an operation owned by John D. Rockefeller. Brown also helped with relief efforts during World War I and ran for the U.S. Senate in 1914, six years before women could vote nationally.

The museum, a few blocks from the state Capitol, is offering Titanic-themed tours this year and some recent visitors sang songs from the musical on the front porch as they waited to begin. At the end, they were surprised to learn that Brown, despite having just an eighth-grade education, spoke several languages – which came in handy with the Titanic's international collection of passengers – and had planned to take another trip on the Titanic, in part to take advantage of its well-stocked library.

Some of her own books are included in the museum's library, which like the rest of the home is lit by dim 15-watt bulbs like the ones she used. Upstairs, there's a copy of Brown's Titanic insurance claim, recording the loss of items including 14 hats, "street furs" and a $20,000 necklace. There are no Titanic items in the stone Victorian – which was saved from demolition in 1970 – thought there is a binnacle, a nonmagnetic stand that held navigational instruments, from the Titanic's sister ship, the Olympic.

Brown followed her brother to the mining town of Leadville, Colo., when she was 18 and got a job in a dry goods store. After marrying mining engineer J.J. Brown, she moved out of town to be closer to the mines during the winter.

Janet Kalstrom, a retired banking project manager who has been the museum's Brown impersonator for six years, said that the five-mile trip is a rough 45 minutes by four-wheel drive today and may hold some clues to Brown's toughness.

"Adventure ran in her blood so the strength and courage came from just plugging away," she said.

Brown died in 1932 in New York City while pursuing another lifelong passion – acting.

To mark the Titanic anniversary, the museum is hosting a six-course meal, like first-class ship passengers might have had, on April 14 at Denver's historic Oxford Hotel. Brown's great-granddaughter, Muffet Laurie Brown – the daughter of the baby grandchild Brown was rushing home to see – will attend the benefit gala. In August, the museum plans a more affordable Steerage Class Shindig, featuring beer and an Irish band.

___

If You Go...

MOLLY BROWN HOUSE MUSEUM: 1340 Pennsylvania St., Denver; or 303-832-4092. Regular tours last 45 minutes and are offered every 30 minutes, Tuesday-Saturday, 10 a.m.-3:30 p.m.; Sundays, noon-3:30 p.m. Adults, $8, children 6-12, $4. Special Titanic-themed tours are available by advance reservation (adults, $10, children 6-12, $6). http://www.mollybrown.org

10 Jobs That Can Lead to Depression

Any job can be stressful, but some carry an especially heavy toll on mental health. These 10 jobs could be a bad match for people prone to depression.

About 7 percent of American workers experience episodes of depression each year. Having the wrong job can be bad for your emotional health in general, but the wrong job can be a major contributing factor to depression. Stressful jobs, jobs with low pay, and jobs that don't get much respect from the public are among the those with the highest rates of depressed workers. And while any job can contribute depression if it is not the right job for you, the following 10 careers are particularly challenging.




Caregiving: High Depression Risk
If you take care of sick people at home or at work, you are at higher risk for depression. According to the 2007 National Survey on Drug Use and Health (NSDUH), which ranked 21 occupations by rate of major depressive episodes among full-time employees aged 18 to 64, 10.8 percent of workers in personal care suffer depression — the worst of any field. Full-time caregiving is demanding and emotionally draining. If you are a caregiver at a nursing home, you’re probably not very well paid. If you are a caregiver at home, in all likelihood you’re not paid at all. Studies show that depression is the most common emotional health problem among caregivers.



Food Service: Low Pay and High Demands
Rude and demanding customers, low pay, and unsympathetic bosses are among the reasons the emotional of many food workers is in peril. According to the National Survey on Drug Use and Health (NSDUH), food preparers and food servers come in second on a list of jobs with increased risk of depression. The NSDUH found that more than 10 percent of full-time workers in these careers experienced a major depressive episode.



Social Work: Tough on Emotional Health
A career in social work can be very rewarding, but it’s also very stressful. Social workers deal regularly with the emotional health of others. Working with broken families and abused children requires emotional fortitude and can be very challenging on one’s own mental health. The NSDUH report found that people who work in community and social services have major depression rates of 9.6 percent.



