A New Orleans woman recently lost an arm to necrotizing fasciitis — the so-called “flesh-eating bacteria” — after injecting a drug called “bath salts,” according to a case study report in the medical journal Orthopedics [1]. She presented with cellulitis, a skin infection, two days after attending a party at which she injected the drug. The infection initially responded to administered antibiotics, but then worsened. The woman lost not only her arm, but her breast and a large portion of her chest wall to amputation. The significant removal of tissue was necessary to prevent the spread of the bacteria.
Is Junk Food Addictive?
June 3, 2010 | by
In a recent paper in Nature Neuroscience, two researchers at the Scripps Research Institute in Florida report that obese rats with extended access to what they deemed “palatable food” — bacon, sausage, cheesecake, pound cake, frosting and chocolate — exhibited compulsive like eating behavior, much like rats with extended access to cocaine or heroin [1]. This compulsive eating meant that they continued eating despite negative ramifications, in this case a flash of light signaling an oncoming electric shock administered to their foot. This lack of control over behavior with known negative consequences is a hallmark of both drug addiction and obesity. The investigators found that just like drug addicted rats, these obese rats had fewer striatal (a region of the forebrain) dopamine D2 receptors; this is responsible for the observed dampening of their neural reward responses to the food, which caused them to continue to eat, seeking that elusive high.
