Tag Archives: pressure

Health

5 Ways To Lower Blood Pressure Naturally

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You’ve probably had your blood pressure measured a ton of times at the doctor’s office or even at the dentist. It’s one of those health markers that you likely don’t give a lot of thought to until something’s off, or you have a family history of blood pressure probs.

But it’s worth understanding *before* you have something to worry about—including how to lower high blood pressure if that becomes a health concern for you. Let’s get into it.

So, what exactly is a blood pressure measurement?

Blood pressure, or arterial tension, is the pressure at which the blood flows through the arteries, or the pressure your blood exerts on the walls of your arteries, according to Lauren Munsch Dal Farra, MD, an internal medicine physician, cardiologist and CEO of PALM Health in St. Louis. “When your blood pressure is measured, there are two values, maximum and minimum, expressed by two numbers separated by a slash,” she explains. “For example, 135/85 millimeters of mercury (mmHg) means a maximum pressure of 135 and a minimum pressure of 85.”

The first number in the measurement is also know as systolic blood pressure, which is the pressure in the arteries when the heart beats. The second number is diastolic blood pressure, which is the arterial pressure between beats, says Sameer K. Mehta, MD, a board-certified cardiologist and president of Denver Heart. The difference between the two pressures is known as pulse pressure.

“The exact importance of pulse pressure is still being investigated, though some studies suggest that patients with a wide pulse pressure (greater than 60 mmHg) are at higher risk for heart disease, stroke, or death,” says Dr. Mehta.

What’s a normal blood pressure level?

A “normal” or healthy blood pressure measurement is less than 120/80, Dr. Dal Farra says.

A maximum exceeding 140, or a minimum higher than 90, indicates the person has what’s called hypertension, or high blood pressure. Anything over 180/120 is considered severe hypertension. While hypertension often has no symptoms, over time, it can lead to heart conditions like heart disease and stroke.

“When systolic pressure, or the top number, is between 121 and 139, and the diastolic pressure, or bottom number, is between 81 and 89, we call it prehypertension,” she explains. “Prehypertension means that the person does not have hypertension, but they will in the future unless they correct unhealthy habits.”

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How do you accurately measure blood pressure?

“Blood pressure actually fluctuates a lot over the day, and even a healthy person will at times have the maximum exceeding 160 and the minimum number above 110,” says Dr. Dal Farra. “If they occur on an occasional basis, these values are perfectly normal and do not mean a person has hypertension.”

To gain an accurate understanding of your blood pressure, Dr. Dal Farra recommends using a blood pressure monitor, which you can buy at a pharmacy, to take your blood pressure once to twice daily, at different times of the day, in various circumstances, over a period of three weeks, and averaging the results. Make sure you haven’t smoked, had caffeine, or exercised within 30 minutes of measuring your BP.

Why is a healthy blood pressure level important?

High blood pressure comes from an increase in resistance of the arteries, Dr. Dal Farra says. Your heart has to work harder to get blood to your extremities and vital organs due to this resistance. Over time, this can have negative effects on your body.

“Having high blood pressure increases the risk of major cardiovascular and non-cardiovascular events, including stroke, heart attack, death, and kidney failure,” says Dr. Mehta. “Similarly, controlling hypertension reduces the risk of all of these potential adverse outcomes.”

How can I lower my blood pressure naturally?

Here are the lifestyle changes to make that can help lower your blood pressure without medication.

Practice regular aerobic exercise

Physical activity is the most important lifestyle habit to cultivate to help lower blood pressure. The best exercises for reducing blood pressure (and cholesterol) are aerobic exercises like brisk walking, cycling, or swimming, per studies with hypertensive volunteers. To make an improvement in cardiovascular conditioning, you should aim to do aerobic exercise at least 30 minutes a day, three times a week.

“Although exercise raises your blood pressure while you’re doing it, regular exercise tends to lower it the rest of the time,” Dr. Dal Farra says. “Even without weight loss, regular exercise helps prevent high blood pressure.”

Reduce stress

Over time, low-grade chronic stress can lead to high blood pressure, increased heart rate, and muscle tension. For people who feel stressed, practicing relaxation techniques such as meditation and stretching can be beneficial, Dr. Dal Farra says.

Lose weight if you are medically overweight or obese

Blood pressure rises with body mass index, so for people who are overweight or obese, weight loss is the most effective measure for lowering blood pressure, Dr. Dal Farra says. “Studies suggest that blood pressure can be reduced by 1 mmHg for each one to two pounds lost,” she says. “Losing 20 pounds could drop blood pressure by 5-20 mmHg.”

