No, I better not. Well, maybe just one. Och.

If you’re like me, adopted and clueless about the diseases in my family tree, wary of palm readers glaring at my lifeline and the daughter of an adoptive mother in the final stages of Alzheimer’s and a dad dead and gone from heart failure, the arrival of consumer genomics is both unnerving and intriguing. In my case, genetic testing could potentially fill in some blanks in my life story I can’t get the old-fashioned way: by observing family members, then watching my body gradually sink into my mother’s genes.

A three-year search for my birth mother by the Children’s Aid Society yielded zero information about my medical history and only a sprinkling of anecdotes about my birth parents. She was 5’6” with brown hair, blue eyes and a “lively face. She loved to draw and was an “avid reader.” In fact, she went to art school in London, England during the city’s finest hour, the mid-sixties (read: the Stones, the Beatles, Mary Quant minis, velvet suits and jumbled teeth). She met my biological father during a stint in Canada as a nanny. Records describe him as “very tall and striking” and from “a prominent family.” So I was a scandal. She was 19 and he was 20 when my budding existence became undeniable.

I found this out in 2004. Back then the provincial government in Ontario was still keeping a lock on adoption records. But since the summer of 2009 adoption records have been opened and adoptees are now free to find out more information about their medical history and the names on their birth certificates. Actually, I already know my original name: it’s Tagart. “Hmm, like Dagny Taggart in The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged,” said my friend, Ian, an Ayn Rand fanatic. I’m put off by objectivism and haven’t read Rand’s novels, but according to Ian, Ms. Taggart is a beautiful and powerful railway executive who’ll stop at nothing to get what she wants. I feel sweeter than that.

In the meantime, I’ve applied to learn more about my medical history, but getting an answer could take months, even years. And, in the end, I may be no further ahead if my biological parents decide to exercise their right to disclosure vetoes.

Having my DNA sequenced, by comparison, could take 6-8 weeks, yielding genomic data that, among other things, could tell me if I carry inheritable markers for over 20 diseases, like breast cancer and Alzheimer’s, and whether I’m at risk for almost 80 different disorders, such as type 2 diabetes, Parkinson’s and brain aneurysms. It could also predict how I’d react to certain medications, including hormone replacement therapy, which is temping as the decades mount. So should I do it?

The spit test from 23andMe.com

An editor started me on this journey last year when she called to ask if I’d take on a story about Do-It-Yourself genome sequencing kits. “I want you to go out and find out how the test results from these kits are customizing care,” she said. “How are they changing the face of healthcare by individualizing our treatment options?”

Whether she knew it or not, my editor was echoing Bill Clinton’s Rose Garden speech in the summer of 2000, made not long after scientists wrapped up the Human Genome Project. Back then the president stood at the lectern and predicted:

Human kind is on the verge of gaining immense, new power to heal. Genomics will revolutionize the diagnosis, prevention and treatment of most, if not all human diseases.

And it probably will, but just not now. My story fizzled.

Here’s the deal (and what I told my editor after combing the landscape for hopeful advances). Genome sequencing hasn’t changed primary health care, yet. Experts are unanimous in saying its current impact is very limited. We’re still on the verge of that revolution. Like the dot.com boom a decade ago, it’s another example of us putting too much faith in untested ideas and expecting instant payoff from our technological brilliance.

A good example of that happened last May. The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) had to acknowledge that the genetic revolution had roared ahead of the health care realities when it abruptly blocked the selling personal genetics testing kits at Walgreens drugstores, just 48 hours before they were due to hit the shelves. The official reason: the boxes were missing an FDA clearance and approval number. The National Society of Genetic Counselors then stepped forward next to identify the real concern: “Receiving genetic information directly from a manufacturer or supplier without input from a qualified health care provider increases the chance for misunderstanding or misinterpretation of results,” they said in an official statement. Also, people need to be “prepar[ed] for what they might learn,” added NSGC president Elizabeth Kearney in the same statement. So we’re back to being on the verge of a genetic revolution.

What we do know for sure is that having the gene for Huntington’s Disease is the only example where, if you’ve got the gene, you’ll get the disease. 100% without a doubt. Genetic testing can also predict if you’re a carrier for cystic fibrosis and Tay Sachs. But we’ve known that and have been testing for those diseases for over 30 years. When it comes to cancer, Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s and heart disease, there’s no telling if you’ll get any one of these deadly disorders even if the markers on your genes light up like a Christmas tree. Genome sequencing is not a diagnostic tool or, as Steven Pinker says, it’s not like taking a pregnancy test that tells you yes or no if you’re carrying a child.

What’s better ten years after Clinton’s speech are the tools. The genome-sequencing rate is faster; what used to take years can be done in a day. And just as significant is the drop in the price of sequencing, from millions to thousands to just a couple of hundred bucks in a few short years. In a recession, though, it’s a hard sell, especially in the US where these testing companies are based.

