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A friend who I rides along Beach Rd in Melbourne was discharged at 8.00pm on Friday from the Alfred Hospital in Victoria within 48 hours of sustaining the following injuries from a freak bicycle accident on Thursday: Broken Neck, Broken Jaw, Broken nose, L5 Vertebrae Damage, extensive facial grazing.

To top it all off, Colin had a brain contusion which is essentially bruising of the brain, a more significant injury than concussion. So at the very least, you would think that being monitored for the first 48 hours would be the minimum level of care provided.

After making my way yesterday to the reception desk, I was shocked to learn that he was discharged, upon further questioning I discovered I wasn’t the only person in disbelief, another person had actually gone to the ward to check for himself that Colin (the injured) actually had been discharged.

I sometimes wonder how the Victorian Government can spend $50M plus per year staging events like the Melbourne Grand Prix or the new Olympic Park stadium at a cost of $256 million when that money could/can be spent providing more hospital beds for patients like Colin.

But hey, as long as we have high levels of sporting events and stadiums per capita of the population in Melbourne, do we really need to worry about people like Colin or the 1000′s of other patients waiting for surgery or being discharged prematurely from our hospital system.

After a finding by the Food Safety Agency in Germany have found that Red Bull contains 0.4 micrograms of cocaine per litre, Red Bull has been banned from 6 German states.

It is reminiscent of how Coca Cola was also found to contain cocaine at the turn of the 20th Century.
While it is considered to be within safety tolerances, the Federal Ministry of Food, Agriculture and Consumer Protection and Federal Institute for Risk Assessment sought to extend the ban on Red Bull.

Red Bull made a public statement that the levels of cocaine were attributed to the “use of a decocainised coca leaf extract in the product.”
Well the stimulant must come from somewhere apart from the caffeine.

“Decocainised coca leaf extracts are used as flavouring in foodstuffs around the world and are considered to be safe (eg FDA Gras Status, Council of Europe). Red Bull Cola and other foodstuff containing such extracts may therefore be sold legally.”

At this stage Coca Cola has not made any statements whether they use a decocainised coca leaf extract in their products.

Even though the cocaine may be in miniscule quantities, it may be interesting to see whether this level of cocaine is what give Red Bull it’s wings:))

With the origin of the foods country required for Food labelling, the World Health organisation will be ruling on whether the requirement that the “country of origin” is a breach of International trade agreements as alleged by Mexico & Canada.

The protests are based on the effect on sales based on all agricultural products being required to have there country of origin.

I think it it testiment to the fact that sales have been significantly reduced as experienced by Mexico in their Bovine industry that such laws must remain in place and not be undermined by the political process.

Given the proliferation of GM based food as well, those countries who use GM (genetical modified) based agriculture need to be clearly stated on the packaging, similarly countries that have a record of using chemicals in there products such as China with melamine in their baby food products.

Fortunately at the moment Food Standards Australia require the country of origin to be stated.

It’s a said day when politics starts to determine the level of transperancy in the food labelling laws.

Our Melbourne Dog fitness classes were featured in the Herald sun today.

A great shot of Maggie who has become the unofficial Fitstyler Mascot.

So check the Herald Sun for the feature on our Melbourne Dog fitness classes.

106% increase in Australian takeaway food sales from August 1999 to 2009, will the Preventative Health Task Force have any effect?

With the Preventative Health Task Force making recommendations about the banning of junk food advertising during children’s television viewing times, is more needed to change the growth in the consumption of takeaway food?
More so the levels of fat, sugar and salt needs to be addressed in takeaway food guidelines as adding these ingredients is the cheaper option when compared to fresh healthy ingredients.

The latest ABS figures for July show a disturbing trend that takeaway food sales have increased by 105% in 10 years which is interesting given that we have just experienced the GFC.

So will the government initiatives and recommendations at the very least slow done this rate of growth for takeaway food sales in Australia.