Aerobic exercise, strength training, and nutrient-rich food plans are the essential components of weight loss, Dr. Dal Farra says. She recommends increasing the consumption of fruits, vegetables, high-fiber foods, and complex carbohydrates and eating less saturated fat and simple sugars.

Eat less salt and more potassium

The American Heart Association suggests limiting sodium to less than 1500 mg a day to prevent hypertension. “Most people can self-regulate and excrete extra salt and water in their urine, so reducing salt does not significantly impact blood pressure,” explains Dr. Dal Farra. “However, reducing salt intake is beneficial for people who are ‘salt-sensitive,’ have an imbalance in their salt and potassium ratios, have congestive heart failure, or have kidney disease.”

Studies suggest that more important than just lowing salt is maintaining the correct salt to potassium ratio, Dr. Dal Farra adds. Having a healthy balance of the two minerals (less salt, more potassium) in the body is crucial to maintaining healthy BP.

She recommends eating a plant-based, whole-food diet high in naturally potassium-rich foods, such as broccoli, spinach, beets, beet greens, tomatoes, tomato sauce, carrots, starchy vegetables such as potatoes and winter squash; lentils and beans (especially white beans and soybeans), fruits like bananas, oranges, cantaloupe, honeydew, apricots, grapefruit, and some dried fruits, such as prunes, raisins, and dates.

Limit your alcohol consumption

While research hasn’t shown alcohol to have a direct tie to blood pressure and heart health, it can contribute to weight gain, which is in turn related adverse heart health outcomes.

“Alcoholic beverages contain a large number of calories that contribute to obesity, so if weight loss is a goal, then alcohol should be limited as much as possible,” Dr. Dal Farra says. It’s recommended that men limit themselves to two drinks per day, and women limit their alcohol consumption to one drink per day, Dr. Dal Farra says.

The bottom line: If you’re concerned about your blood pressure levels, talk to your doctor about what effective lifestyle changes you can make. While there are medications that can help lower BP, there are plenty of natural methods you can try as well.

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World

Twitter Removes Accounts in India Under Pressure from Modi

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NEW DELHI — Twitter held firm when the Indian government demanded last week that the social media platform take down hundreds of accounts that criticized the government for its conduct during protests by angry farmers.

On Wednesday, under threat of prison for its local employees, Twitter relented.

The company, based in San Francisco, said it had permanently blocked over 500 accounts and moved an unspecified number of others from view within India after the government accused them of making inflammatory remarks about Narendra Modi, the country’s prime minister. Twitter said it had acted after the government issued a notice of noncompliance, a move that experts said could put the company’s local employees in danger of spending up to seven years in custody.

In a blog post published on Wednesday, Twitter said it was not taking any action on the accounts that belonged to media organizations, journalists, activists or politicians, saying it did not believe the orders to block them “are consistent with Indian law.” It also said it was exploring its options under local laws and had requested a meeting with a senior government official.

“We remain committed to safeguarding the health of the conversation occurring on Twitter,” it said, “and strongly believe that the tweets should flow.”

The brewing conflict in India offers a particularly stark example of Twitter’s challenge in hewing to its self-proclaimed principles supporting free speech. The platform has been caught in an intensifying debate over the outsize role of social media in politics, and growing demand in many countries to tame that influence.

In the United States, Twitter was thrust into the center of the clash last month after it permanently suspended the account of Donald J. Trump, the former president, for encouraging protests in Washington, D.C., that turned violent. In that case, it exercised its right under U.S. laws that give social platforms the ability to police speech on their services.

But in India, Twitter is blocking accounts at the government’s demand. Controlled by Mr. Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party, the Indian government has become increasingly aggressive at stifling dissent. It has arrested activists and journalists, and pressured media organizations to hew to its line. It has also cut off mobile internet access in troubled areas.

Amid an intensifying rivalry with China, the Indian government has blocked a number of apps owned by Chinese companies, including TikTok, the short video-sharing network best known for its videos of dancing teens and tweens.

The government has also taken a tougher stance against its critics on social media. Under Indian law, Twitter’s India executives could face up to seven years in jail and a fine if the company fails to abide by government orders to remove content that it considers subversive or a threat to public order and national security.

The country’s judiciary has increasingly sided with the government, handing Mr. Modi a series of political victories, lawyers and human rights activists say. In November 2019, India’s Supreme Court ruled in favor of Hindus in a decades-old dispute over a holy site in Ayodhya contested by Muslims. It also deferred lifting restrictions on the internet and movement in the contested Jammu and Kashmir region to a government-run committee.

