Cranberries may help combat superbugs: Study

Washington D.C., Apr 4: While consuming a high-diet salt can result in high blood pressure, a recent study has revealed a link between salt-rich diet and weaker immune system.

The study was conducted under the leadership of the University Hospital Bonn, and the results were published in the journal Science Translational Medicine.

The research was conducted on mice that were fed a high-salt diet. Later, they were found to suffer from much more severe bacterial infections.

Human volunteers who consumed an additional six grams of salt per day also showed pronounced immune deficiencies.

The World Health Organization (WHO) has recommended a maximum amount of five grams of salt a day.

It corresponds approximately to one level teaspoon. In reality, however, many Germans exceed this limit considerably. 

Figures from the Robert Koch Institute suggest that on average men consume ten, and women more than eight grams a day.

This means that we reach for the salt shaker much more than is good for us. After all, sodium chloride, which is its chemical name, raises blood pressure and thereby increases the risk of heart attack or stroke.

"We have now been able to prove for the first time that excessive salt intake also significantly weakens an important arm of the immune system," said Prof. Dr. Christian Kurts from the Institute of Experimental Immunology at the University of Bonn.

This finding is unexpected, as some studies point in the opposite direction. For example, infections with certain skin parasites in laboratory animals heal significantly faster if these consume a high-salt diet.

The study also sheds light on the fact that the skin serves as a salt reservoir.

"Our results show that this generalization is not accurate," emphasized Katarzyna Jobin, lead author of the study.

The body keeps the salt concentration in the blood and in the various organs largely constant. Otherwise important biological processes would be impaired. The only major exception is the skin which functions as a salt reservoir of the body. This is why the additional intake of sodium chloride works so well for some skin diseases.

However, other parts of the body are not exposed to the additional salt consumed with food. Instead, it is filtered out by the kidneys and excreted in the urine.

"We examined volunteers who consumed six grams of salt in addition to their daily intake," said Prof. Kurts. This is roughly the amount contained in two fast-food meals, i.e. two burgers and two portions of French fries.

After one week, from the results, it showed that the immune cells coped much worse with bacteria after the test subjects had started to eat a high-salt diet.

In human volunteers, excessive salt intake also resulted in increased glucocorticoid levels.

Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the World Health Organisation's (WHO) Director-General, said that a clinical trial of hydroxychloroquine (HCQ) on COVID-19 patients has come to "a temporary pause", while the safety data of the the anti-malaria drug was being reviewed.

According to the WHO chief, The Lancet medical journal on May 22 had published an observational study on HCQ and chloroquine and its effects on COVID-19 patients that have been hospitalized, reports Xinhua news agency.

The authors of the study reported that among patients receiving the drug, when used alone or with a macrolide, they estimated a higher mortality rate.

"The Executive Group of the Solidarity Trial, representing 10 of the participating countries, met on Saturday (May 23) and has agreed to review a comprehensive analysis and critical appraisal of all evidence available globally," Tedros said in a virtual press conference on Monday.

The review will consider data collected so far in the Solidarity Trial and in particular robust randomized available data, to adequately evaluate the potential benefits and harms from this drug, he said.

"The Executive Group has implemented a temporary pause of the HCQ arm within the Solidarity Trial while the safety data is reviewed by the Data Safety Monitoring Board. The other arms of the trial are continuing," Tedros added.

WHO initiated the Solidarity Trial, a plan to evaluate the safety and efficacy of four drugs and drug combinations against COVID-19 more than two months ago, which include HCQ.

According to the WHO, over 400 hospitals in 35 countries are actively recruiting patients and nearly 3,500 patients have been enrolled from 17 countries under the Solidarity Trial.

Tedros added that the safety concern over the drug related only to the use of HCQ and chloroquine in COVID-19, and "these drugs are accepted as generally safe for use in patients with autoimmune diseases or malaria".

"WHO will provide further updates as we know more," he added.

Bergen, Mar 5: Divorce of parents may impact the academics of children negatively, suggests a new study.

According to the study, parental divorce is associated with a lower grade point average (GPA) among adolescents, with a stronger association seen in teens with more educated mothers.

The study was published in the journal PLOS ONE.

Children and adolescents with divorced or separated parents are known to do less well in school than adolescents with nondivorced parents and to be less well-adjusted, on average, across a spectrum of physical and mental health outcomes.

In the new study, researchers used data from the youth@hordaland study, a population-based survey of adolescents aged 16-19 conducted in the spring of 2012 in Hordaland County, Norway.

19,439 adolescents were invited to participate and 10,257 agreed; of those, 9,166 are included in the current study.

Overall, adolescents with divorced parents had a 0.3 point lower GPA (standard error 0.022, p<0.01) than their peers.

Controlling for parental education reduced the effect by 0.06 points to 0.240 (SE 0.021, p<0.01). This heterogeneity was predominantly driven by maternal education levels, the researchers found.

After controlling for paternal education and income measures, divorce was associated with a 0.120 point decrease in GPA among adolescents whose mothers had a secondary school education level; a 0.175 point decrease when mothers had a Bachelor's level education; and a 0.209 point decrease when mothers had a Master's or PhD level education (all estimates relative to adolescents with a mother who had a basic level of education, such as ISCED 0-2).

Due to the cross-sectional structure of the study, researchers could not investigate specific changes between pre- and post-divorce family life, and future studies are needed to investigate potential mechanisms (such as reduced parental monitoring or school-involvement) which might drive this finding.

Nonetheless, this study provides new evidence that the negative association between divorce and teens' GPA is especially strong in families with more educated mothers.

"Among Norwegian adolescents, parental divorce was hardly associated with GPA among youth whose parents have low educational qualifications. In contrast, among adolescents with educated or highly educated mothers, divorce was significantly associated with lower GPA," said the authors.