Healthcare: Risk of Depression and Suicide
Doctors, nurses and healthcare technicians may make relatively good salaries, but they tend to work long hours and under often stressful conditions, jeopardizing their emotional health. Medical careers may seem glamorous, especially on TV dramas, but these jobs are not for everyone. The NSDUH report found that healthcare practitioners and technicians have depression rates similar to social workers. Studies over many years have shown that suicide rates are higher among doctors than in the general population.



The Arts: Solitary and Unpredictable
It's not that being creative is bad for your emotional health — in fact the creative professions can be deeply satisfying. However, these careers often come with unpredictable income and many hours spent alone and under-appreciated, all of which can make you unhappy at work. Best-selling authors, big-name entertainers, and famous painters are actually the exceptions, not the rule. The NSDUH study grouped together careers in arts, design, entertainment, sports and media, and came up with a depression risk of 9.1 percent for these stressful jobs.



Teaching: Rewarding Yet Stressful
Teaching could be the toughest job you’ll ever love. It’s another profession that’s often listed as one of the most satisfying occupations, and yet 8.7 percent of educators reported major depression symptoms in the NSDUH study. Teachers have to deal with low starting pay, stressed parents, misbehaving kids, and demanding administrators, all of which are potential threats to emotional health.



Office Work: Unpredictable and Dull
Working in an office and collaborating with colleagues can be fun. But for many, an office job can be a dull, dead-end career that wears away at emotional health. Office politics, high demands, and lack of control are some of the reasons office jobs come in at No. 7 in the NSDUH report, with a depression risk of 8.1 percent. Recent rocky economic times have made office work even more stressful, with many office workers wondering how long they’ll still have a job, health insurance, and a future with their company.



Maintenance Worker: Hard Working Conditions
The vital workers who fix our plumbing, mow our lawns, and get our machines up and running are people we obviously can’t live without. But workers in this sector are often hired at very low wages. What’s more they often are the ones outside working in bad weather when we are inside keeping warm (or cool) and dry. Taken together, these factors could certainly have a negative impact on emotional health. And, according to the NSDUH report, risk of depression among maintenance workers is 7.3 percent — slightly higher than that of the average wage earner




Accounting, Financial Advice: Long Hours and High Stress
Accountants and financial advisors spend their careers taking care of other people's money. If you love working with numbers, this could be a good career for you. But being liable for someone else's fortune can certainly be tough on your emotional health. Studies of accountants show their emotional health is stressed by long hours, tough demands and fears of making mistakes; they report major depression symptoms at a rate of 6.7 percent.



Sales: Tough in a Down Economy
With a rate of 6.7 percent in the NSDUH study, people who work in sales rank alongside those in financial services on the depression scale. The recent economic climate could be hard on anyone's emotional health, but exceedingly so when your career depends on getting people to spend money. If you are risk-averse or not skilled at dealing with people, this career choice could be a downer for you. On the other hand, like all the careers mentioned, sales also can be a great career as long as you have the right tools and disposition.



The Happiest Professions: Architect, Engineer, Surveyor
Wondering which occupational group has the lowest percentage of depressed workers? That would be architects, engineers, and surveyors.

And on a final note, statistically speaking, when it comes to depression, anyone with a job is better off than the unemployed — among whom about 13 percent were found to be depressed

An alarming 25 percent of people with diabetes are unaware that they have the disease

An alarming 25 percent of people with diabetes are unaware that they have the disease — just one reason why the fourth Tuesday of every March is dedicated to raising diabetes awareness.


Are you worried about your chances of developing type 2 diabetes? If you’re not, you should be.

Diabetes Risk Factors

That’s because the numbers are staggering: Nearly 26 million Americans have diabetes, and another 79 million are considered prediabetic and at high risk of developing the condition. Yet perhaps the most frightening statistic of all is that one in four people with diabetes isn’t even aware that he or she has the disease, because the symptoms may be mild to non-existent. And over time, untreated diabetes can cause big health problems — from heart disease to nerve damage to blindness.

But there’s an easy way to find out if you’re at risk of type 2 diabetes. The fourth Tuesday of every March (that’s tomorrow!) is the American Diabetes Association’s Diabetes Alert Day, focused on raising awareness of this disease through a simple online test.

