Focus On Your Health

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By Newsweek Editors

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Men may revel in their lifelong ability to father children, but the biological clock doesn't tick for women alone. It's well known that as aging sperm cells replicate within a man's body, they can generate mutations that raise the risk of cancers and deformities in children. Now, for the first time, there's evidence that these mutations may cause mental illness, too. Researchers at Columbia, New York University and the Israel Ministry of Health studied 88,000 Israelis and found that men ages 45 to 49 were twice as likely as those under 25 to father schizophrenic offspring. Men over 50 had three times the risk, the researchers report in the Archives of General Psychiatry. The findings suggest that paternal age may account for a fourth of all schizophrenia. IMPOTENCETreat the Symptom, Cure the Problem? Drugs such as Caverject and Viagra can mask erectile dysfunction, but can they restore a man's natural potency? A new study in the journal Adult Urology suggests that one of them may be able to. Canadian and American researchers recruited 70 impotent men to test the long-term effects of Alprostadil, the artery-opening hormone used in Caverject. The volunteers injected the drug into their penises three times a week, while recording their sexual responses in diaries. A surprising 85 percent of the men who completed the yearlong study began to experience erections even when they didn't use the drug. The researchers found evidence that the injections may gradually improve the vascular systems, allowing blood to engorge the penis naturally. Imagine that--a drug that makes itself obsolete. PEDIATRICSDo Breast-Fed Babies Need More Vitamin D? Rickets, a bone-deforming disease from the dark days of the Industrial Revolution, is staging a bit of a comeback. Between 1997 and 1999, Georgia doctors saw six cases of the condition, which is caused by a lack of vitamin D. The vitamin abounds in fortified milk, and our skin cells synthesize it when exposed to sunlight. The afflicted Georgians--all babies 8 to 21 months old--had lived on breast milk for at least six months at some point, and none had gotten enough sunlight to fill the gap. The American Academy of Pediatrics is now studying whether to recommend D supplements for breast-fed babies. For most kids, a daily stroll in the park is enough. EXERCISESmall Pain, Big Gain Polls say three out of four Americans are satisfied with their general health--even though most are, in fact, overweight and only one in three exercises regularly. Maybe they're just scared of tough workouts. Fortunately, two new studies suggest that even moderate exercise can have a big payoff. A Dutch study, published in the journal Nature, finds that almost any extra activity, such as taking the stairs, helps eliminate pounds. A separate study, appearing in The Journal of the American Medical Association, suggests that women who walk even one hour a week reduce their heart-disease risk by half, compared with more sedentary women. The same study finds that higher levels of activity reduce the risk even more.

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