When the experts say genomics is having a “limited” impact on medicine, this is what they mean:

• even though the full genome has been sequenced, at this point only 1.5% of all human genes code for the proteins that make up our cells and tissues. Scientists haven’t identified what the rest are doing. As science writer, Brandon Keim, put it in a Wired feature in the spring of 2010 “Even after the publication of hundreds of genome-wide association studies — the gold standard of disease gene hunting, in which thousands of genomes are scanned and compared — scientists can explain only a fraction of the heritability that clearly exists in common diseases and conditions. … But they hope ongoing projects will fill massive gaps that remain in current genetic explanations for most common diseases.”

• Last summer, Francis Collins, the director of the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, MD and director of the National Human Genome Research Institute from 1993-2008, gave an update on genomics in Nature magazine’s April issue. He said “Primary care providers aren’t even close to practicing genetic medicine.” He added, “The most profound consequence of the genetic revolution in the long run will be the development of targeted therapeutics based on a detailed molecular understanding of pathogenesis.” But, again, it hasn’t happened.

Still, reporters continue to buzz around genomics.

Journalists love revolutions, be they in Egypt or in a test tube. Check out Joseph Hall’s “I am Joe’s DNA” in last weekend’s Sunday Star. So far the majority of volunteers who have sent off their spit to be sequenced are Nobel laureates, clinical researchers and journalists. The general public still isn’t interested, even though the price for the kits runs as little as $300 USD through internet-based companies like 23andMe. This Mountain View, California-based biotech company was started by Anne Wojciki, a biologist, biotech analyst and wife of Google co-founder, Sergey Brin. Google is heavily invested in the company. Brin is looking to genomics for a cure for Parkinson’s. His mother has the disease and so may he one day.

23and Me wants to “empower individuals to take bold and informed steps toward self knowledge” and “accelerate research” through the combined potential of the internet and genetics. Once you receive your genetic report card, 23andMe “keeps you up-to-date with the latest biomedical literature so you can understand firsthand how breaking scientific news relates directly to you.”

But the low turnout from the average North American suggests the Genomics Age and the general public haven’t found one another yet — despite efforts to make sequencing understandable, even sexy (23andMe even threw swishy “spit parties”). As of last spring 23andMe has laid off almost half its staff (from 70 to 40). It is also now declining media interviews as it ponders its future. In 2010 Navigenics, another genetic  testing company, went through 3 executive officers in a year and deCODE Genetics just “passed through bankruptcy.” All three testing companies are now more focused on selling to doctors, not consumers, says The New York Times.

In 2011, we are in the collecting and analyzing phase of the impending revolution. More data is needed, so more people need to sign on for a spit test. One thing is clear: affordable genetic testing kits are a great example of the crowd sourcing trend started by Wikipedia and Google Analytics — only the data is human DNA. It’s medicine 2.0, as it were. Huge amounts of data will lead to predictions based on patterns. Only then can therapeutic applications be developed.

So where does this leave me? No further ahead, really, than when I first started researching genomics and my biological origins.

Right then, back to life.

But none of these habits are hurting anyone else. They may raise an eyebrow (the toes), then furrow them (the whistling) or be a good reason for deep concern (doesn’t bingeing stem from things left unsaid?), but they don’t physically alter someone else’s cell division or longevity.

To do that you would have to get hooked on what one third of the world is doing every day, every hour and minute for any number of reasons: to calm their nerves, escape boredom, fill in uncomfortable pauses in conversations or melt extra fat.

You’d have to strike a match and start smoking.

I’m Winona Ryder and try as you might, you’re not.

I write for a living, but I work at a bar at night to help pay my bills. I do it because it’s fun and because publishers mostly don’t listen (or ever call me again) when I say, “Hey, you should pay me for those extra rights you just took away.” Working in a bookstore would be fun too (and more me), but I need my days to write. And I need the tips. What I don’t need is the smoke.

When smoking was banned inside Toronto bars and restos five years ago, the problem didn’t go away. It just moved. And I moved with it.

In the summer when I manage the patio I’m constantly dashing around trying to avoid the exhales of smokers. Sometimes I’ll place feeble little notes on the backs of business cards — “Please don’t smoke here. Move to the end of the patio. Thanks!” It’s silly, I know. They’re not breaking the law. Anyway, most of them turn my pleas into coasters when they drop their pints to light up. I have to turn up the wattage in my smile when I ask smokers standing at my work station to take it elsewhere. The withering looks I get say it all: Aren’t we uptight? Or my favourite: “Then don’t work here.” Others direct my attention to the cars zooming past us on the street. “Those cause more pollution, you know.”

Well, I don’t drive, but I do smoke thanks to them.

