"It doesn't make it right … but sometimes money gets to people," Orrillo said, adding that financial strife was just one of many difficulties Mary Hansen was facing. "I think she just had so much on her plate. She has fibromyalgia. She doesn't have much family. … (She) and her daughter were it for the most part."

Angel Raich is busy dying. The famous marijuana activist -- who took the federal government to the Supreme Court of the United States for the right to use medical cannabis -- was, earlier this year diagnosed with an inoperable terminal brain tumor, a condition that causes frequent seizures as well as constant pain and headaches.

Told by her doctors at the University of California-San Francisco that she should prepare to die, that's what Raich, 46, is doing, one day at a time -- with purpose as well as dignity.

Kerry Grens Reuters

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Women who eat about three servings of fish per week have a somewhat lower chance of having polyps found during a routine colonoscopy than women who eat just one serving every two weeks, according to a new study.

The research doesn't prove that seafood protects against polyps, but it "does increase our confidence that something real is going on," said Dr. Edward Giovannucci, a professor at the Harvard School of Public Health in Boston, who was not involved in this study.

A polyp, also called an adenoma, is a mushroom-shaped tag of tissue that grows in the colon and can develop into colorectal cancer.

The idea researchers have been pursuing is that the omega-3 fats in fish might have an anti-inflammatory effect, similar to aspirin, that could prevent the development of polyps.

Giovannucci said that earlier experiments in animals have showed that omega-3 fats can reduce the risk of this cancer, but that studies of humans have had mixed results.

In the latest study, the researchers surveyed more than 5,300 people about their eating habits. All of the participants had come in to the researchers' practices for a colonoscopy.

The team then compared more than 1,400 women without polyps to 456 who had adenomas detected during the procedure.

Some 55 million Social Security recipients will get a 3.6 percent increase in benefits next year, their first raise since 2009, the government announced Wednesday.
The increase, which starts in January, is tied to a measure of inflation released Wednesday morning.
About 8 million people who receive Supplemental Security Income will also receive the 3.6 percent cost-of-living adjustment, or COLA, meaning the announcement will affect about one in five U.S. residents.

In June, the Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney found himself under attack for a joke he tried to make at a meeting with a group of unemployed people in Tampa, Fla. “I am also unemployed,” Romney announced, insinuating that the job he lacked was the presidency.

A large number of the marijuana gardens are located up and down the West Coast, with a majority sprouting up in California. The High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area (HIDTA), a federal program that oversees drug enforcement across that country, reported in June 2010 that "California produces more marijuana than Mexico." Officials estimate that in 2009, California's seized plants would have had a retail value of $17.8 billion. The cost to taxpayers to clean up the razed lands where the weed was grown reached as much as $1 million per farm.

The crops that provide these considerable profits are often protected by heavily armed guards. On August 28, 2011, former Northern California city councilman Jere Melo was shot and killed while investigating an outdoor marijuana-growing operation in Mendocino County. Melo was hired by a timber company to investigate reports of a pot farm being constructed on their land. When Melo and his friend got close to the farm, a man protecting the plants popped up and opened fire. While his partner was able to escape, Melo was not so lucky.

In 2010 HIDTA estimated that almost 121 square miles of land was being used throughout California to grow illegal pot. As the report noted, "For every acre that is 'Impacted' (the actual growing area) there are another two to 10 aces that are considered 'Constrained.' The Constrained area is that which is marked by trails, waterlines, campsites and other areas trampled by growers ... The City of Sacramento is 97 square miles in size and the amount of area used for growing marijuana exceeds the size of the state's Capital city ... Why do the drug trafficking organizations grow so much marijuana in California? The answer is simply the demand by users and unrestrained profits."

Sequoia National Park, well known for being home to some of the world's most gigantic trees, is also residence to hundreds of pot growers during the prime harvesting months of April to October. Several parts of the park are closed to visitors during this time, including the pristine Kaweah River drainage, where drug cartels are cultivating massive amounts of pot. These operations, which would place the industry high on NASDAQ if it were a single legal company, are by no means environmentally benign.

"It's so big that we have to focus our resources on one or two areas at a time, because otherwise it's beyond our scope," Sequoia's special agent assigned to the ordeal, told the Los Angles Times. It is estimated that California's marijuana trade accounts for $14 billion in annual sales.

This 91 year old business woman is recording record sales this month after her product was used in Oregon. Her companies name is GLADD, which stands for Glorius Living And Dignified Death. Asphyxiation is the method that is employed by her device.
Oregon and and other states are racing to push through legislation banning the use or sale of such devices.