Unlike type 1 diabetes, which is usually first diagnosed in children and teens, type 2 diabetes is more common in those over age 40 (although the numbers of kids with type 2 has also gone up in recent years). Other factors that influence diabetes risk include family history, ethnic background, being obese or overweight, having a history of gestational diabetes (diabetes that develops during pregnancy), or inactivity.

The ADA’s Diabetes Risk Test can’t diagnose type 2 diabetes or prediabetes — for that, you’ll need to visit your doctor. But learning about your diabetes risk can give you the incentive you need to get started on the road to a healthier lifestyle, and in the process cut your chances of getting the disease.

Want more proof? A September 2011 study in Annals of Internal Medicine, which reviewed data from more than 200,000 adults, found the five most important lifestyle factors for preventing type 2 diabetes were eating a healthy diet, keeping body mass index (BMI) below 25, not smoking, getting at least 20 minutes of aerobic exercise a week, and drinking in moderation. And while doing any one of these was shown to reduce diabetes risk, the researchers concluded that accomplishing all five can cut risk by a whopping 80 percent.

To take the Diabetes Risk Test, visit the ADA’s Facebook page or Web site beginning tomorrow, or call 1-800-DIABETES (1-800-342-2383). You’ll be helping to raise funds for a good cause: For each test taken until April 27, 2012, the company Boar’s Head has pledged to donate $5 to the association. And your responses could just turn out to be a life-saver for you or someone you know.

Follow @DiabetesFacts for the latest diabetes news and information from the editors of @EverydayHealth.

One Chocolate A day gets you slimmer

MONDAY, March 26, 2012 (HealthDay News) — Here's a sweet surprise for chocoholics: A new study finds that people who eat chocolate regularly are somewhat skinnier than folks who don't indulge their sweet tooth.

The findings don't prove that chowing down on chocolate will melt off your excess pounds. It's possible that another factor is responsible for the modest difference in body mass, or it might be a statistical fluke.

But for now, study lead author Dr. Beatrice Golomb said the findings "reduce any possible guilt that might come with chocolate consumption." Golomb, an associate professor at the University of California, San Diego, said she hopes to better understand what's going on through future research.

As foods go, chocolate is a hard one to figure out. It includes antioxidants, substances that counteract damaging agents in the body. And consumption of chocolate has been linked in other studies to a variety of positive health effects from lower blood pressure to better cholesterol levels. On the other hand, chocolate can come with plenty of calories and fat.

In the new study, Golomb and colleagues reviewed food questionnaires filled out by nearly 1,000 people who were asked how often they ate chocolate. Their average age was 57, and 68 percent were men.

The researchers then tried to find any connections between chocolate consumption and the body mass index (BMI) of the participants. BMI is a calculation based on height and weight that is used to determine underweight, overweight and obesity in adults.

Participants' average BMI was 28 — overweight but not obese. On average, they ate chocolate twice a week and exercised between three and four times a week.

The study found that those who ate chocolate the most often had lower BMIs than the others, even when the researchers adjusted their statistics so they wouldn't be thrown off by factors such as age, gender, education and fruit and vegetable consumption.

For the typical person, the difference between frequently eating or infrequently eating chocolate could account for a 5- to 7-pound difference, Golomb said.

The findings "certainly weren't explained by the chocolate eaters eating fewer calories. They ate more calories and didn't exercise any more," she said.

It's not clear, however, what kinds of chocolate the participants ate, although most would probably have interpreted the question as asking about candy, Golomb said. Milk chocolate is fattier than dark chocolate.

Golomb cautioned that the study does not say that chocolate consumption will help people lose weight.

"It is not a siren call to go out and eat 20 pounds of chocolate a day," she said.

However, the study suggests that diet composition may influence the body's metabolic processes, and therefore BMI, she said.

So why would chocolate fanciers be thinner than others? Dr. Daniela Jakubowicz, a professor at Tel Aviv University in Israel who has studied chocolate, said previous research has shown that diets that force people to avoid sweets actually make them more drawn to them. In her own research, she found that people were actually better able to tolerate a diet when they ate chocolate.