Rather than wallowing in my utter powerlessness or pulling cigarettes from the lips from every smoker who gets in my air — like Karsh did with Churchill’s cigar right before he captured history — I decided to get on the phone and look for scientists to fill my corner. Here’s an article I wrote about the health hazards of sitting beside smokers on patios that quotes a couple of those scientists. Patios became a hotspot for smokers after they were kicked outside. Building entrances became another. All this exposure to outdoor secondhand smoke can’t be good for me.

“It’s not,” says Pam Kaufman. I found Pam at the University of Toronto in the offices of the Ontario Tobacco Research Unit. She just published ground-breaking research on people’s outdoor smoking habits. She and her team strapped on air monitoring backpacks and spent two months testing the air quality at building entranceways in downtown Toronto (28 buildings to be exact).

In a nutshell, Pam found that when smokers hover at entranceways to office buildings and hospitals the people going in and out of those building end up breathing in 2.5 to 3 times more toxins than they would if smokers weren’t around, and smog from cars and industry was the only thing to worry about.

Signs across the city, like this one at the Hilton Hotel, ask smokers to move 9 metres (30 feet) from entranceways. But that’s just moving the problem a-gain. The question is: where can we put smokers so they don’t affect the rest of us?

What in the blazes is going on with my fonts? My HTML commands are not sticking. I’m emphatic about this subject, dear readers, but not THIS emphatic. Sheesh.

“Hard data has been the missing link in outdoor secondhand smoke research,” she told me, in one of our many long phone chats. Putting this into perspective, Pam explained that secondhand smoke at peak smoke break times can and frequently does cross into the “hazardous” zone established by the Environmental Protection Agency’s Air Quality Index. “It’s not just a few wisps,” she says. Still, it’s tricky. “No one has studied the cumulative effect of these transient bursts of secondhand smoke, but all the evidence suggests that no level of secondhand smoke is safe.”

Click here if you want to read my latest story at OpenFile.ca.

Half empty

Working at a bar also gives me a front row seat to another addiction that harms more than the person doing it. Of course, I’m talking about alcohol.

I see the same grown men (and some women) sway past me on every shift. As the night wears on and the dinner crowd thins out, I watch them sitting at the bar, saying yes with their eyes to another drink as the bartender looks their way. I think about them and I think about myself too and how I’m handling my life. I don’t really understand what triggers each of us to unfold in such different patterns. Experiences? Chromosomes? Broken hearts?

There are lots of theories about addiction. David Carr, a former addict, thinks his drinking and drugging was an attempt to simplify his life:

While other people worry about their 401(k)’s, getting their kids into the right nursery school and/or college, and keeping their plot to take over the world in good effect, a junkie or a drunk just has to worry about his next dose. It leads to a life that is, in a way, remarkably organized. What are we doing today? Exactly what we did yesterday. And a drunk or junkie [can always find] fellow travelers.

(From Carr’s book, The Night of the Gun. Scroll up on the right, it’s featured in my “Books I Love” section)

Kelsey Grammar thinks his addictions to alcohol, drugs and marriage stem from unresolved grief (both his sister and his father were murdered). Deepak Chopra says addiction starts as a search for something more. “It’s a search for joy, a search for [some kind of] exaltation and somehow it goes the wrong way,” he told a gathering last week in Squamish, B.C. “In my experience,” he said, “people who have problems with addiction are really the most spiritual people of all.”

I’m counting on that to see them through.

Women are strong. Our immune systems respond better to trauma than men’s and when we get sick we recover much faster (like you hadn’t noticed). This is because estrogen naturally produces more antibodies to fight off infection whereas testosterone can trip up a man’s immunity and, sometimes, even block it. So next time your guy mews over an infected splinter or a bad cold, before you roll your eyes, remember his biology make him more vulnerable, poor lamb.

Of course, some researchers say there’s an obvious reason Mother Nature made women’s bodies stronger in the face of infection: It’s in our species’ best interest to keep females healthy because we’re the ones who produce children and typically take on the bulk of the work raising them.

Nothing lasts forever, though. As we get older, a woman’s resilient defenses ebb, or, in some cases, go into overdrive. And our immune system’s armies of antibodies can actually stage a coup, causing chronic inflammation. “This is one of the reasons a lot more women than men develop autoimmune conditions,” says DeLisa Fairweather, an assistant professor at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health in Baltimore. “These are diseases”—”like lupus,Crohn’s, rheumatoid arthritis, and diabetes”—”where the immune system attacks healthy cells.” In fact, current statistics suggest that women develop almost 80 percent of all inflammation- based autoimmune conditions”—”and that’s a conservative estimate.

Inflammation’s reach doesn’t stop at autoimmune disorders, however. Scientists stumbled upon a eureka moment in the 1980s when they discovered that chronic inflammation was the only common link between cancer, Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s and heart disease, which is now the number-one killer of Canadian women. For each death from breast cancer, several more women die due to cardiovascular disease,” says Jacques Genest, director of the cardiology division at the McGill University Health Centre in Montreal. What’s surprising is that many of these women, when tested, had normal cholesterol levels. Cardiovascular disease, scientists have realized, is not just a plumbing problem (like blocked arteries), but can also be the result of an internal inflammatory reaction.

