Apr 21, 2010

Un calcio... di salute - Blog del Benessere

Chi si interessa di salute e benessere sa già quanto sia importante assumere le giuste quantità dicalcio per prevenire l'osteoporosi. Ma ora dalla letteratura scientifica arrivano nuovi dati che allargano il raggio d'azione del calcio. Uno dei dati più recenti e interessanti riguarda il rapporto fra calcio assunto con la dieta e longevità, approfondito dai ricercatori del Karolinska Institutet di Stoccolma. Per gli autori dello studio, un apporto di calcio superiore a quello giornaliero raccomandato potrebbe ridurre la mortalità per tutte le cause.

Altri studi suggeriscono, invece, che basse assunzioni di calcio possano rappresentare un fattore di rischio importante per altre patologie, come la preeclampsia, l'ipertensione e il cancro del colon. Altre novità dalla ricerca riguardano il possibile ruolo del calcio nel ridurre l'aumento di grasso intra-addominale nella premenopausa e nell'alleviare i sintomi della sindrome premestruale.

Ma quanto calco dobbiamo assumere ogni giorno? Secondo i Larn (Livelli di assunzione raccomandati di nutrienti (elaborati dalla Società Italiana di Nutrizione Umana), il fabbisogno deve essere particolarmente elevato in età evolutiva, con un massimo nell’adolescenza e deve mantenersi elevato fino ai 29 anni circa ovvero fino a quando è possibile aumentare la massa scheletrica. Nell'età adulta, quando ormai si è raggiunto il picco di massa ossea, le necessità si abbassano a 800 mg al giorno. Durante la gravidanza e l’allattamento si consiglia ovviamente di aumentare l'assunzione di calcio per prevenire il depauperamento del patrimonio minerale della donna. Anche nell'anziano, in cui si registra una riduzione dell’assorbimento, si consiglia di aumentare la quota di calcio ingerita per ridurre la perdita di massa ossea.

Apr 16, 2010

DNA analysis for disease risk isn’t catching on among consumers

Connected to Google by both love and money, 23andMe seems the epitome of a 21st-century company — a cutting-edge merging of biotechnology and the Internet, with a dash of celebrity thrown in.
The scarce ingredient so far is customers.

23andMe is the most prominent of a trio of companies that in 2007 began using the Web to market personal genomics services. The companies scan people’s DNA, promising to tell them their risks of getting dozens of diseases. Propelled by its co-founder Anne Wojcicki, the wife of Google’s billionaire co-founder Sergey Brin, 23andMe attracted attention by holding swanky “spit parties” where people gave saliva samples for DNA analysis. Rich and famous people like Rupert Murdoch, Harvey Weinstein and Ivanka Trump became customers and in some cases investors.

But for the common consumer, 23andMe’s service — and those from its main competitors, Navigenics and DeCode Genetics — have been a much harder sell. Two and a half years after beginning its service, 23andMe has only 35,000 customers. And at least one quarter of them got the service free or for only $25, instead of the hundreds of dollars on which the business model is based. Navigenics and DeCode have even fewer customers.

The low turnout suggest that many people have not yet embraced the genomics age. It does not help, either, that the services cost $300 to $2,000 and have been trying to catch on during a severe recession.
But the services face an even more fundamental problem: In most cases, the current level of DNA scanning technology and science is unable to offer meaningful predictions about the risk that a person will get a disease.
“It is a really wonderful form of recreation,” said Scott R. Diehl, a geneticist at the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey. But as for applying it to health care, he said, “It’s very premature.”

The companies have been forced to adjust. Named for the 23 pairs of human chromosomes, 23andMe went through two rounds of layoffs last year. The company, which is privately held and based in Mountain View, Calif., has fewer than 40 employees, down from a peak of about 70. Navigenics, based in Foster City, Calif., is on its third chief executive in a year and has also trimmed its workforce. It is now marketing to doctors and corporate wellness programs rather than consumers.

People close to the company estimate that Navigenics has about 20,000 customers, at least 5,000 of whom were given big discounts to be in a study.
And DeCode Genetics, based in Iceland, passed through bankruptcy following heavy spending to develop drugs and diagnostic tests. The DecodeMe personal genomics service, while only one part of the company’s business, apparently attracted fewer than 10,000 customers.