A Portland, Ore., family with two severely ill sons must go back to Kenya, where there is no treatment for them, the federal government says.

For eight years, Aamir and Hanzallah Khandwalla have been treated in Portland for Desbuquois syndrome, a rare and painful genetic disease that causes dwarfism, dislocated and loose hips and knees and curved spines,

The Food and Drug Administration on Wednesday approved the first new drug to treat lupus in over 50 years, a milestone that medical experts say could prompt development of other drugs that are even more effective in treating the debilitating immune system disorder.

Known as Benlysta, the injectable drug is designed to relieve flare-ups and pain caused by lupus, a little-understood and potentially fatal ailment in which the body attacks its own tissue and organs.

Biotech drugmaker Human Genome Sciences Inc. spent 15 years developing Benlysta and will co-market it with GlaxoSmithKline PLC.

The companies estimate there are at least 200,000 lupus patients in the U.S. who could benefit from the drug.

But experts stress that Benlysta is not a miracle drug: It only worked in 35 percent of North American patients tested and was not effective for patients with the deadliest form of the disease. Additionally, it did not show positive results in African Americans, who are disproportionately affected by lupus.

FDA said in its news release it would require the drug developers to conduct another study exclusively in African Americans.

Dr. Betty Diamond, who has studied lupus for 30 years, said Benlysta should provide encouragement to researchers and drug developers.

"It will send out the message that it's possible to conduct a successful clinical trial in lupus and that's tremendously important to keep the pharmaceutical industry interested in this disease," said Diamond, a researcher at the Feinstein Institute in New York.

Janice Fitzgibbon of McLean, Virginia has been taking Benlysta for two years as part of the drug's clinical trial program.

"It's given me my life back," she said, after being so crushed by pain that she couldn't take her dog for a walk or drive her children to school.

"It's a bittersweet thing for me because I have friends with lupus for whom this drug won't work," said Fitzgibbon, who is 54. "There's no one-size-fits-all for lupus and I'm just extremely fortunate that my lupus is mild and is helped by Benlysta."

FDA approved the drug for systemic lupus erythematosus, the most common form of the disease. Ten-year survival for patients diagnosed with the illness is more than 85 percent, according to the National Institutes of Health.

Lupus patients have long struggled to draw attention to their disease, which affects women nine times more than men. African Americans are three times more likely to have the disease.

"I don't think there's a conspiracy here, but it just hasn't gotten a lot of funding and it hasn't gotten a lot of attention from the media," said Dr. Abby Abelson, chair of the Department of Rheumatologic and Immunologic Disease at the Cleveland Clinic.

Lupus causes fibrous tissue and inflammation of internal organs, skin rashes and joint pain. Most of Benlysta's benefit came from relieving muscle inflammation versus organ problems, as measured on a comprehensive checklist of lupus symptoms.

The disease occurs when the body's protector cells, known as antibodies, stop differentiating between foreign invaders, like bacteria, and healthy cells. The cause of this malfunction is not understood.

Currently most patients treat their disease with a variety of drugs that help ease inflammation, including painkillers, steroids and antimalarial drugs — which were first approved for lupus in the 1950s. Many patients say the side effects of those treatments are nearly as uncomfortable as the disease itself. Steroids can cause bone fractures, weight gain and infection.

Wednesday's approval completes a remarkable turnaround for Rockville, Md.,-based Human Genome Sciences which has been developing Benlysta since 1996 and has no other products on the market. The company originally tested Benlysta, known generically as belimumab, as a treatment for rheumatoid arthritis.

When a mid-stage trial in lupus patients failed to meet researchers' goals in 2006, many analysts wrote the drug off and downgraded the company's stock. But when scientists reanalyzed the data they found that the drug helped block the antibodies that cause lupus symptoms in a subset of patients.

Analysts estimate the drug could reach annual sales exceeding $3 billion within five years.

Human Genome Sciences' stock has ballooned in the last two years — from 70 cents to roughly $25 per share — as the company's prospects have improved. Trading in its shares was halted pending the release of the FDA news after the market's close Wednesday. GlaxoSmithKline shares rose $1.36, or 3.5 percent, to $39.94 in extended trading.

Eating fish high in omega-3 fatty acids has been linked to a lower risk of stroke. A new study suggests it's not only how much fish you eat that matters, but how it's prepared.

Attention all diabetics: This article and recall could be of interest to you or someone your know.

How many of us use the internet to check our something healthwise? Everyone now has access to your personal information that you...............