When a good thing goes bad

You may be scratching your head thinking, But, wait, isn’t inflammation a normal part of the body’s healing process? Isn’t that why an ankle  swells when it’s sprained or when you cut your finger opening a can of tuna, the skin around it turns red and warm. And yes, you’re right. A healthy body will quickly combat infection or injury by sending pro-inflammatory compounds to the area that make it hurt, swell and feel warm. Think of it as a message from your body that lets you know everything is working as it should. It automatically shuts off when the job is done”–”and the warm feeling disappears, the swelling goes down and you get on with your life.

Sometimes, however, the inflammation doesn’t shut off. Chronic inflammation can exist in our bodies without us even knowing. (That’s partly why Time magazine called “the secret killer.”) Unlike say menopause, there are no obvious symptoms, like hot flashes, sweats or cranky outbursts.

When researchers describe it as “the fires within” they’re referring to the way inflammatory proteins break down tissues and organs, like a flame turning wood into ashes”—”not to any perceptible changes in body temperature. In other words, chronic inflammation doesn’t usually make you want to jump up and open a window or fan yourself with a magazine. It’s a slow, silent crumbling of organs and deterioration of bodily functions (similar to metal rusting) that occurs when the immune system keeps unleashing inflammatory chemicals into the body. It is caused by things like poor diet, lack of exercise, high stress or a persistent bacterial infection, like gum disease (but more on that later).

When inflammation is chronic, many things can happen. Inflammatory chemicals that attack healthy cells in the gut lining year after year can cause lactose and gluten intolerance. When they wash over pancreatic tissue, diabetes may result. When they find their way inside joint tissues, rheumatoid arthritis can kick in. And when they bombard artery linings, it may lead to heart disease. Researchers also think that the brains of Alzheimer’s patients become inflamed”—”what’s referred to as “brain on fire””—”before plaque accumulates between the nerve cells, gradually wiping out the patient’s memory. On the cancer front, studies show that the same hormones that turn up the inflammatory response in our bodies also stimulate cells to divide more frequently and increase malignancy risk.

Take the test

Blood work can reveal inflammation, but it’s not definitive

There’s a blood test for chronic inflammation, in case you were wondering. The CRP Blood Test, available through your family doctor, measures C-reactive proteins (CRP) in your blood. CRPs are pro-inflammtory markers produced by the liver in reaction to an inflammatory signal. Normally we have less than 1 mg/L, but when we’re fighting a bacterial infections they can spike as high as 1,000 mg/L. Researchers are most interested in persistent slightly elevated levels (over 1 mg/L) because they indicate chronic inflammation. If a patient is at risk of an inflammatory disease, their doctor may order this test in conjunction with an erythrocyte sedimentation rate (ESR). The CRP is more sensitive and takes time, and using the tests together gives a better indication of the inflammation levels, but won’t reveal exactly where it lies.

Gender Differences

The most exciting recent advance in the field of inflammation studies has been the division of research along gender lines. Up until about 10 years ago, most medical research used only male subjects in its studies. “There are remarkable differences between men and women that were ignored for way too long,” says Fairweather. “Now we’re starting to reinterpret everything and offer different treatments.”

Fairweather points to statins, an anti-inflammatory cholesterol-lowering drug often prescribed to patients with heart disease. “Right now, these are prescribed more often for men than women,” she says. That’s partly because men typically have a greater risk of coronary heart disease than pre-menopausal women.

But while the research is fairly new, statins are now being discussed as a possible treatment for chronic inflammation. And while chronic inflammation in women may start with an unbalanced immune system, it doesn’t stop there. Dramatic changes in our hormone levels during menopause intensify it. Estrogen has a dousing effect on inflammatory chemicals circulating in the body. But as we age and the hormone drops off we lose an important gatekeeper in the fight against chronic inflammation.

Differences in our bodies and neurobiology also mean that stress cuts a more destructive path in women than men. Cortisol, a stress hormone, plays a direct role in turning up the flame and “women naturally have higher levels of it,” says Fairweather. Add to that our higher rate of sleep disturbances (which have been shown to trigger an inflammatory cascade) and you have two more culprits that are contributing to the growing list of reasons why women’s bodies are simmering in silence. Meanwhile, poor diet and a lack of exercise”—”which aren’t just a woman’s problem”—”can have a huge influence on how inflamed our bodies are on the inside.

What about a cure?

For years doctors prescribed baby aspirin to lower chronic inflammation, saying it reduced the risk of heart disease, cancer and wiped away a few wrinkles. Even Dr. Oz told Oprah and her viewers to take two baby aspirins a day back in 2008 as part of his “Anti-Aging Checklist.”

