HEALTHY LIFE
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Wednesday, February 13, 2008

NOT A TOY

Fire officials seek ban on novelty lighters

BREAK A SWEAT
Hellogoodbye’s “Touchdown Turnaround”
Looking for a song to add to your MP3 player that will getyour heart pumping while working out? It may or may not
be a new release, but it will certainly get you in the mood toburn some calories and get in better shape.

NEWS TO USE
CRUISE LINES NOW OFFERHEALTHIER FOOD CHOICES
Sailing away on a cruise shipwith a midnight buffet no longer means waving goodbye toyour diet.
Keeping with the times,
cruise lines are promising spalike cuisine alongside the buttery lobster and piles of crab
legs. The hope is that lighter
selections will lure health-conscious baby boomers and others who fear being trapped at
sea with a 24-hour pizza bar.
Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd.
last year introduced its “Vitality” program, which weaves
healthier meals and exercise
into the sailing experience.
Carnival Corp. now has lighter dishes with nutritional stats
on menus for hawk-eyed calorie
counters. In the past year, mostmajor cruise lines have tossed
trans fats overboard. – AP

HEALTH BRIEF
Can a drug that helps hearts
be harmful to the brain?
Cognitive side effects likememory loss and fuzzy thinking aren’t listed on the patient
information sheet for Lipitor,
the popular cholesterol-lowering drug. But some doctors are
voicing concerns that in a small
portion of patients, statins like
Lipitor may be helping hearts
but hurting minds.
“This drug makes women stupid,” Dr. Orli Etingin, vice chairman of medicine at New York
Presbyterian Hospital, declared
at a recent luncheon discussion
on women and the brain. Etingin
told of a typical patient in her 40s,
unable to concentrate or recallwords. Tests found nothing amiss,but when the woman stopped taking Lipitor, the symptoms vanished. When she resumed taking
Lipitor, they returned.
“I’ve seen this in maybe twodozen patients,” Etingin said
later, adding that they did better on other statins. “This is justobservational, of course. We really need more studies, particularly about cognitive effects andwomen.”
Lipitor maker Pfizer Inc.
says the drug’s safety and efficacy have been demonstrated in
more than 400 clinical trials and145 million patient years of experience, and that the extensive
data “do not establish a casuallink between Lipitor and memory loss.” – WSJ/AP

27

examiner.com

E-mail Healthy Life Editor
Sara Schwartz:
sschwartz@examiner.com

The cartoonish plastic frog with bulging eyes could be a children’s toy —but for the torchlike flame that bursts from the novelty lighter’s head.
“They look like something you would get in a McDonald’s Happy Meal,”
said John Dean, president of the National Association of State Fire Marshals, who often shows off the device. “They’re cute, they’re little” — butthey can be deadly.
Dean’s group is backing an effort to ban novelty lighters across the country,
and a handful of states are considering it. In California, Washington and Arkansas, local ordinances have been passed to keep the lighters off store shelves.
Novelty lighters can look like anything from tiny skateboards and cell phones
to farm animals and butterflies. Some light up or make noises, including thetiny green frog that elicits a “ribbit” when its flame is ignited.
“They look like toys so kids play with them, and that’s caused a number ofinjuries and ... deaths,” Iowa state Sen. Keith Kreiman said. –AP

COOKING WITH KERRY DUNNINGTON

Dining in on Valentine’s Day
By Kerry Dunnington
Special to The Examiner

What to pour?

On the front of a Valentine’s Day card my husband
Nick had drawn and hand-delivered to me were twobeautifully shaped hearts that were bound together
almost as one. Inside was a poem he composed thatread:» Cabernet Sauvignon:
Benziger 2005; costs $26» Rose: Wattle Creek
Yorkville Highlands 2006;
costs $15
» White: St. Supery
Virtu – 2006; costs $26

To my wonderful wife
who is the love of my life
who in everyway makes my day
I love you so much
all I want to do is touch
so on February 14th when we sit down to dine
I want you to be my Valentine
Isle of view, isle of view, isle of view
This was the first of many surprises planned for meon Valentine’s Day. Our romantic evening began firesideeating a variety of cheeses accompanied by slices of ripe
red pears Nick had artistically plattered. We sipped KirRoyales, champagne with a splash of Crème de Cassis,
from long-stemmed champagne glasses.
For dinner, lobster tails were briefly marinated inlemon juice, oil, mustard, salt and garlic and broiled
until crimson red. Tender red potatoes were seasoned
with fresh parsley, salt, pepper and olive oil. Colorful salad greens were tossed with a zesty lemony vinaigretteand topped with shredded radicchio, julienned carrots,
toasted sunflower seeds, black olives and feta cheese.
We swirled Matrot Bourgogne in our Riedel stemware
and reminisced about the wonderful Valentine’s dinners we’ve enjoyed together. For dessert, we fed eachother pieces of angel food cake dipped in chocolate fondue. Our Valentine’s dinner was simple, colorfully Valentine heart red, delicious and romantic.
This Valentine’s Day, if you’re not inclined to go out todinner but don’t know what to prepare at home, checkout my dining in menu suggestions. Many side suggestions are naturally Valentine-red.
Catch Kerry Dunnington’s column
biweekly in Healthy Life. She can be reached at
thisbookcooks@verizon.net.

V-day menu ideas» Poach shrimp, chicken or fillets of fish in lemon, olive
oil and garlic, and accompany with steamed red Swiss
chard and couscous.
» Marinate filet of beef and top with sautéed mushrooms. Serve with roasted red potatoes
and a salad of red leaf lettuce tossedwith red pepper, red onion and cherry tomatoes.
» Add sautéed tofu to stir-fried
vegetables and serve with wild riceand sliced red beets tossed with feta
cheese, toasted walnuts, red onion
in a vinaigrette dressing.
» Top slices ofroast pork loin withbaked red apples
or red pairs, andserve with sautéed
red cabbage andbaked sweet potatoes.
Source: Kerry Dunnington

Surprise! Eventhose withchronic disease
can live to 100
NEW YORK – Living to 100 iseasier than you might think.
Surprising new researchsuggests that even people who
develop heart disease or diabetes late in life have a decent shotat reaching the century mark.
“It has been generally assumed that living to 100 yearsof age was limited to those who
had not developed chronic illness,” said Dr. William Hall of
the University of Rochester.
Hall has a theory for how
these people could live to thatage. In an editorial in Monday’s
Archives of Internal Medicine, where the study was published, he writes that it might bethanks to doctors who aggressively treat these older folks’health problems, rather thantaking an “ageist” approachthat assumes they wouldn’tbenefit.
For the study, Boston University researchers did phoneinterviews and health assessments of more than 500 womenand 200 men who had reached100. They found that roughly
two-thirds of them had avoided significant age-related ailments.
But the rest, dubbed “survivors,” had developed an agerelated disease before reaching 85, including high bloodpressure, heart disease or diabetes. Yet many functioned remarkably well — nearly as wellas their disease-free peers.
Overall, the men were functioning better than the women. Nearly three-fourths of themale survivors could bathe anddress themselves, while only
about one-third of the womencould.
The researchers think that
may be because the men had
to be in exceptional condition
to reach 100. “Women, on theother hand, may be better physically and socially adept at living with chronic and often disabling conditions,” wrote leadauthor Dr. Dellara Terry andher colleagues. – AP