Digital rights groups say the government’s pressure on Twitter amounts to censorship.

“The power used for banning smartphone apps is the same power that is being used to direct Twitter to take down accounts and order internet shutdowns,” said Apar Gupta, the executive director of the Internet Freedom Foundation.

India is a potentially huge growth market for global internet companies, with its 1.3 billion people, broadening internet access and aspirational middle class. The government’s stronger hand in the business complicates the prospects.

The country ranks No. 5 in terms of requests for Twitter to remove content, according to a company transparency report, after Japan, Russia, South Korea and Turkey. The country sent nearly 5,500 legal demands, including court orders, to block content. It also sent around 5,900 requests for access to the personal information of users between January 2012 and June 2020.

That involvement came to the fore last year when a prominent public interest lawyer, Prashant Bhushan, wrote tweets criticizing the Indian Supreme Court’s role in eroding freedoms in the country. Twitter removed the tweets in question. Lawyers and digital rights advocates said at the time that the company had set a dangerous legal standard. Twitter said it had removed Mr. Bhushan’s tweets in accordance with legal directives.

India’s protesting farmers have opened a new front in the government’s efforts to tame social media.

Mr. Modi has been locked in a monthslong dispute with the country’s farmers over his government’s market-friendly farm laws. Farmers, many from the state of Punjab in the country’s northwest, have set up camp in areas around the capital, New Delhi. In late January, the protests turned violent after farmers entered the city — many on tractors — and in some places clashed with the police.

Last week, Mr. Modi’s government asked Twitter to remove over 1,000 additional accounts related to the protests. It alleged that many were run by overseas sympathizers of the Khalistan movement, an effort that had been more active in previous decades and that called for members of the Sikh religion to break away and form their own country. Some were backed by Pakistan, India’s archrival neighbor, the government alleged.

Twitter initially suspended some of the accounts last week, including the account of The Caravan, a narrative reporting magazine that has been closely covering the demonstrations. It subsequently reinstated the accounts after informing the government that it considered the contents to be acceptable free speech.

The Indian government’s conduct got global attention last week when the pop singer Rihanna retweeted an article about officials shutting off internet access to parts of New Delhi during the farmer protests there. Greta Thunberg, the environmental activist, also tweeted about the protests and shared a link to what she called a tool kit, which included talking points that supported the protesters as well as information about how to join with others with similar sentiment. Mr. Modi’s supporters seized on the link, saying it showed outside forces were supporting the farmers.

Also on Wednesday, the Indian government appeared to be demonstrating to Twitter that the company needs the country more than the other way around. The Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology, the government arm that has been pressuring Twitter to take down material, posted its response to Twitter’s blog post on a competing service in India called Koo.

A virtual meeting between Twitter executives and government officials was underway on Wednesday evening.

Devdutta Mukhopadhyay, a lawyer who works on free-speech issues in India, said Twitter was walking a “delicate balance.”

“For the companies, it is a double bind,” Ms. Mukhopadhyay said. “They want their services to be available in the country, but they also don’t want to be complicit in censorship that doesn’t adhere to international human rights standards by virtue of being arbitrary or disproportionate.”

She said Twitter should push back and “use its clout to show the same amount of courage that it did when it blocked Donald Trump’s account.”

“They should not let it go just because it’s a developing country.”

Mujib Mashal contributed reporting.



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Sports

Kobe Bryant Did NOT Pressure Pilot to Fly Through Dangerous Conditions, Investigators Say

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Breaking News

6:57 AM PT — Kobe Bryant did NOT pressure his helicopter pilot to take any dangerous risks to complete his doomed flight on Jan. 26, investigators say … but the pilot may have put pressure on himself to forge ahead through dangerous conditions to please his famous client.

Pressure from an important client CAN lead pilots to make bad decisions, experts say … but that wasn’t the case with Kobe.

“There was no evidence that Island Express, the air charter broker or the client [Kobe Bryant] placed pressure on the pilot to accept the charter flight request or complete the flight and adverse weather.”

So far, NTSB investigators believe the pilot experienced a condition called Spatial Disorientation in the moments before the crash, which made him think the aircraft was climbing when in fact it was descending. As one investigator put it, “The pilot doesn’t know which way is up.”

In fact, investigators say spatial disorientation is obviously a very dangerous condition — and they want more aircraft operators to implement programs to help identify and prevent pilots from experiencing it during flight.

During the presentation, Vice Chairman Landsberg seemed to point the finger at the pilot — saying he should have recognized the danger the weather presented that day and turned around and landed at Van Nuys airport, which was just a short distance from the crash site.

