Peanut Butter News

Full Story at CNN.com

New York (CNN) — More than 1,000 people in New Jersey and New York, many of them adolescent Orthodox Jews, have been sickened with mumps since August, health authorities said Monday.

Orange County, New York, has confirmed 494 cases since early November, county spokesman Richard Mayfield told CNN. Almost all of those infected with the virus are of the Orthodox or Hasidic Jewish population, and their average age is 14, he said.

Full Story at WPTZ.com

LEBANON, N.H. –
He’s not even 3 years old and he faces the fight of his life. Neighbors are meeting to see if a simple test could save a boy who needs a bone marrow transplant.

Last November, Hunter Morgan had a fever. When the fever hadn’t broken after several days, his mother took him to the hospital, and soon found out that her 2 1/2-year-old had a rare, life-threatening disease.

Full Story at CNN.com

Washington (CNN) — With the first of its flights touching down in earthquake-devastated Haiti late Wednesday afternoon, the U.S. began deploying military planes, ships and ground troops to the Caribbean nation.

One of two planes carrying a 30-person assessment team arrived at Port-au-Prince airport about 5:30 p.m. Wednesday. The team will assess what Haiti needs to cope with the immediate aftermath of the disaster.

One of the team’s first jobs is to get the airport working to a point where it can handle all the flights coming in from around the world filled with people and supplies to help the victims of the quake.

Full Story at  CNN.com

In this day and age of food-on-the-go, supplements can add much-needed nutrients to your diet. But a walk down the vitamin aisle at any store could very well make your head spin. Here’s a breakdown of several of multivitamin options.

Basic Multivitamins

What they are: One-pill wonders that offer 100 percent of the recommended daily allowance (RDA), as suggested by the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences, for many important vitamins.

Benefits: They give you much of what you need in a day, including vitamins A, C, D, and E, B vitamins, and folic acid. Bonus: You have only one tablet to remember to take and swallow. Try One A Day Essential Multivitamin ($10 for 130 tablets, drugstore.com).

Full Story at CNN.com

(CNN) — The search for two missing hikers on Oregon’s Mount Hood has moved from a search operation into a recovery operation, authorities said Wednesday.

“It was our hope that we might get a window today to take a last look,” Clackamas County, Oregon, Sheriff Craig Roberts told reporters. “Unfortunately, that hasn’t happened.”

Anthony Vietti, 24; Luke Gullberg, 26; and Katie Nolan, 29, set out about 1 a.m. Friday on what was to have been a fairly easy “semi-technical” hike in which they would have descended the south side of the mountain, Sheriff’s Deputy Scott Meyers has said.

Gullberg was found dead Saturday from hypothermia.

Full Story at money.cnn.com

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) — The maker of Slim-Fast announced a recall of its canned, ready-to-drink products due to possible bacterial contamination.

Unilever, the company which also makes products like Skippy peanut butter and Ragu pasta sauce, said the weight-loss drink may be tainted by Bacillus cereus, which can cause diarrhea, nausea and vomiting.

U.S. Food and Drug Administration spokeswoman Rita Chappelle said the recall affects 10 million cans distributed in the United States.

Full Story at CNN.com

Las Vegas, Nevada (CNN) — Principal Sherrie Gahn said she was shocked when she first came to Whitney Elementary School seven years ago.

“The kids were eating ketchup packets,” Gahn said. “I said to one of my teachers, ‘What on Earth are they doing?’ and she said, ‘That’s their dinner.’ “

Whitney Elementary is in a dusty, rundown neighborhood of Las Vegas known as the Boulder Strip. The main drag, the Boulder Highway, is lined with pawn shops and low-rent motels.

Full Story at NYTimes.com

The World Health Organization tried this week to dampen fears about mutations seen in the swine flu virus in several countries, noting that both mutations had been found in very few people.

A change that created Tamiflu resistance has been found in about 75 people around the world, said Dr. Keiji Fukuda, chief flu adviser to the W.H.O.’s director general. Two clusters, in cancer units at Duke University Medical Center in North Carolina and a hospital in Wales, were both among patients whose immune systems had been severely suppressed by cancer treatment; some had had their bone marrow, which produces infection-fighting white blood cells, wiped out so that replacement blood stem cells could be injected.

Full Story atReuters.com

HONG KONG (Reuters) – China must be alert to any mutation or changes in the behavior of the H1N1 swine flu virus because the far deadlier H5N1 bird flu virus is endemic in the country, a leading Chinese disease expert said.

Zhong Nanshan, director of the Guangzhou Institute of Respiratory Diseases in China’s southern Guangdong province, said the presence of both viruses in China meant they could mix and become a monstrous hybrid — a bug packed with strong killing power that can transmit efficiently among people.

“China, as you know, is different from other countries. Inside China, H5N1 has been existing for some time, so if there is really a reassortment between H1N1 and H5N1, it will be a disaster,” Zhong said in an interview with Reuters Television.

“This is something we need to monitor, the change, the mutation of the virus. This is why reporting of the death rate must be really transparent.”

Full Story at  CNN.com

London, England (CNN) — Procter & Gamble is recalling Vicks Sinex nasal spray in the United States, Britain and Germany after finding it contained bacteria, the company said.

Procter & Gamble said it announced the voluntary recall after finding the bacteria in a small amount of product made at a plant in Germany.

There have been no reports of illness from the bacteria, but it could cause serious infections for people with weakened immune systems or those with chronic lung conditions such as cystic fibrosis, Procter & Gamble said late Thursday.

The bacteria poses little risk to healthy people, the company said.

Full Story at CNN.com

Lexington, Missouri (CNN) — Police arrested a sixth member of a Missouri family under investigation for allegations of child sexual abuse, police said.

Darrel Mohler has been charged with two counts of rape, Lafayette County Sheriff Kerrick Alumbaugh said at a news conference. Missouri police did not have Mohler in custody earlier. On the request of Missouri officials, Marion County authorities went to Mohler’s home in Silver Springs, Florida, and caught him just before he pulled into the driveway, according to a news release from the Marion County Sheriff’s Office. He was subsequently arrested.

Full Story at CNN.com

However, the onslaught of information about H1N1 — be it playground rumors, employer signs telling you to cover your cough, memos from your kids’ school, or scary-sounding news reports — is making it pretty hard to figure out what you should be doing right now.

Although some people have already been vaccinated, it could be weeks — depending on your age and risk factors — before you even get a chance at the shot (or spray). So now what?

Sometimes it feels like you have two choices. A: Wring your hands endlessly about something over which you have no control. Or, B: Tune out the static and pretend this is all just a horrible dream. (Call it the ignore-the-whole-sorry-mess-until-my-neighbor-is-sick approach.)

Well, guess what? There are a few things you should — and should not — be doing at the moment. Here’s your guide.