Golomb said that, ideally, future research will randomly assign some people to eat chocolate and others to avoid it. But that may be a challenge, especially if some participants refuse to go without it.

"We have a few pesky details to iron out," she said.

The study, funded by the U.S. National Institutes of Health, was published online March 26 in Archives of Internal Medicine.

Group sought wedge between blacks, gays to fight same-sex marriage

(CNN) -- A national group opposed to same-sex marriage aimed to fight it by driving "a wedge between gays and blacks" and identifying "glamorous" Latino artists and athletes to advocate traditional marriage, according to newly released confidential memos.
The strategies were among several pursued by the National Organization for Marriage (NOM), which has actively campaigned against same-sex marriage efforts.
The Human Rights Campaign, a gay rights organization, said it obtained the documents, part of a civil action in Maine, on Monday and published them on its website.
"This court-ordered disclosure shows NOM fighting a losing battle with strategy and tactics that are racially and ethnically divisive, filled with false political calculations, and out of touch with the majority of fair-minded Americans," Human Rights Campaign said in a statement.
Most of the memos were written in 2009. The president of NOM did not dispute the authenticity of the memos, saying in an online statement, "Gay marriage is not a civil right."
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The memos highlight several efforts to fight same-sex marriage initiatives, which NOM contended were backed by the "pro-gay Obama agenda."
"The Latino vote in America is a key swing vote, and will be so even more so in the future because of demographic growth," one NOM memo states. "Will the process of assimilation to the dominant Anglo culture lead Hispanics to abandon traditional family values? We can interrupt this process of assimilation by making support for marriage a key badge of Latino identity."
Plans included Spanish language radio and TV ads, pamphlets and YouTube videos.
NOM also targeted what it termed "Democratic power bosses" it claimed were inclined to put the interests of gay rights groups "over the values of African-Americans."
"The strategic goal of this project is to drive a wedge between gays and blacks -- two key Democratic constituencies," another memo states. "Find, equip, energize and connect African-American spokespeople for marriage; develop a media campaign around their objections to gay marriage as a civil right; provoke the gay marriage base into responding by denouncing these spokesmen and women as bigots. No politician wants to take up and push an issue that splits the base of the party."
NOM argued "gay marriage is the tip of the spear, the weapon that will be and is being used to marginalize and repress Christianity and the Church."
The organization said Tuesday it was proud of its "strong record" on minority partnerships.
Brian Brown, president of NOM, touted the group's work with prominent African-American and Hispanic leaders.
"Gay marriage advocates have attempted to portray same-sex marriage as a civil right, but the voices of these and many other leaders have provided powerful witness that this claim is patently false," Brown said in a statement. "Gay marriage is not a civil right, and we will continue to point this out in written materials such as those released in Maine. We proudly bring together people of different races, creeds and colors to fight for our most fundamental institution: marriage."
NOM has been instrumental in the campaign to stop same-sex marriage laws, including Maine.
Lawmakers there in early 2009 approved a measure legalizing such marriages, but voters in the state later that year passed a referendum to overturn the new law.
An effort is currently under way to put a similar measure on the ballot this coming November. A coalition on Tuesday launched Mainers United for Marriage, which wants Maine to become the first state to win marriage for same-sex couples through a ballot measure.
The release of NOM documents follows the successful 2009 efforts to overturn Maine's same-sex marriage law.
The court case came about after the Maine Ethics Commission opened an investigation based on a fund-raising complaint from Fred Karger of Californians Against Hate. He alleged financial backers of Stand for Marriage Maine were concealing their identities. NOM was a major contributor to Stand for Marriage Maine, a political action committee, documents showed.
NOM, which refused to disclose the names of donors, eventually filed a lawsuit. It claims the commission had limited authority to investigate.
Freedom to Marry, which supports same-sex marriage, blasted NOM's tactics, as outlined in memos that were submitted for depositions.
"NOM has spent years working to drive wedges within communities across the nation, all the while claiming it does not 'hate' anyone, gay or non-gay," said group President Evan Wolfson in a statement. "Now exposure of NOM's own strategy memos confirms that NOM will stop at nothing to push its agenda, pitting American against American, minority against minority, family members against family members."

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