On Thanksgiving week 11 years ago, a regional Environmental Protection Agency boss ordered three of his top agents to rush to a Libby Montana, a remote town at the foot of Cabinet Mountains, on the Canadian border. The team intended to disprove a newspaper's report of hundreds of people dying because of exposure to asbestos from a nearby vermiculite mine.

The EPA experts thought it unbelievable that an environmental accident could destroy so many people in one tiny town and they didn't know about it.

For the most part, the townsfolk themselves had no idea of the scope of the disease that had been killing them for years.

Sure, about one house in three had lost a loved one to lung disease or had another one or two family members trying to stay alive sucking oxygen out of a green tank. But even when victims coughed up blood, the doctors in town blamed it on smoking or asthma, bronchitis or allergies. The word "asbestos" was never mentioned.

In February 2004, the Justice Department launched what it said was the biggest environmental crime prosecution in U.S. history. The indictments charged Grace and seven current or former executives and managers with knowingly endangering the public and Libby mine workers through exposure to asbestos and concealed the information.

It's an incredible story.

Mark Strassmann - 'The American Spirit' series
This is a prime example of how hoplessness and despair, can turn into some good for all.

Lately, my friend has been having some MS issues. She finds herself disconnecting momentarily, from her thought process, and her motor skills. Nothing drastic. For instance, at work, she works as a teller for a credit union, she is hesitating during the task of counting money during transactions. Not a lot, just periodically, for a millisecond.

Her supervisor, a younger person, has raised concerns, but not compassionately. Moving further up the chain, is another younger supervisor, and it seems as though they would like to eliminate her, to get someone a bit younger in to the slot my friend has.Noticing that they were constantly asking her stupid questions about her actions, such as looking in a phone book, for a phone number, the supervisor asks, "What are you doing?".Pretty obvious, shes looking in a phone book.

Starting to worry that her disease was causing her problems, she asked for a meeting with Human Resources, to alert them about the issues. She was assured that there was no need to worry, and there was nothing to be concerned with.

She has never had a problem discussing with anyone, her affliction, and has a few customers that also have MS, and they gravitate towards her, probably feeling more at ease. There is one that is not that well, and its noticeable. That lady always sees my friend for transactions, and after every visit, the younger girls always make flippant comments.

With the feeling that she was soon to be railroaded out of her job, she went through the chain of command,to notify them about her health issues, and she has since received an E mail telling her to no longer discuss her illness with anyone, co worker, or customer alike!If anyone asks ,how she is feeling, she must say fine, and not talk about it. She is to avoid those that seek her out, and avoid discussingit with them.

Its ok for the others she works with to talk about their sex lives, drunken escapades, their pregnancies, whatever.

She can't. Is this discrimination?

I don't know anyone that isn't near exhaustion these days from the constant pressures of just getting through the day, these days.

How to ruin a person's credit is medical debt reported to any credit bureau, and is a tragedy for the whole family.

People do not have very much money in their pockets these days. People should rethink what money is in today's society of the ever changing of wealth to overseas markets, and investors.

The average person should become frugal in place of wealth, for frugality is now popular in this country.

MONEY: It comes in many forms and has been around for over 100,000 years. We could delve into the history, but that would be boring for most of us, including me. Sure, we say we need money to pay the bills, buy food, pay to keep the roof over our head, but do we need money for all of it? What about bartering, planting crops, or raising your own meat. What about doing a little sweating and exchange babysitting or mowing someone's yard, for something you need. Exchange of ideas goes along way, try it. Do you really need that big house with the big mortgage? After all, it is still just a roof over your head. For me, I have always been frugual. So, nothing new for me.

TIME: Everyone that doesn't have much money these days, the one thing you now have on your hands is time. Are you just going to waste it and let time pass you by? I, like everyone else thought of myself as being invincible when I was young. Oh, I have plenty of time for this and that. The phrases you always hear are: I ran out of time.....I don't have enough time.....I've got so much time, I don't know what to do with it.....I don't have the time......I have plenty of time....... Well, for me personally I don't have plenty of time, I thought that I would. Father Time has shortened it with a disease of unknown cause, and no treatment nor cure. Yes, I too had many hopes and dreams unfilled. Yet, I know that there are thousands of others that wear the same shoes, and struggle and fight for another day of TIME. I look upon this as just a minor inconvenience of life. So, I would have to say that TIME is the most valuable for me. If only I hadn't wasted so much time, I wish I could have more time.....

This is a very dangerous situation developing across the country and........