But a growing number of doctors disagree with this advice. “Aspirin can cause internal bleeding,” says Genest. “And the risk may not outweigh the potential benefits.” Now the focus is on lifestyle, he says. “It’s about healthy food choices, exercise, avoiding smoking and finding ways to lower stress.” It’s been a long time coming, but, finally, traditional medicine is starting to embrace a preventative and more holistic approach to overall health and wellbeing.

3 surprising inflammation triggers

1. Sleepless nights

Rubin Naiman, sleep specialist and clinical assistant professor of medicine at the University of Arizona’s Center for Integrative Medicine, points to a whack of research that links sleep debts to a rise in cortisol levels and inflammation biomarkers. And it goes both ways. “Sleeplessness increases chronic inflammation,” Naiman says, “but chronic inflammation also increases sleeplessness.”

Our bodies should do exactly what the planet does when the sun goes down, says Naiman. “All of the heat absorbed during the day should dissipate and steadily decrease throughout the night before reaching its lowest point just before the dawn and coming back up,” he says. “Sleep is a release of energy.” Scientists have found, though, that people suffering from sleep disorders don’t get cool enough at night because they’re inflamed. In some cases, their body temperature literally qualifies as a fever state (over 37ºC), says Naiman.

Naiman has a few tips for those who suffer from the occasional bout of insomnia and are looking for ways to get a better night’s sleep:

• COOL THE ROOM: lower your thermostat at night to around 20ºC.

• TURN OFF THE TV: A little TV humour is okay before bed, but avoid being “dramatized” by one-hour police shows or murder mysteries. Save those for a the day, says Naiman. At night you want to create a release of energy, not a build-up.

• UNPLUG YOUR BRAIN: Don’t take or make any phone calls or fire off any emails one hour before you sleep.

• PREP FOR REST: Use your pre-sleep hour to read a book or practice simple relaxation techniques like meditation and gentle yoga.

•SET YOUR ALARM CLOCK: Move your clock to somewhere you can hear it, but not see it. And if your clock has a digital display, ditch it. “Even a small amount of light from clock radios can trickle through closed eyelids, suppressing melatonin production and disrupting sleep,” says Naimain.

2. Couple stress

Have you been burned by love? New evidence shows that stress from personal relationships directly impacts our body’s inflammatory response. In fact, love gone wrong can sometimes be as bad for the body as smoking, obesity and hypertension. And, once again, women are more at risk than men because we produce more of the stress hormone cortisol than they do, and it cuts a more destructive path in our bodies.

Recent studies showed that women with lower marital satisfaction experienced a more rapid progression of inflammation-related disorders like carotid atherosclerosis (a vascular disease affecting the arteries to the brain), arthritis and metabolic syndrome, which can lead to heart disease and diabetes. Part of this is because trusting, supportive relationships can inspire health-promoting behaviours, including better eating habits and romantic walks together, while unsupportive relationships can result in cancelled trips to the gym, more sleep disturbances, Häagen-Dazs binges, and higher rates of smoking and drinking. But it’s even more subtle than that: Often, our expectations about the availability and responsiveness of our partner can influence how the body reacts to stress, especially when expectations fall short. This can lead to depression, which studies show make us more vulnerable to infection, fuels inflammatory production and may slow down the healing process.

One 2009 from Ohio State University also found that how we love directly affects our immune systems. People who avoid conflict or withhold love (an act dubbed as “attachment avoidance”) have higher levels of inflammation than those who were less evasive. In other words, experiencing your feelings, working through your problems and being open-hearted is better for your body and psyche than bottling up your feelings or pushing someone away. What’s more, when women avoid intimacy their cortisol levels spike — along with their risk of chronic inflammation.

3. Forgetting to floss

“The old ‘Brush your teeth’ should really be ‘Clean your mouth,’” says Howard Tenenbaum, head of research in the Department of Dentistry at Mount Sinai Hospital in Toronto. Ever since a bi-directional link was discovered between gum inflammation and Type 2 diabetes, and, possibly heart disease, periodontists have been sharing patients with endocrinologists and cardiologists. “We now know that treating periodontal disease — swollen and inflamed gums that bleed easily and may have a slightly bluish tinge — can improve the clinical course of diabetes,” says Tenenbaum.

Although, rumour has it that cleaning your mouth properly can also ward off heart disease, here the evidence is more tenuous. “There’s a strong possibility of a link,” says Tenenbaum, “but we don’t know for sure.”

So why is a clean mouth so vital to our overall health? “It’s the only area of the body where a structure (the teeth) perforates the skin,” says Tenenbaum. “It’s a week spot and a breeding ground for bacteria.” When gums are diseased they spill a whole array of cytokines into the bloodstream. Flossing and using a soft brush in circular motions along the gum line is key to eliminating bacteria and warding off inflammation, but so is brushing your tongue and sweeping the bristles over the insides of your cheeks.