Investigators noted Kobe and the pilot had a long professional relationship and Kobe trusted him to fly his children even when the NBA star wasn’t present.


NTSB

“This type of relationship that he had with the client can lead to self-induced pressure during the en-route portion of the flight,” investigators say.

But the main takeaway seems to be this … officials believe Ara Zobayan had multiple opportunities to safely land the aircraft BEFORE experiencing spatial disorientation and crashing the aircraft. They also believe he ignored key parts of his training that could have saved the helicopter, even in those final minutes.

Story developing …

The federal agency tasked with investigating the helicopter crash that killed Kobe and Gianna Bryant, along with 7 others, will announce their findings in a Tuesday meeting — including the probable cause of the accident.

National Transportation Safety Board will meet virtually Tuesday — and it will be open to the public, so we’ll live stream the whole thing here.

The NTSB has been working on the case ever since the aircraft — a Sikorsky S-76 helicopter — crashed in Calabasas on Jan 26, 2020.

As we previously reported, the NTSB initially said preliminary findings showed no outward evidence of engine failure — and months into the investigation, officials said the pilot may have been disoriented when the aircraft was caught in deep fog.

Autopsy results showed the pilot, Ara Zobayan, was NOT on alcohol or drugs at the time of the crash … and NTSB investigators said Zobayan’s girlfriend told them he was in great shape before the accident.

The NTSB said in June it found evidence showing Zobayan thought he was ascending over the fog, when in reality, the helicopter was going downward at a high rate of speed.

In addition to revealing the likely cause of the crash, the NTSB is also expected to make flight recommendations for similar aircraft in the hopes of preventing another tragedy.

Along with Kobe and Zobayan, seven others — including Kobe’s daughter, Gianna, and friends Alyssa Altobelli, Keri Altobelli, John Altobelli, Christina Mauser, Payton Chester and Sarah Chester — perished in the Jan. 26, 2020 crash.

#RIP

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Business

Biden administration faces mounting pressure to address SolarWinds breach

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The computer intrusion campaign that has been linked to Russia has hit multiple federal agencies and the private sector, raising concerns about the security of corporate secrets, government emails and other sensitive data. The Trump administration formally pointed the finger at Russia earlier this month after revelations surfaced in December that hackers had put malicious code into a tool published by SolarWinds, a software vendor used by countless government agencies and Fortune 500 businesses.

As Biden officials assume responsibility for investigating the hack campaign, members of Congress, former federal officials and new evidence unearthed by Microsoft this week have added renewed urgency to the search for answers.

“This SolarWinds massive breach concerns all of us, and frankly, is not that surprising, given what we have been finding, which is that the federal government is not well prepared to deal with these kinds of breaches,” Sen. Rob Portman, Republican of Ohio, said at a hearing this week.

In a letter Friday to congressional leaders, Kevin McAleenan, the former acting secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, said it is imperative that Biden’s nominee to lead the department, Alejandro Mayorkas, be swiftly confirmed. The SolarWinds incident, McAleenan wrote, underscores “the growing need for a renewed focus on our nation’s cybersecurity, and in particular the security of our supply chain. In the wake of the SolarWinds breach, DHS needs dedicated and confirmed leadership to work in concert with other government agencies to address this issue immediately — and to ensure we are prepared for potential future attempts.”
The day after Biden was sworn in, a congressional commission on cybersecurity sent a 15-point list of priorities and policy recommendations to the White House, including steps to prevent another government breach.
And Microsoft’s report on Wednesday further highlighted the sophistication of the attackers, estimating that they may have spent an entire month selecting their targets and developing custom code designed to stealthily compromise each victim. SolarWinds was just one mechanism that the adversary used to gain access to networks, an official from the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency said to CNN, emphasizing that other techniques were used to gain access to networks and compromise information as part of long term “intelligence gathering effort.”

Amid growing pressure, the Biden administration is still trying to get up to speed. Efforts by Biden staffers to understand the full extent of the breach were hamstrung before taking office, according to one former senior Homeland Security official.

“There is a concern that things could be worse,” the former official told CNN.

Meanwhile, there are indications that officials have only scratched the surface of the scope and scale, a source familiar with the probe said.

Speaking to reporters Wednesday, White House press secretary Jen Psaki said the administration would “reserve the right to respond at a time and manner of our choosing to any cyberattack,” but that staffers were only “just getting onto their computers.” She declined to answer a question about whether Biden intended to raise the spying issue with Russian President Vladimir Putin.

