Area Presentations…

Upcoming presentations in the San Diego area are scheduled for the Osher Lifelong Learning Center at Cal State San Marcos (www.csusm.edu/olli) and at the OASIS Adult Learning Center (www.oasisnet.org). Dates, times and locations are posted on their websites. Titles include Health benefits of wine and chocolate, Keeping your wits: 10 ways to prevent dementia and Alzheimer’s disease, Probiotics: feeding the germs that keep us well, Bone: anything but boring, Being a kid in the Stone Age.

In the news

            Hepatitis A: everyone should get the vaccine because you can never know when you will be exposed to the virus. It could be at the beach, at a fancy restaurant or when having dinner at the home of a friend or relative. Salt water, even lots of it, won’t kill or dilute the virus if there is a sewage spill and the authorities might not even know about it the day you go for a swim. Persons who are infected can spread the disease before they have obvious symptoms and not everyone is a scrupulous hand-washer.

The hepatitis A vaccine is extremely effective, protection lasts for a lifestyle and side effects are rare. It’s not cheap but neither is a hospital stay.

Lifestyle

Dieting Guidelines

Consider the first three letters of the word diet. That should serve as a reminder that purposeful starvation or even marked calorie restriction are not normal human behaviors. Before the modern era such events did occur and humans developed the capacity to tolerate prolonged hunger. True famine was extremely rare.

In order to avoid the body’s reaction to starvation, such as slowing of the metabolism, cravings or the urge to become inactive, don’t cut back too much on calories. By lowering portion sizes to about 75% of what you usually eat and by having small, calorie-sparse snacks between meals, you can easily cut about 500 calories from your daily intake. If you do that consistently you will lose about one pound per week. Another pound should melt away if you exercise at least one hour about 4 times a week.