Tenenbaum recommends toothpastes that contain triclosan, an antibacterial ingredient, as well as anti-bacterial rinses. Tenenbaum’s lab is now conducting a clinical trial with a rinse containing resveratrol, a compound in red wine that has been shown to block inflammation.

The top two inflammation crushers

WHAT YOU EAT can determine whether you’re in a pro-inflammatory or anti-inflammatory state, writes lifestyle guru Dr. Andrew Weil, in his book Healthy Aging: A Lifelong Guide to Your Physical and Spiritual Well-Being. Weil, director and founder of the Center for Integrative Medicine at the University of Arizona, suggests stocking up on foods rich in Omega-3s”—”greens, seeds and nuts, and oily, cold-water fish like salmon, sardines and black cod”—”while cutting back on foods high in Omega-6s, found in grain-fed meat and processed foods such as cookies and candy. “Omega- 6s tend to increase inflammation by promoting blood clotting and blood-vessel narrowing,” he says, “while Omega-3s counteract each of these processes.” Weil says correcting Omega imbalances would bring the North American diet in line with the Mediterranean diets, where obesity, heart disease and chronic inflammation rates are lower.

Eating low-glycemic foods (or slow digesting carbohydrates) such as yams, wild rice and beans, are also key. Again, our love of high-glycemic carbohydrates, found in cakes, waffles and doughnuts, jump start a process called glycation. It produces pro-inflammatory compounds called advanced glycation end products (AGEs) that lead to oxidative stress, which can do everything from degrading the elastin and collagen in your skin to destroying blood vessels and organs. He also suggests using spices that have potent anti-inflammatory properties, such as turmeric and ginger. Andrew Weil’s Food Pyramid, (below), presents the best food choices and serving suggestions for warding o! chronic inflammation. On the bottom, you’ll find the items you should add most often to your diet, namely red and green veggies and fresh or frozen, coloured berries. This is followed by whole grains, pasta, and beans and legumes, all the way up to red wine and chocolate at the top.

For more information on each food item in the pyramid, including how it works to combat chronic inflammation, visit drweil.com.

The power of movement

Exercise is always recommended as the first line of defence against aging. But studies show that gentle activities like yoga are best to prevent the onset of chronic inflammation

A STUDY published in September confirmed that regular exercise was key in lowering the number of C-reactive proteins in the body, in patients with heart disease, but extreme exercise increase them. Meanwhile, a study from Ohio State University published last January was the first to present clinical evidence of the link between a particular type of yoga practice ”—”the gentle Iyengar”—”and lower levels of inflammation. The study involved 50 healthy women, average age 41, half of them yoga experts and the other half with only a few classes under their belts. The novices, the study found, had over 40 percent more inflammatory markers in their bloodstream compared to those who had been working the mat once or twice a week for at least two years.

What makes Iyengar so special? The mechanics of the poses and the placement of blocks and bolsters at certain points along the body are very stimulating to the adrenals (the glands above the kidneys in charge of releasing adrenaline and cortisol), says Marlene Mawhinney, president and senior instructor at Yoga Centre Toronto (YCT). Other poses im- prove circulation and pulse rates. YCT offers special classes in Iyengar yoga for people suffering from inflammation-based disorders, including rheumatoid arthritis and heart disease. Mawhinney has even started collaborating with scientists in research trials and presenting evidence of yoga’s medical benefits at conferences. “Doctors today are looking at a wider approach to therapies,” she says.

Still, if yoga isn’t for you, any form of exercise will help lower the inflammatory response in your body. The key is to mix it up: combine strength training with cardiovascular activity such as walking, biking or running. And just remember: Don’t overdo it”—”excessive exercise can trigger inflammation too!

Roberta Ferrence points to several new studies that show the dangers posed by outdoor tobacco smoke to servers and patrons is considerable and cumulative, especially if smokers are sitting at a table less than nine metres away from other guests, which is the case on most Toronto patios.

“It forms a mushroom cloud, like an atomic bomb that rains down on us,” says Ferrence, who works with the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health and is also executive director of the Ontario Tobacco Research Unit.

Local politicians, however, say smoking on patios is not an issue with voters. “I don’t get a lot of calls about it,” says Toronto city councillor John Filion (Ward 23, Willowdale).

As chair of the Toronto Board of Health, Filion was a leader in the campaign to ban smoking indoors in bars and restaurants. The Smoke-Free Ontario Act, which contains the ban, went into effect early in 2006.

That law followed a publicity campaign that included a federal government commercial featuring Heather Crowe, a retired server from Ottawa, who told TV viewers: “I have a smoker’s tumour in my lung the size of my hand and I never smoked a day in my life.”

