Journalism Research and Random Meanderings

Tuesday, November 23, 2004

Another Happy Chocolate Story: Chocolate fights tooth decay? 

The previous entry got me wondering about other health issues associated with chocolate. My search quickly brought me to this article which is part of a collection of articles about chocolate on the Exploratorium site.

The article says chocolate has a gotten a bad rap. Not only does it not cause some of the health risks it is alleged to create, it may have beneficial effects.

The Exploratorium site is worth an entry of its own but it's not going to get one today. I'm too busy building shelves for the chocolate shipment that's coming.

"Housed within the walls of San Francisco's Palace of Fine Arts, the Exploratorium is a collage of over 650 science, art, and human perception exhibits... Online since 1993, the Exploratorium was one of the first science museums to build a site on the World Wide Web."

Health Help or Risk?

"Chocolate has been said to cause acne and tooth decay, and has a reputation for being a fattening, nutritionless food. On the other hand, chocolate is also known for being everything from an anti-depressant to an aphrodisiac. While there's still much we don't know about chocolate, recent research is helping us better understand how chocolate consumption affects our health.

The good news is that most of the bad effects of eating chocolate are either overstated or entirely false."

Watch this space for the results of my own research into the effects of bathing in chocolate.

PB

The best news heard in months: Chocolate more effective than cough medicine 

I couldn't be happier. This entry should be longer but I feel a little tickle in my throat and have to get to the store.

=======Begin Excerpt==========
Persistent coughs melt away with chocolate - New Scientist: "An ingredient in chocolate may actually be a more effective cough medicine than traditional remedies, a new study suggests.
And not only that, the UK-based research showed that the cocoa-derived compound had none of the side effects associated with standard drug treatments for persistent coughs."

Dame Helena Shovelton, chief executive of the British Lung Foundation, says: "The results of this research sound very promising.”

But she advises that “patients to speak to their family doctor before changing their medication or treating their cough with chocolate", as tempting as that may be.
=======End Excerpt==========