What gets dirtier and dirtier the more it cleans? A sponge! The squishy clean-up helpers soak up spills, scrub pots, and scoop up crumbs off of countertops. After multiple uses – and lots of time spent dripping wet – a sponge can become a breeding ground for microscopic and sometimes stinky bacteria. And yet they still get dragged across dishes and dinner tables all the time. Proper care and handling of a kitchen sponge could protect you and your family from foodborne illnesses.
Use sponges wisely – but not all the …

According to a new study the average mobile phone carries 18 times more potentially harmful germs than the flush handle on a men’s toilet.
The analysis of handsets found that almost a quarter were so dirty that they had up to ten times the acceptable level of TVC bacteria.
One of the phones in the test had such high levels of bacteria that it could have given its owner a serious stomach upset.
Elevated levels of TVC indicate poor personal hygiene and act as a breeding ground for other bugs.
The findings from Which? …

Are you hesitant to help people who have collapsed because you don’t want to give them mouth-to-mouth resuscitation? You might be in luck, as two studies published in the New England Journal of Medicine on Thursday show that hands-only CPR could be just as effective.
In fact, according to Gene Emery of Reuters, “When someone collapses suddenly, mouth-to-mouth rescue breathing may not be necessary and could lower the chances of survival… The findings come at a time when less emphasis is being placed on mouth-to-mouth rescue breathing, which people often regard …

One of the first chemotherapy drugs given to patients diagnosed with cancer — especially lung, ovarian or breast cancer — is cisplatin, a platinum-containing compound that gums up tumor cells’ DNA. Cisplatin does a good job of killing those tumor cells, but it can also seriously damage the kidneys, which receive high doses of cisplatin because they filter the blood.
Now a team of scientists at the Harvard-MIT Division of Health Sciences and Technology (HST) has come up with a new way to package cisplatin into nanoparticles that are too big …

Seahorses are helping scientists gain new understanding about how detailed vision develops – in research which may open a way to restore sight in people with age-related blinding diseases.
Researchers at the Vision Centre have found that the seahorses’ eyes share similarities with the human eye, leading to the possibility of imitating the development of the seahorse’s fovea to regenerate this vital region of the eye in people with impaired vision.
“The fovea is the tiny pit at the back of the eye, which is the source of all our detailed vision. …

Good friends and family do more than make life worth living. These relationships can actually add years to your life.
A new study shows that people with lots of close friends and family around will likely live a lot longer than  lonesome people. The study appears in the July issue of PLoS Medicine.
The protective effect of having lots of healthy and fulfilling relationships is comparable to that of quitting smoking, the study authors state.
“Our social relationships are important not only to our quality of life, but also our longevity,” says study …

Sex after menopause? Some experts will tell you it’s a downhill ride of waning sex drive and dried up hormones.
Sorry, we’re not buying it. We happen to think there are plenty of 50-plus babes who are rocking it just as much as in their younger days. (See Madonna.) And there’s no reason the rest of us shouldn’t too.
“You’re not bothered by menses. You’re not bothered by kids in the house. You can have sex in any room in the house,” says Irwin Goldstein, MD, the director of San Diego Sexual …

Nicole Kidman’s nose. Angelina Jolie’s lips. Plastic surgeons say they get these very specific requests regularly and usually oblige.
It’s a way for doctor and patient to be on the same page about the desired outcome. But when the patients veer further — seeking to become a near double for a celebrity, doctors tell CNN they need to draw the line, for ethical reasons and concerns about the patient’s mental health.
Last weekend, reality star Kim Kardashian urged one of her Twitter followers not to undergo plastic surgery to try to look …

Today the Annie E. Casey Foundation released its twenty-first Kids Count Data Book, which measures the well being of children across all 50 states. The foundation, established in 1948, is a private charitable organization, dedicated to helping build better futures for disadvantaged children in the United States. The primary mission of the Foundation is to foster public policies, human-service reforms, and community supports that more effectively meet the needs of today’s vulnerable children and families. The annual data book is one way to illuminate the needs of children throughout the …

When your mind drifts, it’s hard to remember what was going on before you stopped paying attention. Now a new study has found that the effect is stronger when your mind drifts farther – to memories of an overseas vacation instead of a domestic trip, for example, or a memory in the more distant past.
Psychologists have known for a while that context is important to remembering. If you leave the place where a memory was made – its context – it will be harder for you to recall the memory. …