Policy-makers across the country committed to banning smoking inside bars and restaurants. The law went into effect nine days after Crowe died.

Now, scientists are saying Ontario’s law doesn’t go far enough. They advocate a ban on smoking in all places where people congregate. They point out that Alberta has smoke-free patios. Nova Scotia and Quebec also plan to review their outdoor tobacco policies this fall.

Part of the problem, scientists like Ferrence say, is that many assume wind blows the smoke away. “But with a bit of wind and luck it will rain down 10 feet away on someone else,” she says.

Ferrence points to a 2007 study by Stanford University researchers, the first of its kind to measure air quality over patios where smoking was allowed. They found peak and average outdoor tobacco levels near smokers during the cocktail and dinner hours rivalled the indoor smoke-particle concentrations that eventually led to the bans.

Ferrence conducted her own study in 2009 and came to similar conclusions.

Monitoring the air quality over 25 patios in Toronto, her team found that exposure to smoke on patios was high. In an eight-hour shift, bar workers were exposed to particulates in smoke at an average 367 micrograms per cubic metre* for at least 30 minutes. Studies have demonstrated that exposure to this level of smoke for even half an hour leads to sustained vascular injury.

The study, Ferrence says, debunks the myth that smoke over patios rises and dissipates.

The Smoke-Free Ontario Act doesn’t go far enough, she warns. She argues that a smoking ban in outdoor workspaces is needed to protect servers and patrons from the dangers of secondhand smoke.

Some bar owners are ready for a change.

“Most of us survived the bylaw that banned smoking inside because it was a blanket bylaw that applied to all the surrounding communities,” says Greg Garson, owner of Fionn MacCool’s Irish Pub at the corner of Adelaide St. W. and University Ave.

Garson wants his guests to enjoy a few drinks and a good meal, “but not at someone else’s expense,” he says.

A professor of physics and astronomy at McMaster University in Hamilton, Ont., Welch studies supernovas. To mark 2009 as the International Year of Astronomy, he and Calgary-based artist Dianne Bos decided to recreate a stellar explosion inside the campus art gallery. “We’re re-enacting the Tycho Supernova of 1572,” says Welch. “It marked the first time astronomers understood supernovas as taking place well outside the earth’s atmosphere.”

To construct a convincing model of a starry night, Welch had to bypass those outdated set-ups at planetariums. “The problem with planetariums,” he says, “is that the stars give off a constant light. They don’t flicker as if they’re being affected by the earth’s atmosphere.”

So he built a microcontroller. It’s basically a chip that runs a small computer— the kind you’d find in your garage door clicker or TV remote. He programmed it to individually control the brightness levels and colour of hundreds of LED bulbs painstakingly arranged in the constellations of the Northern Hemisphere across the ceiling, down the walls, and over the floor of the Panabaker Gallery at the McMaster Museum of Art.

The show begins like any night—say, at the cottage—with a dazzling spray of illuminated pinpricks. “With stars twinkling above and below, viewers will think they’re floating in the Milky Way,“ says Welch, sporting a big kid grin. That is, until a giant flash jolts you! That’s a star collapsing. Only, there is no “POW” because space doesn’t come with a soundtrack. As the explosion subsides, a single beam of light encircles the room. This represents light echoes, left-over streaks of light that last a few minutes in the exhibit, but hundreds and even thousands of years in real time.

In fact, light echoes from ancient supernovas are still traveling through space, ricocheting off interstellar dust, planets and space junk. But in this re-creation, the light pans to reveal the corner of an astronomer’s lab set up by Dianne Bos, where viewers can catch glimpses of 16th- and 17th-century star charts, celestial globes, gleaming candlesticks and jewel-toned Persian carpets.

It takes us back to a time when the prevailing worldview insisted that the skies were fixed, even though intrepid astronomers had observed falling stars, meteors and supernova explosions for centuries. Today, we know better, “but we’re still inward,” says Welch, only it’s technology (hand-held devices) and not religion that has us bowing our heads in silence. Supernovas have this way of bringing together past, present and future.

If viewers take anything from this show, though, it would be to look up more. After all, we were born out of the stars. “The cores of supernovas,” says Welch, “are the nuclear furnaces that converted hydrogen and helium into carbon, nitrogen and oxygen, without which life would never have been possible. It was only because some of these stars blew up and spilled their contents back out into the universe that we exist.” Talk about an illuminating past.

Light Echo runs from September 10 to October 31 at the McMaster Museum of Art.

Ever since seven people died and thousands more fell ill in Walkerton, Ont., after drinking water contaminated with bacteria from runoff from farms, the study of cows, cow pies and flowing water has become scientifically hot.

This is in no small measure due to the voice of Ann Clark, a professor of plant agriculture at the University of Guelph, whose research is proposing a fundamental rethinking of how cows and streams can co-exist. Her solution? Stop fencing the cattle out and let them cross the water to greener pastures.

