People who eat quickly until full are three times more likely to be overweight, a Japanese research indicates. The findings, published in the British Medical Journal, highlight how eating styles, and not just what or how much is eaten, can contribute to an obesity epidemic. For their study, researchers at Osaka University asked more than 3,000 Japanese volunteers aged 30 to 69 about their eating. About half of the men and a little more than half of the women said they ate until full. About 45 per cent of the men and 36 per cent of the women said they ate quickly. Those who said they ate until full and ate quickly were three times more likely to be fat than people in the “not eating until full and not eating quickly” group, the researchers found.

Mouthwashes may stain teeth
Over-the-counter mouthwashes really do kill bad breath, although some may stain the tongue and teeth, at least temporarily, according to the first systematic review of the effectiveness of these products. The findings are published in the Cochrane Library. Bad breath, or halitosis, is caused by the breakdown of bacteria in the mouth, producing foul-smelling sulphur compounds. Antibacterial mouthrinses are widely used to treat bad breath, despite some uncertainty about their effectiveness. Researchers from the ministry of health in Bahrain reviewed five randomly controlled studies that compared various over-the-counter mouthrinses to placebo in a total of 293 adults over the age of 18 with bad breath. They found evidence that compared with placebo and as judged by the human nose, mouth rinses containing antibacterial agents such as chlorhexidine and cetylpyridinium do markedly reduce levels of odor-causing bacteria on the tongue, while those containing chlorine dioxide and zinc neutralize foul-smelling sulfur compounds.

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