The computer break-ins will be one focus of a forthcoming presidential briefing by the intelligence community, Psaki added.

When former President Donald Trump finally weighed in on the massive cyberattack in a pair of tweets in December, instead of condemning the attack — or Russia — he downplayed it, criticized the media and baselessly claimed it could have affected US voting machines.
Biden appears willing to grapple with the espionage effort head-on.

“President Biden seems to understand the urgency of this crisis in a way that President Trump did not,” said Sen. Mark Warner of Virginia, the top Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee. “And in his first days, (he) is moving with fitting speed to investigate it, so that we can take steps to remediate its effects, respond appropriately to Russia, and best determine how to deter and prevent attempts of this kind in the future.”

But while there is little disagreement among US officials that the intrusion was severe, opinions about a potential response, and what that would look like, vary.

A US official told CNN that the evidence currently suggests the hack still qualifies as a highly sophisticated foreign intelligence operation and falls short of an act of cyber warfare — a nuanced distinction that will factor into any discussions about reasonable response options.

But that said, there will almost certainly be a cost imposed for this activity, the official added, noting there is a price to be paid for getting caught, even if the attack technically falls within the lines of foreign espionage.

“In all likelihood,” the attack was cyber espionage, former Homeland Security acting Secretary Chad Wolf told CNN. At the time he left office earlier this month — amid an abrupt resignation — the attackers had not taken any action because of their access into these networks, he said.

Gen. Keith Alexander, the former director of the National Security Agency, told CNN that Biden has a range of policy options available to him.

“There are ways you can respond by indicting individuals and by diplomatic and economic measures, which they should do,” Alexander said, “but any response in cyber in the physical space would probably develop into a bigger attack on us, and we’re not prepared to defend against that. The nation is not ready for a cyber engagement of that kind.”

Alexander added that Congress must pass legislation to enable the public and private sectors to share threat information more easily, and to provide legal immunity to companies that share that data.

Biden’s response could also be complicated by a shortage of senior personnel. Biden’s first confirmed Cabinet pick — Avril Haines, the director of national intelligence — acknowledged earlier this week she had not yet received a classified briefing on the hack, underscoring concerns that she and other top Biden officials may already be behind the eight ball due to a difficult transition process.
Though she was sworn in Thursday and indicated that the hack was a top priority, other top intelligence and homeland security positions remain vacant.

“I’ve never seen this level of vacancy. It’s mind boggling, really challenges continuity,” said a DHS official who pointed to CISA as an example of the Trump administration’s leadership disarray. “We will have challenges in replacing some talent.”

Earlier this week, GOP Sen. Josh Hawley blocked quick consideration of Biden’s Homeland Security nominee, leaving the third-largest federal department without confirmed leadership. CISA has been led by career official Brandon Wales since Trump fired Chris Krebs shortly after the election.

Rob Silvers, a partner at the law firm Paul Hastings, is expected to be tapped to lead CISA in the Biden administration, according to a source familiar with the situation. He served as assistant secretary for cyber policy at DHS during the Obama administration, as well as in other senior roles at the department. Silvers did not respond to a request for comment.

“The biggest problem is that you don’t have a confirmed secretary,” the former senior DHS official told CNN. “That really sets the tone and the trajectory of the ability to start getting things done.”

During his Senate confirmation hearing Tuesday, Mayorkas said he was intensely studying the SolarWinds attack as a private citizen. If confirmed, he promised to conduct a thorough review of two CISA cybersecurity programs — Continuous Diagnostics and Mitigation (CDM) and EINSTEIN — to understand if they are sufficient to stop a threat such as SolarWinds, and if not, to explore additional defenses for the federal government.

Wales said CISA “actively engaged with the transition team,” including providing 14 briefings focused on the ongoing cyber incident. “We’re committed to seamlessly integrating new members of the Biden Administration into the Agency, while continuing aggressive efforts to understand and respond to this complex cyber campaign,” he said in a statement to CNN Friday.

Given the length of time that the adversary has had access to some networks, remediation — both short term and long term rebuilding — will be a protracted process, a CISA official told CNN.

CISA already provided ideas to the Biden team to help evolve federal cybersecurity and overcome the challenges identified by the latest incident. Suggestions, the official said, include: funding for CISA to hunt for adversary activity on federal networks; the deployment of new sensors inside federal agencies to detect anomalous activity; and improvements to visibility of the cloud environment, like Office 365.

Officials are also considering creating a civilian program akin to the Pentagon model that helps ensure third party partners are meeting cybersecurity standards, but that would be a longer term endeavor, the official said.

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