“Everyone says they’ve seen cows shitting in streams,” she says, “but it’s too broad a generalization.” Clark has been studying the behaviour of cows and their effect on stream ecosystems for several years and has concluded that the classical (and costly) solution involving long lines of barbed wire is mostly an unnecessary expense that ignores what cows actually do.

From 1997 to 1999, Clark was part of a team of scientists who set out to investigate cattle habits and their impact on streams. Over a period of eight years, they covered six counties in Ontario collecting data from pasture walks on eight beef-producing farms.

The team found that even when cows had unfenced access to streams, they returned with astonishing regularity to the same crossing points, as if to marked territory. Fewer than five per cent of the cows deposited manure directly into the water while under observation.

“That’s the central surprising thing to come out of this research,” says Clark, who now insists that cows are less likely to threaten water by direct defecation than by stirring up sediment with their hooves that is full of harmful pathogens. Laying down reinforcement at the cows’ preferred crossing points, she says, could achieve the same degree of water protection, much more cheaply, than fencing.

Cows stand for hours in ponds, where the only thing they contaminate is their own drinking water. But when it comes to flowing waterways, which could transport bacteria downstream to municipal wells, Clark says, the animals don’t dally. They target their preferred crossing point and spend an average of only one to three minutes, once or twice a day, actually “in” the water (with at least one hoof).

The reason is still a mystery, Clark says, but not the application of the findings. Given the small amount of time cows spend in streams, she thinks it’s better to help them cross more quickly than to try to keep them out. Thus the concrete walkways.

Clark’s proposals have sparked a debate in the agricultural community. While everyone agrees that cattle and water aren’t a good mix, they disagree on how money should be spent to control a seemingly infinite number of variables — from the size and shape of the pasture, to the size of herd, to the length and width of the waterway in question.

Fencing proponents say simple exclusion has a single great good Clark’s approach cannot provide — peace of mind. “Fencing offers complete restriction of access,” says Tracey Ryan of the Grand River Conservation Authority, “and even though it’s still voluntary, it’s the easiest solution to define. And it ensures results.”

Ryan added that the Rural Water Quality Program in her county is one of the few in the province that offers grants for fencing, to between 75 and 100 per cent of the cost of materials (100 metres of fencing can easily add up to $3,500, before labour and upkeep). “It’s not that we exclude other options,” she says, “we just don’t fund them.”

But cash-strapped farmers don’t have much choice without broader funding. Clark is struggling to make other options available, ones more applicable to bovine behaviour.

Despite her sense that she has discovered a better cow/water management system, a nervous public appears more comfortable with universal fencing. Ryan says she receives letters, e-mails and the odd photograph every week from concerned citizens in the Cambridge, Ont., area who have seen cows standing in the Grand River, the town’s only water source, presumably having gone through breaks in the fences.

No photos or film of cows actually defecating in the river have crossed her desk yet. But people have seen it happen, she says. Anecdotes like this concern Clark, whose team’s evidence suggests just the opposite.

Furthermore, ecological complications don’t stop with fencing. The cow-control practice currently favoured by many farmers, environmentalists and funding bodies is called “buffering.” Buffers are strips of land between the fencing line and the watercourse, where saplings are planted and grasses are left to grow tall. Buffers keep livestock away from the banks, reducing erosion and stream-side defecation, while giving the aquatic ecosystem time to heal.

To the urban eye, it’s a pleasing solution. But Clark warns that buffers are a short-term measure. “We’re convincing ourselves we’re doing nature a favour,” she says, “when in fact we’re creating an unnatural situation. Sure, you get beautiful herbaceous cover, but in the long term, you’ll actually have a degraded watercourse.”

In 30 years, when the trees have become the dominant species along a stream, their shade will cut out the light and reduce ground cover, setting up a situation where spring runoff could again wash away exposed soil that may contain harmful bacteria.

Which direction do we turn, when so many options may lead us down the same contaminated path? Clark suggests the answer may ultimately rest in heading off the problem at the intestinal pass. She points to an ongoing and controversial study on diet by Cornell University and U.S. federal authorities that has linked the switch to corn feeding of beef cattle to the increase of E. coli 0157, the deadly bacterial strain that devastated Walkerton.

Corn-fed cattle produce a sweeter, more tender beef. The problem is, cows digest grains poorly. The starches in their intestines produce acids that encourage the growth of certain bacteria resistant to human stomach acids, or so the study claims.

If the study is right, and pathogenic E. coli is a function of diet, then we’ve solved the problem. But farmers have not been asked to change their feeding programs, because the research has not yet been duplicated by others.

Today’s farmers, then, are in an unenviable position. They want to be good environmental stewards, but whether they fill the grain troughs or push their herds back out to pasture (with or without fences), a lingering stench of doubt follows wherever they go.